Loughborough University
Thursday 4 September – Saturday 6 September 2025
The German History Society in the UK and Ireland, which publishes the journal German History, is inviting proposals for its sixteenth Annual Conference. The 2025 conference will be hosted by Loughborough University. The theme for this year’s conference will be “Protest and Populism,” and confirmed keynote speakers addressing this theme include James Brophy, Lyndal Roper and Paul Nolte. Papers and round tables on all topics and periods are welcome.
The Society invites historians of Germany from all parts of the world to submit panel proposals on their research topics in German history broadly conceived, including the history of Germany and the German-speaking world in its broadest global context, from the medieval period to the present day. Panels will last for 90 minutes and should have three speakers and a chair. Each paper should be no longer than 20 minutes.
Proposals for round table format panels, and for panels that address specific methodological problems, problems of source criticism, or problems of public history and education in the field of German history, are welcome, as are proposals for panels whose individual papers cover differing historical periods. These should involve three or four speakers and a chair, and should last 90 minutes, with each paper 10-20 minutes in duration, depending on the number of speakers.
Proposals for individual papers will also be accepted, with the proviso that the conference organisers will seek to group individual papers into groups of three for the purposes of creating panels. Individual papers should last no longer than 20 minutes.
Deadline for submission of proposals: FRIDAY 18 APRIL 2025. The Society will select proposals and inform applicants by mid-May 2025.
Postgraduate students are explicitly encouraged to participate in panels or to submit their own panel proposals or individual papers. The annual conference is intended to offer a friendly, constructive environment in which to present work completed and work in progress to a specialist audience. There will be a conference dinner open to all members.
Please note that panellists/individual presenters will have to bear the costs of the dinner, travel and accommodation themselves. Some bursaries will be available for postgraduate students; those presenting papers will receive preference for funding. Information on applying for postgraduate bursaries is available on the German History Society website: https://www.germanhistorysociety.org/postgraduate-ecr-funding/
The conference is free for members of the German History Society. There will be a modest conference fee of £25 (waged) and £8 (unwaged) for delegates who are not members of the German History Society. For details on how to join the German History Society (which also offers additional benefits, including the right to apply for our various grant schemes, and free subscription to the society’s journal, German History), see http://www.germanhistorysociety.org/membership
Panel proposals: please send one copy of the panel proposal, including title of panel, name of chair, names of speakers and their institutional affiliation (if applicable), overall description of panel, and brief abstracts of the three papers. The entire proposal should be no longer than two pages overall.
Round table proposals/proposals for panels on specific methodological problems, problems of source criticism or problems of public history/education: Rather than including individual abstracts, these should provide a longer overall description, plus name of chair and names of speakers and their institutional affiliation. Again, they should be no longer than two pages overall.
Individual proposals: These should include title of paper, institutional affiliation of the speaker and an abstract. They should be no longer than one page.
All proposals should be sent in electronic format to the Secretary of the German History Society at the following address: [email protected]
A pdf version of the call for papers can be found here: