FROM WAR TO POST-WAR
Reflections on the End of the Second World War
CONFERENCE – UNIVERSITY OF KENT – 6 MAY 2015

2015 is enriched by commemorations of numerous important historical events. This conference focuses on a more recent date, which decisively determined the world’s political and social constitution since: the end of the Second World War in 1945. Around the globe, the transition between war and post-war has challenged people, authorities, societies and political systems alike. Therefore, this conference will reflect on this as a historical ‘caesura’ and question its ‘zero hour’ (Stunde Null) connotation. The aim is to highlight the rather multifaceted development from different historical perspectives, including military, political, cultural, diplomatic, memory, history of science, among others, and discuss the various, sometimes controversial remembrance practices after 70 years. This approach often exposes contradictory developments, which have been generated due to chaos and uncertainty inflicted by the transition from war to post-war: continuity and break, winner and loser, support and exploitation, destruction and rebuilding, health and disease, relief and grief, legal and illegal behaviour or structures, and so on.

This conference will aim to examine these issues, and many more, both on their own merits and as part of broader thematic discussions, the largest of which will centre around a core question: Does the end of a war represent change or continuity?

Doctoral students as well as established scholars not only from history, but also from the wider humanities, are invited to submit an abstract of 300 words maximum, as well as a short CV by 10 April 2015.
Papers are expected to be maximum 20 minutes in length.
Please address proposals and questions to Charlie Hall at ch518@kent.ac.uk