The conference Resistance and Empire is an event of the research group Empires, Colonialism and Post-Colonial Societies, based at the Institute of Social Sciences of the University of Lisbon. The ICS Empires research group is an interdisciplinary team of historians and anthropologists at different levels of their careers (PhD students, post-doctoral, early and senior researchers) interested in the study of the historical dynamics and contemporary manifestations of the Portuguese imperial experience, with a privileged, though not exclusive, focus on the connected histories of Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Goa, Macau, Timor, San Tomé e Príncipe, Cape Verde, and Guinea Bissau. It aims at investigating transits, shifts, and connections between colonial and post-colonial, imperial and post-imperial, processes in different historical periods and geographical settings. The group places the Portuguese case within a wide global setting both historically and historiographically, while seeking inclusive anthropological perspectives that articulate both European and Non-European agencies, cultures and historicities.

The research group meets regularly to discuss and develop common research activities and organizes seminars and events. The current conference is expression of their active engagement in developing a novel agenda for the study of resistance in the context of colonial and imperial histories. For more details on the group activities see here.