Dimensions of Political Ecology Conference

February 22 – 24, 2018

University of Kentucky | Lexington, Kentucky, USA

The University of Kentucky Political Ecology Working Group invites you to participate in the Eighth Annual Dimensions of Political Ecology Conference (DOPE), to be held February 22-24, 2018 in Lexington, Kentucky, USA. DOPE has become a key international forum for students and faculty at all stages of their careers, as well as activists and grassroots community organizations, fostering critical interdisciplinary discussion of urgent topics including: rural social movements; food systems; complexity in ecological and social systems; decolonization, knowledge, and difference; science and technology studies; neoliberal natures and climate justice; and feminist political ecologies, among many others. Over 300 scholars, activists, and environmental professionals attended DOPE 2017, representing dozens of disciplines and more than 90 academic institutions spread across four continents.

We encourage you to contribute to the intellectual vitality and continued success of the conference by organizing a session for DOPE 2018. The conference is open to any topical, theoretical, or methodological framework that brings together scholarship on the ecological dimensions of political, social, and economic research, as well as the social aspects of natural sciences.

This year’s featured speakers include:

• Keynote Speaker: Dr. Farhana Sultana (Syracuse University, Department of Geography and Program for the Advancement of Research on Conflict and Collaboration)
• Welcome Address: Dr. Carolyn Finney (University of Kentucky, Department of Geography)
• Plenary Panel: Dr. Allison Harnish (Albion College, Department of Anthropology and Sociology), Dr. Flora Lu (University of California-Santa Cruz, Department of Environmental Studies), Dr. Sharlene Mollett (University of Toronto-Scarborough, Department of Human Geography and Centre for Critical Development Studies), Dr. Ingrid Nelson (University of Vermont, Department of Geography and Environmental Studies Program)

Call for Organized Sessions

The DOPE Organizers strongly encourage participants to organize their own sessions, or to join sessions organized by other participants, rather than submit individual ‘orphan’ papers. To organize your own session, please:

1. Draft a Call for Papers (CFP). For an idea of the themes and structure of past DOPE Conference sessions, we suggest consulting the program from last year’s conference.
2. Email your CFP to the DOPE Organizers at ukpewg@gmail.com. We will post it to our social media and website. You should also distribute it among your colleagues and to relevant listservs.
3. Conference registration will open on October 1, 2017. All participants in your session must have registered and paid by the final registration deadline (December 1, 2017). As such, we suggest that you establish a session deadline of November 17 or earlier.
4. After you have submitted your call, we will send you a Google Form that you will have to complete. This will confirm the final composition of your panel, including participants’ names, institutions, abstracts (300 word limit), titles, keywords, discussants, organizers, chairs, and other relevant information. We will ask that you be as detailed as possible and send this information by the final registration deadline (December 1, 2017).
    

Guidelines and Suggestions for Session Organizers 

• When planning, remember that each session is 100 minutes long, and we strictly limit organizers to two session slots. 
• While we welcome conventional paper sessions, we also encourage organizers to consider workshops, panel discussions, lightning talks, or other session styles.  
• Each DOPE participant may present in one session and also serve as a discussant or panelist in ONE additional session. We ask that participants limit themselves to two conference activities.  
• Undergraduate students are asked to submit their papers to our Annual Undergraduate Symposium. 

Individual Abstracts

We strongly encourage participants to submit abstracts in response to CFPs being circulated (follow listservs and check our website for new CFPs); however, we will accept individual abstracts. Abstracts submitted to the conference individually rather than in response to specific CFPs will be sorted thematically, and cannot be guaranteed placement in the conference schedule.

Abstracts should be no more than 300 words in length and include a title and three to five keywords. Abstracts should be submitted within the registration form. The abstract submission deadline is December 1, 2017.

Registration

Registration will be linked from our website starting October 1, 2017, and ending December 1, 2017. The conference registration fee is $45 for graduate students and $90 for faculty and non-academics. There is no fee for undergraduate participants. All University of Kentucky students register for free.

Follow us on Twitter at @DOPEUKY or on Facebook as the University of Kentucky Political Ecology Working Group. We also encourage you to visit our website: www.politicalecology.org.

Please send any questions you may have to the DOPE Organizers at ukpewg@gmail.com.