The Material Culture Caucus of the American Studies Association encourages participation in the November 12-15 annual meeting “Creativity Within Revolt” in Baltimore. We invite papers, panels, and alternative forms of presentation that explore expressive, materialized forms of creativity amidst and/or in response to revolt as an American condition of being.  We particularly encourage submissions from museum professionals,artists, public historians, activists, K-12 teachers and others working with material culture outside the traditional structures of the academy, as well as graduate students. 

 Our location in Baltimore requires reflection on its material worlds. As a site of both hegemonic and insurgent landscapes, Baltimore and the surrounding region have been key sites of meaning making through production and consumption of material things. We invite participation for a panel that will address the contemporary and historical material currents and circulations in and around Baltimore, the Chesapeake, and the broader region

We will also sponsor panels on a broad range of topics related to the conference theme, and frequently create panels from individual submissions. Participants may submit individual papers or organized panels for sponsorship. Potential topics include but are not limited to:

• Spatialities,  temporalities, and materialities of revolt
• Material/object based modes of revolt 
• Artistic representations or responses of/to revolution
• Collecting, curating, or archiving objects as a mode of revolt 
• Decolonizing material and spatial systems 
• Decolonizing/decolonial objects and collections
• Indigenous or decolonial material culture praxis 
• Landscapes or material culture as a praxis of revolt
• Craft and making as layered political projects
• Collaborative museum or collection-based projects that consider past, present and future