Please join Keyman MTS for day one of our conference "Freedom and Unfreedom in James Baldwin's Istanbul" on May 22, 2026 in Harris 108.
View the full conference program.
Register for day 2.
Visit the conference webpage.
Friday, May 22
2:00pm Opening — İpek Kocaömer Yosmaoğlu and Kenan Behzat Sharpe
2:30 - 3:30 Keynote: Zeynep Oral — “‘Here, in İstanbul, I can breathe freely,’ said My Friend Jimmy”
3:30 - 4:00 Break
4:00 - 5:00 Panel I: Anticolonial Struggles and the Cold War
Martha Biondi — “James Baldwin and Black American International Engagements in the Cold War Era”
Kim Fortuny — “Baldwin’s 1970 Istanbul Interview and the Vietnam War”
5:00 - 5:30 Break
5:30 - 6:30 Panel II: Memory, Presence, and Intellectual Networks in Istanbul
Hüsnü Yeğenoğlu — “James Baldwin’s Erotic Exile: The Distinctive Aura of Istanbul”
Tayler Friar — “Elsewhere, Encounter, and the Afterlife of Baldwin in Istanbul”
7:00 Reception and dinner
Elizabeth Howell
(847) 467-2359
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