History and Archives

A Brief History of INCS

In 1985, Richard Stein, who felt that a Western MLA Branch in nineteenth-century studies was needed, invited 50 colleagues to meet and discuss ideas for collaboration. A November 1985 lunch produced a lot of shared interest and led to the planning of a conference for the following April at Scripps College. At its first meeting, the organization was named the Western Association for Nineteenth-Century Interdisciplinary Studies; the following year it became INCS.

The new organization, founded with the help of scholars at UCLA, UCSC, Pomona, and San Jose State, was notable for two distinguishing features: first, the goal was to be interdisciplinary, with conference sessions designed to mix and match different kinds of perspectives rather than focusing on shared single issues; second, all conference presentations would be limited to summaries, with the bulk of time at each session devoted to discussion. The format proved extremely successful, and INCS conferences are noted for stimulating conversation in and out of sessions themselves. The other feature of the group that was initiated in early years—and continues now—is a junior-friendly attitude: graduate students and faculty sit on panels together, and many long-time members mark their professional starts with appearances at INCS.

Originally, INCS was linked to a journal called Romanticism Past and Present, which eventually evolved into Nineteenth-Century Contexts. The group has been hosted by many different institutions and met in many cities: Yale, Berkeley, the University of Oregon, the University of California-Santa Cruz, San Jose State University, Boston University, the University of New Orleans, Marquette University, the University of Missouri-Kansas City, the University of Iowa, Rutgers, the College of William and Mary, George Mason University, Skidmore College, Louisiana State University, the University of Kentucky, the University of Texas at Austin, the University of Virginia, the University of Houston . . . and many others. INCS has also met in international venues (sometimes in collaboration with other organizations), among them Lancaster, Paris, and Venice. The identity of INCS is based on the annual conference. Some regulars, in fact, attend all of them, viewing the conference as an essential annual reconnection—with friends, colleagues, intellectual roots, and ongoing conversations about issues that cannot be raised as easily elsewhere. Enjoy the archives!

Past Conferences

  • Trans(-)Turns in Nineteenth-Century Studies, Miami University of Ohio, March 2024 | Program
  • Nineteenth-Century Movement(s), University of Tennessee, April 2023 | Program
  • Strata, University of Utah, March 2022 | Program
  • Unprecedented Disruptions, The annual INCS conference was cancelled in the pandemic year of 2021. Special Issue of Nineteenth-Century Contexts responding to COVID pandemic, 2021, Vol. 43, No. 5 | Table of Contents
  • The Green Conference, University of Southern California, March 2020 | Program
  • Monuments and Memory, Southern Methodist University, March 2019 | Program
  • Measure and Excess, Roma Tre University, June 2018 | Program
  • Serials, Cycles, Suspensions, San Francisco State University, March 2018 | Program
  • Odd Bodies, Muhlenberg College, March 2017 | Program
  • Natural and Unnatural Histories, Appalachian State University, March 2016 | Program
  • Mobilities, George Institute of Technology, April 2015 | Program
  • Nineteenth-Century Energies, University of Houston, March 2014 | Program
  • Leisure, Enjoyment, and Fun, University of Virginia, March 2013 | Program
  • Picturing the Nineteenth Century, University of Kentucky, March 2012 | Program
  • Speaking Nature, Pitzer College, April 2011 | Program
  • Family/Resemblance, University of Texas-Austin, March 2010 | (Program)
  • The Pursuit of Happiness, Bard College and Skidmore College, April 2009 | Program
  • The Emergence of Human Rights, Marquette University, April 2008 | (Program)
  • “Up-to-Date with a Vengeance”: Nineteenth-Century Science, Technology, and Media, University of Missouri-Kansas City, April 2007 | Program
  • Conflicts, Rutgers University, March 2006 | Program
  • Impurities, Louisiana State University, April 2005 | Program
  • Serious Pleasures, University of Iowa, April 2004 | Program
  • Nineteenth-Century Sex, University of California-Santa Cruz, March 2003 | (Program)
  • Nineteenth-Century Knowledges, George Mason University, April 2002 | (Program)
  • Exhibiting Culture/Displaying Race, University of Oregon, April 2001 | Program
  • Centers and Peripheries, Yale Center for British Art, April 2000 | Program
  • Transatlanticisms, The Ohio State University, April 1999 | Program (cover only)
  • Nineteenth-Century Money and Culture, Loyola University at New Orleans, April 1998 | Program
  • Life and Death, University of California-Berkeley, April 1997 | Program
  • The Exhibition of Culture: Nineteenth-Century Theory and Practice, Yale Center for British Art, April 1996 | Program
  • The Nineteenth-Century City: Global Contexts, Local Productions, University of California-Santa Cruz, April 1995 | (Program)
  • Rethinking “Family Values”: Formations, Transformations, Resistances, Dissolutions, College of William and Mary, April 1994 | Program
  • Colonialism at Home and Abroad, Arizona State University, April 1993 | Program
  • Borders of Culture, Margins of Identity, Loyola University at New Orleans, April 1992 | Program
  • Scenes of Crisis, Sites of Change, Yale Center for British Art, April 1991 | Program
  • The Body and the Body Politic, California State University-Long Beach, March 1990 | Program
  • Production and Consumption: Science, Commerce, Culture, Portland State University, April 1989 | Program
  • Transport, Transition, and Rites of Passage, Northeastern University, April 1988 | Program
  • Revolution, Instability, Change, San Jose State University, April 1987 | Program
  • Representing the Real, Scripps College, March 1986* | Program

International Conferences Co-Sponsored by INCS

  • Ruskin, Venice, and Nineteenth-Century Cultural Travel, Lancaster University and Universita Ca Foscari, Venice, Italy, September 2008 | Poster
  • Nineteenth-Century Worlds, University of Notre Dame London Centre, July 2003 | Program
  • Ways of Seeing: The Nineteenth Century, Nanterre, France, June 2000 | (Program)
  • Nineteenth-Century Religion and the Fragmentation of Culture in Europe and America, Lancaster University, UK, July 1997 | (Program)

If you have any of the missing programs in your files, please send it in pdf to our webmaster so that we can complete our archives.