SFPS Annual Conference 2024; The End(s) of Empire

2024 marks the 70th anniversary of the battle of Dien Ben Phu; this humiliating surrender for the French is often taken to signal the beginning of the end of French colonial occupation. The defeat would be quickly followed by Algerian independence and the return of the pied noirs, which reignited a sense of national shame. Meanwhile 1960 and 1962 respectively marked the end of Belgian colonial occupation on the African continent and the independence of what is today the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi. Yet the sense of an encroaching ending haunts the empires from much earlier, and is perhaps especially marked in France’s vieilles colonies, most acutely after the Haitian Revolution. It is notably explored, for example, by an anxious planter caste in the early nineteenth century, in island colonies founded on enslavement and rocked by the Haitian example. In other words, the sense of an imminent ending, of anxiety, illegitimacy and insecurity, is as old as the colonial mission itself, and is embedded from the very earliest cultural productions right through to the period of decolonisation. More recent developments, from French neocolonialism to Belgium’s ongoing struggle to come to terms with its colonial legacies, tempers any unproblematic sense of an ending, or of a colonial period that can be neatly consigned to the past. This conference expands on these contemporary, yet centuries-old, issues, taking the notion of the End(s) of Empire as a springboard from which to examine more broadly the discipline of Francophone Postcolonial Studies. 

Highlights of this year's conference include:  

Keynotes from Jennifer Yee and Adi Saleem 

A Roundtable discussion commemorating the 35th anniversary of ASCALF and SFPS with Charles Forsdick, Mary Gallagher, Peter Hawkins, Nicki Hitchcott, David Murphy and Dominic Thomas.

A session commemorating the contribution of our recently deceased colleague Celia Britton to Francophone Postcolonial Studies.

Download Programme pdf

To register and pay to attend this conference, please download and complete the registration form as instructed. 

Further information along with the conference programme, can be found on the SFPS webpage: https://sfps.org.uk/forthcoming-events/