2019 ASLH-ASA African Legal History Symposium

Since the early 1990s, the study of the law has been a steadily growing field of African history. It has allowed scholars to uncover previously overlooked sources and voices not always heard in traditional archival material. Over the past 30 years, this direction has deepened our understanding of the way that law refashioned both the physical and social landscapes of Africa.

The fortunate coinciding of the American Society for Legal History (ASLH) and African Studies Association (ASA) annual meetings this November 2019 in Boston was the catalyst for this event. The African Legal History Symposium, to be held on Thursday, November 21, at Boston Park Place Hotel, will present new and exciting research projects by a wide range of global scholars. Using innovative methodological and historiographic strategies, the panelists reveal the dynamic ways that Africans engaged and enacted law from precolonial to postcolonial times. The symposium will include panels that emphasize (1) African voices in the court room, (1) Borders and the question of belonging, (3) Discipline, punishment, and the state, and (4) Decolonization and African legal systems. As organizers, we hope the panels will inspire scholars of both legal history and African history.

The symposium will take place in the White Hill Room of the Boston Park Plaza.  There will be a reception afterwards in the Back Bay Room.  Any one registered for either the ASLH or ASA conference is welcome to register for the symposium, though space is limited to fifty attendees.  Please make sure to register for this free symposium by no later than 5pm, November 15, 2019.

Symposium co-organizers: Charlotte Walker-Said (cwalker-said@jjay.cuny.edu), Erin Braatz (ebraatz@suffolk.edu), Elizabeth Thornberry (thornberry@jhu.edu), and Trina Leah Hogg (trina.hogg@oregonstate.edu).