Call for Papers
The History of Adult Worker Education
University of Huddersfield, 28 November 2015
The SSLH November 2015 conference will be held at the University of Huddersfield on Saturday,
28th. The theme is the History of Adult Worker Education.
The current plan is for the conference to be entirely in plenary with some three keynote
presentations and a larger number of shorter panel contributions. We take the view that since
people cannot be in more than one place at the same time a more collegiate and coherent discussion
is facilitated by a conference organised in plenary. Even so, we urge all who think they can
contribute to offer papers. We intend to create opportunities for everyone to present and possibly to
publish.
Three keynote themes are proposed.
[1] 'Nineteenth-Century' Adult Education: Growth and Necessity;
[2] Independent Working Class and 'Twentieth-Century' Adult Education
[3] The Demise of Adult Education?
Three panels might be constructed for shorter presentations.
The first can deal with any aspect of nineteenth-century adult education. In both keynote and panel
presentations the 'nineteenth century' could be treated as the 'long' century; that is, not ending in
1900 but going on to, say, the First World War.
A similar point can apply to keynote and panel presentations for the second theme: the 'twentieth
century' is best seen for our purposes, perhaps, as a 'short' century, from 1900 or 1908, say, to 1979.
The third panel would deal with the impact of de-industrialisation on adult worker education, not to
mention the changed social, political and technological environment of modern times.
As we see it, the broadest possible view might be taken of 'adult education'. All opportunities for
learning beyond childhood can be taken as adult education and all institutions or activity with a
discernible developmental, psychological mental and/or political impact, can be of interest.
Similarly, while we have a particular interest in adult worker education, we see no good reason for
not taking a very broad view of the category as well as a narrow one; social formations, like all else
of course, are subject to historical change.
We are also interested in the notion of 'independence' as applied to the history of adult education, as
indeed, 'independence' within 'education'.
Please send proposals and abstracts [no more than one side of A4] before the end of February 2015
to john.halstead@blueyonder.co.uk