Call for Papers: Broadside Day
Saturday 14 February 2026 (deadline for submissions 1 December 2025)
Council Room, Firth Court, University of Sheffield, Western Bank, Sheffield S10 2TN
Organised by the Traditional Song Forum and the Vaughan Williams Memorial Library, in association with the Contemporary Folklore Research Centre, the Broadside Day is the annual one-day conference for people interested in street literature in all its fascinating aspects – broadsides, chap books, songsters, woodcuts, engravings, last dying speeches, catchpennies, wonder-tales, almanacs, fortune tellers, and all kinds of cheap printed material sold to ordinary people in the city streets, at country fairs, and from pedlar’s packs up and down the country in past centuries. The day consists of short papers, presentations, displays, discussions, and is suitable for beginners and experts alike.
We are inviting speakers who may wish to present a 20-minute paper. Suggestions for topics include (but are not restricted to):
- The subjects of the material (songs, stories and news items)
- Street literature collectors
- Authors
- Printers
- Street-sellers
- Printing technique
- The role that street literature played in spreading literacy, propaganda and dissent, and in keeping the poor entertained and informed
For more information contact Steve Roud via [email protected] or Tiffany Hore via [email protected].
Anyone wishing to offer a presentation (20 minutes), please submit a title, synopsis (300 words) and brief biography (100 words), by 1 December 2025, to [email protected]. Remote presentations will be considered.
Book tickets for Broadside Day
