Call for Papers

Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island

June 18-20, 2025

Plenary Speakers: Angelica Duran (Purdue University), Edward MacDonald (UPEI)

 ‘Nonconformist Teaching’ is a multi-disciplinary and international conference which investigates approaches to learning, teaching, and education generally among Puritans, Dissenters and/or Nonconformists, during the Long Reformation, 1500-1800, building on the discussions of “Reading Dissent” at the 2022 conference. Possible topics include

• limits on learning or encouragements to learn,
• ideas about what and how one should read,
• nonconformist models of teaching,
• the early history of children’s literature,
• the portrayal of occasions for learning, formal or otherwise,
• learning in visual culture,
• nonconformity and literacy,
• and in our own time, teaching the nonconformists to 21^st century college and university students across the disciplines.

In conjunction with the L. M. Montgomery Institute at the University of Prince Edward Island, we also invite sessions on the intersection between Montgomery and Bunyan studies. Miscellaneous sessions on your own work and work in progress on any theme relating to the Society’s scope are also encouraged.

Modest travel bursaries (on request via e-mail) are available for postgraduate students whose papers are accepted. Selected papers will form a special issue in the Society’s peer-reviewed journal: Bunyan Studies: The Journal of Reformation and Nonconformist Culture.

Please send a brief biography (100 words), along with a title and brief abstract (250-words) of a 20-minute paper, or for panels (3 x 20 minute papers) – no later than October 15, 2024 – to Shannon Murray: smurray@upei.ca.