Knowledge Beyond Boundaries

The conference is open to submissions from all current undergraduate and taught master’s students at LSE, as well as recent alumni of undergraduate and taught master’s programmes, and students from CIVICA partner universities around Europe.

This year’s conference draws on the 2025 Festival theme of visions for the future: how will AI, new technologies and innovation shape our societies? How will we confront the global challenges of climate change and inequality?

We welcome student research from across the social sciences which explores the threats and opportunities of the near and distant future, and interrogates what a better world could look like.

This conference is the ideal forum for you to interrogate how we approach research questions, create and disseminate knowledge, and break down barriers between disciplines. The conference aims to provide a friendly, inclusive space for sharing student research from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, with an emphasis on projects that cross disciplinary boundaries, challenge existing paradigms, and apply new approaches and methods to re-envision what social science research looks like. 

At the conference, you can share work you’ve completed as part of your degree programme, try out new ideas in front of a diverse audience, or collaborate with other students to investigate a research question together.

You can submit an abstract to present a paper, poster, creative show and tell, or performance, either as an individual or part of a collaboration:

• Paper: a 10-minute presentation of original research 

• Poster: a 3-5 minute ‘lightning talk’ presentation accompanied by a poster 

• Creative show and tell: a 10-minute presentation sharing an artefact or item with research significance (e.g., archival material, photograph, object) 

• Performance: an original artistic expression of up to 10 minutes which relates to academic research or study of the social sciences (e.g., drama, spoken word, dance, poetry, music) 

These abstracts can draw upon work you've completed as part of your degree programme, new ideas or collaborations.

Here, research means any scholarly work – it may be informative, critical, or creative. Works in progress are very much encouraged – the conference will be an opportunity to gather useful feedback as you develop your project further.  

Submissions will be organised into themed panels with a range of perspectives, approaches, and ideas represented. You can submit on any social science topic, with preference given to submissions that link their research to this year’s theme: visions for the future. Collaborative submissions are highly encouraged, especially those which bring together researchers with different disciplinary expertise. 

You can find guidance on how to write an abstract here. You can also watch this helpful video, which shares tips and advice on how to write an engaging abstract.

You should submit your abstract here.

The deadline for the submission of abstracts is 23:59 (BST) on Sunday 13 April 2025. You will be contacted about the outcome of your submission on or before Thursday 24 April 2025.