Slow Memory COST Action (CA20105) Capstone Conference in Porto, 2-5 July 2025
Organized by Alice Semedo and Isabel Machado Alexandre
From 2021 to 2025, the COST Action “Slow Memory: Transformative Practices for Times of Uneven and Accelerating Change” has brought together over 300 scholars and stakeholders, from over 40 countries, many disciplines and career stages. We have considered how to capture and respond to environmental, economic, and social change through the novel concept of “slow memory”. Our goal has been to trigger a new discovery phase in memory studies by providing a platform for networked, transnational, multidisciplinary research and policy-making that moves beyond the focus on conflict and eventfulness in commemoration. We discussed and shared ideas in many in-person and online meetings, training schools, workshops and writing retreats, producing working papers, a podcast, a virtual exhibition and dozens of scholarly publications. Along the way, we practiced a “slow” form of meeting, resisting the pressures of sped-up academia and engaging with different places and communities, taking walks and visiting sites that helped us develop an understanding at different tempos.
At the Slow Memory Capstone Conference in Porto from 2-5 July 2025, we will gather to take stock of and present what we have learned and to consider how the concept of slow memory can move beyond what we have seen and done in the Action.
The conference will combine scholarly presentations with fascinating visits and workshops, exploring Porto’s underground rivers and bridges, Matosinhos’ historic canning industry sites and the former Petrogal refinery. We will also be treated to a workshop on Conflict Textiles with Roberta Bacic. The meeting will end with an optional excursion on July 5 to Régua, at the heart of the Douro Valley, a place steeped in memory where the terraced vineyards hold centuries of history and tradition.
We invite not only active members of the Action but also others to join us!
In addition to contributions from the Action’s Working Groups on Work, Welfare, Politics, Conflict, Environment and Capacity Building, we welcome a wide range of submissions (including roundtables and panels, individual presentations, workshops, performances, exhibitions, collaborative activities, etc.) through which you conceptualize slow pasts and slow remembering. What insights have been valuable in the COST Action as it draws to a close? How can the concept of slow memory be taken forward in academic research? How do you, and your team, plan to continue working on slow memory? How can academic research better collaborate with non-academic actors (and which ones) to effect change? What new or extended themes and avenues can be explored?
Send your ideas or proposals to jenny.wustenberg@ntu.ac.uk by 31 January 2025. Please send one PDF per proposal that includes:
- Submitter and presenter names, institutions, email addresses
- Title
- Abstract (up to 200 words)
- Bios for participants (up to 100 words each)
- Proposed format for event
- Whether participants are members of the Action (and which Working Group)
Submitters will be notified of outcome by early March 2025. Please note that, in most cases, we cannot fund travel and accommodation. Though there will be no conference fee per se, some conference activities (walking tours, dinners etc.) will incur a cost to the participant.
