CFP: 2027 Conference “Singing History: ​Interdisciplinary Approaches to Ballads and the Past”

A two-day conference, Singing History: ​Interdisciplinary Approaches to Ballads and the Past, will be held at National Library of Australia, Canberra, November 11–12, 2027. This conference will bring together historians, literary scholars, singers, musicians, musicologists, art historians, folklorists and folk song practitioners, scholars in digital humanities, archivists, librarians, and anyone interested in topics such as, but not limited to:

• ballads, songs, and balladry
• how popular song figures in musicology
• folklore and folk song studies
• singers, songwriters, and the songwriting process
• the history of news, news media, and ‘fake news’
• political history, military history, colonial history
• convict history, convict ballads
• Australian history, Indigenous history, diasporic histories (including the many emigrant groups to Australia)
• music and nation-building, national and sporting anthems
• protest songs
• maritime and shipwreck history, sea shanties
• history of sports and sports songs
• digital history, digital humanities, digital cultural heritage
• archives, Trove, libraries (esp. digitised collections)
• print media, print culture
• visual material culture, broadsides

Please submit abstracts of c.250 words, plus a short bio (100 words) by March 30, 2027 to SingingHistory2027@gmail.com with the subject line “Singing History 2027 Proposal”. Notifications of acceptance will be provided by the end of May.

A limited number of modest travel bursaries will be available for PhD/ECR scholars. If you are interested in applying for a bursary, please include a statement of need with your abstract which details your access to travel funding.