Central Region Humanities Center Biennial Conference

Call for Proposals: Submit by March 20

Faculty and graduate students are invited to submit paper proposals by March 20, 2026, 11:59 p.m.

Submission Details

Graduate students and early career scholars working in a humanities discipline or public humanities are invited to submit a paper proposal on topics related to the impact and legacy of the Declaration of Independence in Ohio, the Ohio Valley region, or the old Northwest Territory.

The conference will facilitate an exploration and discussion of the history, meaning, and legacy of the Declaration of Independence through academic and public humanities talks and exhibitions by community organizations. It aims to highlight the many ways people and communities from the Central Region realized the sentiments articulated in the Declaration of Independence in the 250 years since 1776. The conference’s main premise is that perseverance in the defense of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness is the shared story of Americans from a variety of backgrounds over multiple generations.

Possible paper topics, drawn from the text of the Declaration of Independence, include but are not limited to:

• “All men are created equal”: oppositions to discrimination since the Revolutionary Age.
• Unalienable rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
• Government by consent.
• Sufferable and insufferable evils, and the safeguards against them.
• The public good, and the laws and government that serve it.
• Migration, naturalization of foreigners, and “the population of these States”.
• An independent judiciary free from arbitrary interventions.
• The ability to petition the government.

Proposal Submission

Please submit your paper proposal to the conference program committee by March 20, 2026, using our submission form.

You will be asked to provide your contact information, professional affiliation, paper title, a 300-word paper abstract, and a 250-word short bio. Decisions about the submissions will be announced by April 15, 2026.

The CRHC has limited funds to support travel to the conference and will consider funding requests by accepted participants.