We are delighted to invite proposals for a two-day working symposium dedicated to immigration, displacement, and belonging, with a particular focus on how arts, culture, and storytelling can be effectively used to build community, shift public attitudes, and inform immigration-related policy in the United States.
Art, culture, and storytelling are at the forefront of migration. Across contexts of mobility and displacement, people rely on creative practices to communicate and express emotion to cope, entertain, and generate livelihoods; sustain language and memory; navigate identity; build community; advocate and effect change; and share experiences across cultural difference. Arts and storytelling can also be used to create boundaries, reinforce hierarchies, emphasize differences, and galvanize exclusionary discourses, policies, and laws. Despite their profound influence, these creative dimensions of migration remain largely undervalued, under-resourced, and underrepresented within immigration-related scholarship, social services, and policymaking.
This symposium is hosted by the Institute for Immigration Research (IIR), a multidisciplinary research institute at George Mason University. The IIR is committed to advancing collaborative and publicly engaged approaches to immigration research and practice. This symposium seeks to further that mission by centering arts-based, cultural, and narrative interventions as important sites of knowledge production, advocacy, and policy engagement.
Symposium Structure
The two-day working symposium will take place on the George Mason University, Fairfax, VA campus and will feature workshops along with a series of panels and discussion forums. This is a working symposium, and presentations do not have to be a “finished work.” The goal is to think together, share best practices, identify challenges and gaps, and develop strategies for impactful work at the intersection of immigration and arts.
The symposium will conclude with a dedicated discussion to explore shared priorities, the possible formation of a special interest group, publications, and future collaborations.
Proposal Invitation
We welcome contributions from a wide range of disciplines, fields, and methodological approaches from within and outside academia. We strongly encourage formats that move beyond traditional paper presentation such as workshops, roundtables, listening/viewing sessions, poster or visual presentations, multimedia projects, creative works, and other innovative formats. The focus is on immigration and immigrants living in the United States, though we welcome submissions from those working on immigration topics in other countries. Presentations should engage some aspect(s) of the questions below as they relate to various dimensions of human migration:
- How are people under the broad umbrella of migrants using arts, culture, and storytelling in relationship to belonging, advocacy, and policy?
- Could arts, culture, and storytelling be galvanized to have a greater impact?
- Could research on arts (and research centers) better contribute to advocacy and policymaking?
Individual presentations: Each presentation will be 10 minutes, allowing time for discussion. Please submit a 300-word abstract, a 100-word bio, and contact (name, email address, institution or organization). If you prefer a different format, please indicate that in your submission.
Panel proposals: Three to six individual presenters for a 90-minute time slot. Please submit a 300-word abstract for each presentation, a 100-word bio for each presenter, and contact information for each presenter (name, email address, institution or organization).
Workshops: Likely topics include:
- Bridge-building and peacemaking through storytelling
- Quantitative data as storytelling
- Translating ethnographic research and creative practice for policy makers
If you are interested in leading a workshop on these or other relevant topics, please submit a 300-word abstract, a 100-word bio, and contact information (name, email address, institution or organization).
Abstract Deadline: February 12, 2026
Notification: By March 5, 2026
How to Submit: Email proposal as attachment to iir@gmu.edu. Please write “Spring 2026 Symposium” in the subject line.
Travel Support: Limited travel support may be available. Please indicate in your submission if your participation depends on support.
Questions: IIR Director, Dr. Lisa Gilman (lgilman3@gmu.edu) or IIR Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Dr. Ezgi Benli-Garcia (ebenliga@gmu.edu).
To download a PDF of the call for proposals click, here.
December 18, 2025