Dynamic Objects: Material Connections Across the Globe
Call for Proposals
Submissions due: September 14, 2025 (via email to emergingscholars26@gmail.com)
Symposium dates: April 25-26, 2026
Location: In-person at the University of Delaware, Newark, DE and the Winterthur Museum, Wilmington, DE
Join us at the Emerging Scholars Symposium 2026, Dynamic Objects: Material Connections Across the Globe, where groundbreaking research will meet interdisciplinary dialogue. Dynamic objects challenge traditional narratives; their materials, ecosystems, and human-object relationships transcend static definitions, shaping global histories and futures. This conference brings together scholars who are working on boundary-breaking artifacts that embody fluidity. These can range from practices of making to the circulation of migratory objects or the questions posed by hybrid technologies resisting categorization. We ask how “living” materials evolve through interaction, challenging notions of permanence in trade, ecology, and art. We invite submissions that chart material flows across ecosystems and geographies to reveal hidden connections between local landscapes and global networks. We aim to foster discussions that trace objects in motion — through physical space, memory, or time — to uncover their role in cultural exchange and identity formation. Scholarship that spotlights object agency and that reimagines the power dynamics influencing creators, makers, and users is especially welcome. Selected participants will present their work alongside peers redefining material culture studies, and network with leading scholars at institutions like the Winterthur Museum and the Center for Material Culture Studies (CMCS) at the University of Delaware.
Since 2003, the Emerging Scholars Symposium has been a space for discussing innovative new approaches in material culture studies. It has also provided scholars-in-training with a platform to practice sharing their research publicly and connect with other graduate students engaged in similar work across the country. Graduate students in the American Civilization program at the University of Delaware organized the original event to promote interdisciplinary discussions amongst their peers. Now in its 18th iteration, the symposium continues this tradition by promoting scholarly discourse across boundaries of chronology, medium, methodology, and discipline.
Submissions should align with this event’s commitment to interdisciplinary research, bringing together people of all backgrounds to study objects of any kind, from the material culture of everyday life to fine art and architecture. To that end, we welcome entries centering on underrepresented histories, including the stories of people of color, women, and queer communities. Most importantly, we encourage up-and-coming scholars and emerging museum professionals, makers, and artists to bring a new perspective and an open mind to the objects they study.
Dynamic Objects invites papers that:
- Explore material or spatial connections across ecosystems
- Consider the movement of objects through physical space, memory, or time
- Focus on objects, materials, cultures, or people that problematize boundaries or embody fluidity
- Discuss objects exerting agency over their human users/makers
- Study materials that embody dynamic/shifting relationships between the landscape and global trade/movements/commercial networks
- Study objects that change or alter when interacted with or manipulated
Interested candidates must be currently enrolled in a graduate program (PhD, MA, MS, or MFA) or be a recent PhD grad (grad year May 2025). UD’s CMCS is pleased to provide travel funding to all selected presenters.
To apply, please submit an abstract (250 words max), a CV (2 pages max), and a title for your talk to emergingscholars26@gmail.com by September 14, 2025 End of Day (11:59 PM EDT).
You are also welcome to include up to two relevant images. Confirmed speakers will be asked to prepare a 15-minute presentation and participate in a moderated question-and-answer session. Speakers are required to provide digital images for use in publicity and must submit their final papers and presentations/slide decks prior to the conference.