The Law and the Child will focus on law's central role in changing understandings of childhood and children's experiences from the Medieval World through 2000.

Although we do not intend to limit proposals by such examples, we would be interested in papers on among other things selfhood, family, market relations, society and state.  We hope to explore the multiple sources that intersect in the legal construction of childhood and in children's lived legal experiences, including race, class, gender, disability, sexuality, ethnicity, psychology, dependency, agency, citizenship, and (il)legitimacy.  We also hope papers will address topics in both civil and criminal law.  The conference will focus on showcasing the work primarily of junior scholars, including both graduate students and nontenured faculty.  This conference, one of a series begun in 2007, is co-sponsored by the University of Minnesota Law School and History Department, the American Society for Legal History, the Indiana University Maurer School of Law, the Society for the History of Children and Youth, the Childhood and Youth Studies Across the Disciplines IAS Research Collaborative at the University of Minnesota, the University of Pennsylvania Law School and History Department, the University of Illinois College of Law, the University of Michigan Law School, and the University of Chicago Department of History.