category: postcolonial

UPDATE/MAY 23RD 2013

Thu, 23 May 2013 19:00:57 -0400

TYCA-NE 2013 CALL FOR PROPOSALS

October 3-5, 2013

Hyatt Morristown / Morristown, NJ

Program by Bergen Community College

TYCA-NE of the National Council of Teachers of English is currently seeking presentation proposals for its October 2013 Conference in Morristown, NJ. Presentations should focus on some aspect of the TYCA purpose: “the intellectual and pedagogical growth of English teachers and administrators in the two-year college throughout the northeast region.” Our theme for this year’s conference is:

R/evolutions: Addressing Pedagogical and Institutional Change in Higher Education

The TYCA-NE 2013 Conference asks us to define what changes are taking place, to anticipate future changes and to consider collaborative ways to implement changes, not only in our local institutions, but also in our communities.

Join us in New Jersey this year, at the center of our TYCA region. Morristown is known as the seat of the Revolutionary War, a tactical setting chosen by General George Washington as he led his Continental Army to encamp during the harsh winters. For two pivotal winters, the area served the Patriots who helped change America. Today, Washington Headquarters is maintained and preserved for its critical military history.

What kind of changes are you seeing at your institutions, can you see more changes evolving, and how are you addressing them? Proposals may address the following topics:

Pedagogical Changes:

Readiness, Remediation and Redesign
Developmental Acceleration, Supplementation and Contextualization
In Defense of Fiction
Future of Creative Writing
Using Whole Books with Thematic Content
Flipped Classroom
K-12 English Curriculum Changes
HS-College Collaborative Initiatives
Crafting Authentic Writing Experiences
Beyond First Year Writing
Online Teaching and Learning
Effective E-Materials and Resources
Virtual Innovations and Interactions
New Ways to Teach Writing
Transforming Assessment

Institutional Changes:

Serving more students with fewer resources
Changes in current policies and legislation regarding developmental education
Increasing use of adjunct labor
Changes as a result of administration overhaul
Political change and how it affects community colleges
Faculty bargaining and the future of tenure-track positions
Reaching out into the college community and implementing strategies for retention

We are interested in presentation topics that include revolutions in pedagogical thinking, planning and collaboration.

Format Options:

20 minute talk, discussion, or workshop followed by questions and answers;
60 minute full-panel discussion for groups of two or more followed by questions and answers;
Presentations may be combined with other proposals by the Program Planning Committee;
Computers, LCD projectors, wireless connections and on-site tech support will be provided.
Proposal Requirements:

200-250 word abstract elaborating on both the topic and format of the presentation;
50 word title and description for the conference program and schedule;
Type of session (i.e. 20 min workshop…) and specific audio-visual and technical requests;
A brief biography and contact information of each presenter.

TYCA Northeast hopes to foster creativity, collaboration and innovation. While traditional proposals will be accepted, non-traditional presentations are greatly encouraged and may receive priority consideration.

Proposals should be submitted by June 17, 2013. Presenters will be notified of proposal acceptance by June 30, 2013 and must register for the conference by August 31, 2013. Full submission instructions can be found on the conference website at www.tycanortheast.org/. The registration deadline for the conference is September 10, 2013.

Conference Registration Deadline: September 10, 2013

Victorian Saints and Sinners NeMLA Apr. 3-6th, 2014 submission deadline Sept. 30, 2013

Thu, 23 May 2013 13:17:19 -0400

The figure of the prostitute is more than an emblem for mid Victorian religious, social, and sanitary reform; she is emblematic of challenges to the domestic narrative of a morally centered middle class that was at the heart of the British Empire’s self-identity. The prostitute is representative of increased anxieties about miscegenation, sexuality, suffragist movements, and the visibility of women in roles outside the private sphere.
This roundtable seeks participants who interrogate the keen interest of the Victorians in missionary work, philanthropy, and other reform efforts designed to save women from lives of prostitution at home in the heart of the British Empire during the years 1837-1901.Topics of inquiry include but are not limited to:
The role or portrayal of the fallen woman in literature or art (Possible authors include D.G. Rossetti, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Mary Elizabeth Braddon, Rudyard Kipling, Thomas Hardy, Elizabeth Gaskell, George Gissing, Amy Levy)
Portrayals of the Salvation Army or similar movements in novels, short stories, poems, drama, or periodicals
Reform texts (In Darkest England and the Way Out, etc.) and social exposés (the 1861 edition of London Labour and the London Poor, Havelock Ellis, etc.)
The artistic representation of specific reformers and their efforts to end prostitution (such as William Gladstone, the Salvation Army, etc.)
Women writing and campaigning for change around The Woman Question (Frances Power Cobbe, Sarah Stickney Ellis, Annie Besant, Dinah Mullock Craik etc.,)
The Contagious Diseases Acts of 1864, 1866, and 1869 and medical reformers like William Acton and their literary impact
Please submit 250-300 word abstracts, along with a brief biographical statement, in .doc or .docx format to Anna Brecke (annabrecke@my.uri.edu) and Rebekah Greene (rebekah_greene@my.uri.edu).

[UPDATE] Shaping Indian Diaspora edited volume (Abstracts 15th June 2013)

Thu, 23 May 2013 10:53:36 -0400

The Indian diaspora is the largest within the Asian diaspora as the Indian community scattered around the world is over 25 million. Besides, the special features that distinctively shape Indian diaspora make of it an outstanding phenomenon. Its large scale brings together a kaleidoscopic community mirroring from distant places the many regions, languages, cultural heritage, religions and traditions that India comprises. The Indian population residing outside India brightly stand out for their professional success and growing social and economic impact in combination with their idiosyncratic cultural bond with India. Therefore it is not surprising to find out that Indian diaspora is regularly discussed in academic platforms, literary writings, economic forums, government organizations, film and media productions.
The purpose of the present volume is to gather together essays from as diverse backgrounds as possible (linguistics, literature, cultural studies, history, sociology, history of art, film studies, theatre studies, etc.) in order to offer an in-depth study and analysis of the diasporic practices of the Indian communities. The following themes are of interest to the volume:
- the definitional, theoretical and practical frameworks of Indian diasporic strategies.
- historical connotations of Indian diaspora as well as contemporary policy implications.
- the reflections on Indian migration and diaspora in literature and other arts.
- interaction between diasporas and ‘home’ communities.
- rubrics as the diasporic imaginary, diaspora politics, diaspora-homeland relations.
- performance and pedagogy: the Indian body in the classroom.
- food/rituals/customs.
- youth culture/popular culture.
- theatre/performance/visual arts/sports.
- diasporic spaces/places.
- nation, nationalism, cultural policies.
- virtual communities, new media.
- translating/interpreting in the time of war and terrorism.
We seek contributions that approach Indian diaspora from different and varied perspectives. Scholars are invited to engage with this topic in a fruitful dialogue and insightful analysis. Different critical stances and approaches are welcome.
Prospective authors are invited to submit a formal abstract (300-500 words) and a short bio by 15th June 2013. After approval, full papers (3500-6000 words) must be submitted by 1st December 2013. The volume is likely to appear by mid 2014 from a refereed publishing house still to be confirmed. Abstracts and full papers should be sent as attachments as Word files (2003 or 2007 versions) following latest MLA style sheet instructions to: dwivediveena81@gmail.com and cristina.gamez@uco.es

Short Story at MMLA 2013

Wed, 22 May 2013 22:53:38 -0400

This session welcomes critical papers on the short story for the annual MMLA convention. Proposals may be related to the conference theme of Art & Artifice, but it is not necessary.

Please send 250-word abstracts by May 31, 2013, to Katy L. Leedy, Marquette University, katy.leedy@marquette.edu.

The convention will be held November 7-10, 2013, in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. For more information, visit the conference website at http://www.luc.edu/mmla/annualconvention.html.

Assimilation & Vice in American Literature, NeMLA Convention, Harrisburg, PA (April 3-6, 2014)

Wed, 22 May 2013 11:45:55 -0400

We typically think and speak of assimilation not only as a process that results in cultural hybridity but as a process accomplished through hard work and sacrifice. But what role does vice play in this assimilation narrative? Moreover, what do forms of vice tell us about the time period from which the author writes? In speaking of 'vice,' we will not limit ourselves to criminal acts (although we will not exclude these, either); rather, we will also speak of the narrative functionality and potentiality of activities like dancing, gambling, alcohol consumption, and adultery in assimilation stories.
Please send 250-300 word abstracts to Francisco.Delgado@stonybrook.edu.

Deadline: September 30, 2013

Please include with your abstract:
Name and Affiliation
Email address
Postal address
Telephone number
A/V requirements (if any; $10 handling fee with registration)

Interested participants may submit abstracts to more than one NeMLA session; however, panelists can only present one paper (panel or seminar). Convention participants may present a paper at a panel and also present at a creative session or participate in a roundtable. http://www.nemla.org/convention/2014/cfp.html

Intersections and Assemblages: Genders and Sexualities Across Cultures, April 4-5, 2014

Tue, 21 May 2013 15:59:26 -0400

Intersections and Assemblages: Genders and Sexualities Across Cultures
The 10th Biennial Associated Colleges of the South (ACS) Women’s and Gender Studies Conference, April 4-5, 2014
Location: Furman University, Greenville, South Carolina, U.S.A.

The Associated Colleges of the South and Furman University invite papers, panels, and/or proposals for roundtable sessions for the tenth biennial Gender Studies Conference to be held at Furman University, Greenville, SC on April 4th and 5th, 2014.

The theme of the conference recognizes the multiplicity and diversity of scholarly approaches and activism to the long-standing aspiration for the abolition of all forms of inequality based on gender and/or sexuality. It also recognizes and welcomes transnational and cross-cultural or comparative perspectives on gender and sexuality in addition to those in/on the West.

While the intersectionality of categories of race, class, gender, sexual orientation, and other markers of location or positionality has long been established in scholarship, we would like to think that the concept metaphor of ‘assemblages’ can also be useful in looking back and thinking ahead of new, emergent, or utopian forms of solidarity in the many ongoing or past intersectional movements in different locations that may or may not be operating in tandem with one another. What do we see when we map what we do collectively as intellectuals? Are we now at a juncture where we may begin to re-assess and revitalize the much-expanded field or related cluster of fields that constitute Gender Studies? What can we learn about the exercise of and resistance to new, or not-so-new forms of power based in dominant or emerging cultural practices that impact our understanding of gender and sexuality?

Faculty, staff, and students of ACS institutions and beyond are invited to submit 250-300 word abstracts of paper proposals or entire panels in MS Word format along with a short biographical statement to this address: wgsconf2014@furman.edu. The deadline for submissions is October 31st, 2013. Proposals may interpret the theme and the following list of suggested topics broadly:

Diversity in/of Genders and Sexualities
Gender-Queer-Global Intersections
Sexual Inequalities in Neoliberal Times/University
New Normativities of the Future
Affect and Embodiment
Rhetorics of Materiality
Feminist, Queer, Trans Theories: Convergences and Divergences
Gender and Science/Neuroscience
Is Feminism Over? Is there a Fourth Wave?
Gender Pedagogies for Today
Gender and Sport
Genders, Sexualities and Minority Ethnicities
Feminisms and the Financial Crisis
Feminisms and the Environmental Crisis
Ecofeminism
Queer Economics
Gender and Trans(-)media
Postcolonial Feminisms
LGBTQ and the Postcolonial
Margins within Margins
Space and Gender
Bodies Under Religion and/or Law

[UPDATE] “Making Meaning at the End of the World: Apocalyptic Texts” SAMLA Nov. 8-10 Abstracts by 6/7

Tue, 21 May 2013 12:14:37 -0400

SAMLA Convention 2013
November 8-10, 2012
Marriott Atlanta Buckhead Hotel
Atlanta, Georgia 2013

“Making Meaning at the End of the World: Apocalyptic Texts”
Chair: Lynne Simpson, Presbyterian College
Affiliated Group: College English Association

As R.E.M., that great band from Athens, Georgia, famously sang, “It’s the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine.” What is driving our current American obsession with the apocalypse? Papers that explore imagined endings from environmental disasters to zombie invasions are welcome. What do apocalyptic literature, television, and film mean for us culturally, and what might we discern from these often cautionary tales? Please send abstracts of around 500 words to Lynne Simpson at lsimpson@presby.edu by June 7.

From Science to Sensation: Art and Artifice in Wilkie Collins

Tue, 21 May 2013 08:43:29 -0400

From Science to Sensation: Art and Artifice in Wilkie Collins (MMLA November 7-10 2013)

A special session on the relation between science and sensation in the work of Wilkie Collins at the Midwest Modern Language Association 2013 conference that focuses on the theme of Art and Artifice.

Accused of such literary crimes as sensationalism and dilettantism, Collins is too often dismissed as a writer of lighter fare, passed over for studies of the period's more serious writers - like Dickens, for instance, with whom he worked closely as a journalist for Household Words and as a a dramatist. This session puts Collins and his work in the critical spotlight, looking from an interdisplinary perspective at how Collins's writing explored deeper social issues - marriage, sexuality, ethics and science, to name but a few - while catering to his audience's taste for art and artifice.

We are particularly interested in papers that explore Collins's writing that receives less critical attention.

Deadline for abstracts June 14, 2013

Please submit a 300-word proposal and a brief bio to
Professors Elizabeth Anderman and Erika Behrisch Elce:

Erika.Behrisch.Elce@rmc.ca
Elizabeth.Anderman@Colorado.edu

[UPDATE] Energy in Literature

Mon, 20 May 2013 23:18:19 -0400

June 15th, 2013, EDITED ANTHOLOGY
Energy in Literature: Essays on Energy and Its Social and Environmental Implications in Twentieth and Twenty-First Century Literary Texts (edited by Paula A. Farca)

Call for papers on energy and energy sources in twentieth-century and twenty-first century literary texts (any genre, any country). Scholars of all disciplines are encouraged to submit. TrueHeart academic, an independent academic publisher on people and environment, based in Oxford UK, is publishing a series entitled "Bridging Disciplines," and has expressed interest in this project.

Energy in Literature proposes to show connections in literary texts among energy, society, and environment and explore how authors of recent literature present energy sources ranging from coal and oil to solar, wind, nuclear, biofuels, hydropower.

Energy in Literature strives to address the following questions:
What are the most common energy sources in literary texts? What are the environmental, social, political, cultural, and economic ramifications of these energy sources?
How do authors present energy issues such as production, consumption, and conservation? Do new energy sources help or hurt communities? What problems do certain energy sources create or solve and for whom? For instance, how do constructions of dams or the effects of carbon emissions impact communities and families?
How do the authors of literary texts show the balance between people’s need for energy and their duty to preserve the environment? How do authors address pollution problems?
What ethical choices do protagonists of literary texts make about energy?
How do issues of gender, race, ethnicity, and class intersect with energy issues in literary texts?

Contact info:
Dr. Paula Farca (LAIS, Colorado School of Mines)
pfarca@mines.edu
Please submit your abstracts and short biographical notes to pfarca@mines.edu by June 15th 2013. Completed papers will be due in October 15th, 2013.

Atwood's Apocalyptic Visions (8/1/13)

Mon, 20 May 2013 13:39:07 -0400

Cambridge Scholars Publishing has expressed interest in a collection on Margaret Atwood and the theme of the apocalypse (though the collection is not yet under contract).

Please send abstracts of 500-600 words (or completed essays) to Karma Waltonen (kjwaltonen@ucdavis.edu) by August 1, 2013.

(The last novel in the MaddAddam series will debut in September. This book focuses primarily on the story of Adam One and Zeb and resolves the problems of painballer and pigoon threats to the surviving humans and Crakers. Abstracts about what you assume will be the lens through which you read this novel/the trilogy will be considered.)

Special Issue: Feminisms, Academia, Austerity

Mon, 20 May 2013 12:24:11 -0400

JOURNAL OF GENDER STUDIES
Special Issue 2014: Call for Papers

‘Feminisms, Academia, Austerity’
Guest Editors: Helen Davies and Claire O’Callaghan
(JGS Editor: Blu Tirohl)
The current age of austerity is posing significant challenges to feminist scholarship within academia. Recent government funding cuts to higher education are jeopardising the future of research in the arts and humanities more broadly, but the decline of centres, institutes and courses devoted to gender and women’s studies has the potential to threaten the future of feminism in the academy. Retirements and redundancies may signal the end of feminist teaching and research in certain higher education institutions. The dearth of employment opportunities for postgraduates and early career researchers has the potential to elide the next generation of feminist scholars. The increasingly competitive environment of employment in higher education is generating divisions and inequalities which put pressure upon the networks of support, co-operation and community which have been integral to feminist research, teaching and practice
This special issue of the Journal of Gender Studies, ‘Feminisms, Academia, Austerity’, provides a multi-disciplinary space to critically investigate such concerns from a range of perspectives. In what ways are these changes affecting our work and lives? What potential is there to resist these narratives of decline? How might feminist teaching, research, theory and activism engage with and combat such challenges? The guest editors invite articles of 5000-7000 words in length which might address, but are not limited to, the following themes:
• The impact of the age of austerity upon women’s and feminist writing, art, performance, scholarship, theory, teaching and activism;
• Resistance to narratives of decline in the age of austerity;
• The challenges posed to ‘sisterhood’ in the current academic environment;
• Bridging the gap between postgraduate/early career feminist researchers and established scholars;
• Postcolonial, queer, and/or differently abled responses to the age of austerity in feminist research;
• Historical, political and sociological responses to the age of austerity in feminist research;
• Exploring alternative futures for feminism in the academy;
• Strategies of resistance to the marginalisation of feminist research;
• Encouraging the next generation of feminist scholars.

The deadline for submissions is 30th June 2013. Please see the Journal of Gender Studies’ guidance for authors at http://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cjgs20/current
If you have any queries, please contact Helen Davies (Helen.Davies@tees.ac.uk) and Claire O’Callaghan (cfo3@le.ac.uk)

[UPDATE: Deadline Approaching]

Mon, 20 May 2013 12:20:38 -0400

CFP: Media Spaces of Gender and Sexuality
Media Fields Journal
University of California, Santa Barbara

This issue of Media Fields investigates the connections between media, space, gender, and sexuality, seeking conversations that center on these interrelations and negotiations. We invite papers that raise questions of how media spaces construct gender, and how gender, in turn, constructs media spaces; how spaces condition and are conditioned by gender performances and sexual practices; and how gender legibility limits (or allows) access to various media spaces.

Film and media scholarship historically came of age through its study of the relationship between gender, sexuality, and media. Much has been written about the status of women as objects of the cinematic gaze, as well as about the status of female and queer-identified subjects as media producers. Yet in more recent times, issues of gender and sexuality have once again become marginalized in academic discourse, revealing the need for new explorations that coincide with the impact of the “spatial turn.” In this age of conflict, dissent, surveillance, and migration—when the study of media is often also the study of the precariousness and dynamism of the spatial—it is particularly important to trace the interconnections between space, media, and gender.

We are inspired by the work of those film and media scholars who have explored such interconnections. Lynn Spigel’s seminal book on the gendered discourse surrounding domestic television viewing provides us with one useful example, as does Lucas Hilderbrand’s forthcoming work on the culture of gay bars after Stonewall. While some scholars like Spigel and Hilderbrand have studied the connections between gender, space, and media in their own work, fewer media studies journals have made this topic a primary focus. As a result, we seek scholarship that deals with space in a range of ways: essays might discuss online spaces that allow for specific negotiations of gender or sexuality, or with gender embodiment in physical spaces of various scales, from the very local (the living room, for example) to the global.

Essays might also draw upon feminist interventions into Marxist/historical materialist theories of space, as well as engaging the intersections between gender, race, and class. These important intersections exceed the label, “identity politics”—a label that we feel is now often deployed in order to debunk the continued relevance of gender and sexuality to any scholarly conversation. While we do indeed call for political approaches to gender and space—essays informed by the agendas of feminist and queer activism—we stress that gender and sexuality are not merely areas of special interest, but are instead structuring principles of discrimination that permeate our lives on a number of registers.

Thus, our approach is multivalent. We invite submissions that consider this complexity, possibly addressing the following topics:

--Transnational Queer and Feminist Media: How are flows of bodies, labor, capital, and images gendered and sexualized?

--Queering Questions of Scale: How does heterosexism delimit notions of nation, state, and the transnational?

--Gendered Spaces of Conflict and Dissent: How do media contribute to the gendering of the different spaces of war and dissent as well as of the subjects who are involved?

--Gender, Sexuality, and Online Spaces: How are social media practices and spaces gendered and sexualized?

--Queer/Feminist Gaming: representations of gendered and sexualized spaces in mainstream video games, gendered geographies of video game production, gendered spaces of gaming culture

--Spaces of Surveillance: How is surveillance fundamentally gendered, sexualized, and spatialized? How does voyeurism continue to bolster certain experiences of space and place?

--Gendered Infrastructures: How are media infrastructures gendered, and why does this matter?

--Gender, Sexuality and Access: How do gender and its legibility (e.g., normativity) result in certain types of access to particular spaces?

We are looking for essays of 1500-2500 words, digital art projects, and audio or video interviews exploring the relationship between gender, sexuality, and space. We encourage approaches to this topic from scholars in cinema and media studies, anthropology, architecture, art and art history, communication, ecology, geography, literature, musicology, sociology, and other relevant fields.

Feel free to contact issue co-editors, Hannah Goodwin and Lindsay Palmer, with proposals and inquiries.
Email submissions to submissions@mediafieldsjournal.org by May 30th, 2013.

The Arts of Travel; MMLA, Milwaukee, Nov 7-10, 2013

Mon, 20 May 2013 08:55:28 -0400

One might consider traveling well to be an art in and of itself. While there is a lot of logistical planning, organizational skill, and practical preparation that must go into a trip, the art of traveling well--one might argue--is the ability to adapt, even to thrive, when the planning fails. This panel invites papers that consider traveling from perspectives that move beyond the merely practical. Does the art of traveling vary by location? By time period? By cultural perspective? What kinds of arts and artifacts are encountered by travelers, and what qualities are necessary to appreciate them? Is it possible to understand "foreign" arts as a traveler, or must one remain forever distanced from art objects that are produced by a culture that is not one's own? What might be the definition of an "artificial" traveler or an "artificial" destination or an "artificial" artwork? What are the implications of seeing a replica in a museum, for example, instead of the "real thing"? Why do so many people consider it an artificial or inauthentic experience to go on a packaged tour, but not so if they strike out on their own with a guidebook and itinerary? This panel welcomes papers on any time period and any travel destination, so long as they frame the process or product of travel through the lens of art and/or artifice.

MMLA Conference theme this year is Art and Artifice. Papers are welcome from scholars at all levels and focusing on any time period.

Inquiries and proposals should be directed to Professor Andrea Kaston Tange via email (akastont@emich.edu). Please indicate name, institutional affiliation, and rank on your proposal or in your email. Please send 500-word proposals by May 31, 2013.

Epistemologies of Spaces and Places (Theory of Science thematic section) - abstracts due June 20

Mon, 20 May 2013 08:23:00 -0400

/// Epistemologies of Spaces and Places ///

Theory of Science, a journal for interdisciplinary studies of science, seeks research articles, review articles and book reviews focusing on epistemologies of spaces and places.

Spatial, or geographical turn in the history and philosophy of science, advocated by scholars such as Steven Shapin or David Livingstone, constitutes one of the possible orientations by means of which researchers attempt to overcome more traditional ways of inquiry that have perceived scientific knowledge as universal by definition. The spatial turn echoes concerns raised most notably in feminism that had born arguments in favor of modes of knowing "located in body and space" (Dorothy Smith) and brought Donna Haraway to develop the notions of situated knowledges and positioned rationality. Likewise, postcolonial studies have focused on intersections of place and knowledge since the founding works of Edward Said on Orientalism and traveling theory. The ethnographic studies of science, exemplified by Bruno Latour, found the seemingly universal space of scientific knowledge constructed in laboratories and by a network of immutable mobiles. The questions raised by the spatial turn lead us even beyond Clifford Geertz assertion that most knowledge is inherently local. While we have become accustomed to speak of historical epistemology or changing epistemes, can we identify spatial or geopolitical arrangements and boundaries that would accord space a role similar to that of time in the production, evaluation and dissemination of knowledge? Is geo-epistemology (Claudio Carnapo) a warranted concept? Do disciplines in human sciences and in natural science differ fundamentally by their spatial embedment? How can we analyze the ties between spaces, places and knowledges without making recourse to mere styles and lingering preconceptions of uneven development?

For a special thematic section of the journal, we seek additional texts that deal with the epistemologies of spaces and places conceptually or empirically. The theme is opened to various spatial scales, from architectural setting to geopolitical considerations. Contributions focusing on either natural, social or human sciences are welcomed.

Please, send abstracts or prior queries by 20th June 2013 to teorievedy@flu.cas.cz; full papers will be expected by 20th August.

Theory of Science is a peer-reviewed academic journal founded in 1969. Currently, the journal is indexed in databases such as ERIH, CEJSH, EBSCO. For more information, visit http://teorievedy.flu.cas.cz/ .

Adoption: Crossing Boundaries, March 27-30 (due July 15); Florida State Univ.

Sun, 19 May 2013 17:28:39 -0400

Call for Proposals

ASAC's biennial conferences feature stories and histories of adoption as explored by writers, artists, and scholars across the disciplines, especially the humanities. Adoptions and the lives of adoptees always involve crossing boundaries, whether the boundaries of families, the boundaries of races, the boundaries of nations, the boundaries of aboriginal peoples and others, the boundaries of communities, the boundaries of law, or all of these borders. This conference takes up these themes and threads, and also encourages other kinds of boundary-crossing—boundaries between disciplines; between adoptees, birthparents, adoptive parents, and social workers; boundaries between creative writers, scholars, and activists. And we extend our topic across other boundaries by considering similar issues with regard to foster care and assisted reproduction.
The conference includes academic work from a wide range of scholarly disciplines and areas—literature, film and popular culture and performance studies, cultural studies, history, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, religion, political science, law, women’s and gender studies— as well as film, creative writing, graphic art, music, drama, or productions in other media. We encourage interdisciplinary panels, presentations, and productions.
Keynote speakers:

Jackie Kay, Professor of Creative Writing, Newcastle University (UK), Scottish-Nigerian adoptee, author of the groundbreaking volume of poetry The Adoption Papers, the adoption memoir Red Dust Road, and many other works of poetry, prose, and drama.

Laura Briggs, Professor and Chair of Women, Gender, Sexuality Studies, University of Massachusetts Amherst and author of Somebody’s Children: The Politics of Transracial and Transnational Adoption (Duke UP, 2012), the winner of the James A. Rawley Prize from the Organization of American Historians

Featured films will include: Somewhere Between (2012), a documentary which follows four teenage girls adopted from China; Resilience (2009), which shows a Korean birthmother who searches for and meets her son in the US; and Any Day Now, (2012) a fictionalized account of a gay couple’s attempt to adopt a special-needs child they have fostered (the script is based in part on events in Florida, and we hope to have some of the parties at the conference.)

We invite proposals for papers and panels that:
● Analyze literary, cinematic, dramatic, musical, visual, dance, popular culture, or performance art representations of boundary crossing in adoption, foster care, or other nonstandard means of family formation or child care, and boundary crossing in narratives of the lives of adoptees, adoptive parents, and/or birthparents
● Study boundary-crossing in adoption and other reproductive, family and caring structures in historical, anthropological, philosophical, sociological, legal, religious, political, gendered, LGBTQ, and/or psychological perspectives.
● Promote dialogue between people positioned differently with regard to adoption because of their life experience, profession, and/or discipline.
We expect that most papers will run about 20 minutes and that panel proposals should allow some time for discussion (assuming that panels will be about an hour and fifteen minutes ).
We also invite creative presentations (writing, film, drama, graphic arts, other media, etc.) on border crossing in relation to adoption. Writing samples should ordinarily be less than 10 pages.
Please send 200-word proposals for papers or samples of creative work, a cv or resume along with your proposal, and links if you are working in visual or multimedia, to asac2014@fsu.edu. Give your proposal, cv, and/or writing sample a title that includes your last name.

Proposal deadline July 15, 2013

Applications from graduate students interested in submitting papers are invited for a travel grant award of up to $500. Awards will be given based on quality of paper submitted by July 15 (not just 200-word proposal), cost of travel, contribution of papers to scope of conference, and amount we have available.

A conference website is under development and we will soon post information about registration, accommodation, and travel. For additional information, contact Eric Walker at ewalker@fsu.edu

Conference program planning committee includes:

Eric Walker, Department of English, Florida State University, co-chair
Marianne Novy, University of Pittsburgh, co-chair
Karen Balcom, McMaster University
Emily Hipchen, University of West Georgia
Margaret Homans, Yale University

45th Annual Convention, Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA); April 3-6, 2014; Harrisburg, PA; Susquehanna University

Sun, 19 May 2013 17:10:47 -0400

Title of the Panel: Adaptations as (Re)Creations of Discourses in Latin American Theater and Cinema

Description: A recurrent trend in contemporary Latin American theater and cinema is the adaptation of myths, hybrid texts as chronicles, and fictional texts as novels and short stories. By focusing on the “new” reading that authors do of the adapted texts through the use of the theatrical and cinematographic features, their adaptations offer new meanings to the adapted texts and constitute original texts. Following Linda Hutcheon’s approach to adaptation proposed in her book A Theory of Adaptation (2006), this panel explores the intertextuality among hybrid and fictional texts, and their adaptations as plays and films. Hutcheon states adaptation, as a form of intertextuality, involves not just formal relations of texts such as different modes of engagement with the story, shifts of mediums or frames (from telling to showing), but also implies political, social, pedagogical or personal reasons that compel the adaptor to contest, deconstruct or give a new meaning to the adapted text. By discussing how, why and for what playwrights and filmmakers deal and position themselves in the process and in the creation of the adaptation, the panel will visualize the adapted works as original works into new social, cultural and aesthetic conventions. This panel welcomes critical works on individual or a set of theatrical and/or cinematographic creations that stand out in other texts.

Please send 250 word abstracts in English, Spanish or Portuguese to María Magdalena Olivares mmolivareshenriquez@smcm.edu by Sept. 30, 2013.

The Literary Legacy of Revelations

Sat, 18 May 2013 15:17:07 -0400

The Literary Legacy of Revelations

45th Annual Convention, Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)
April 3-6, 2014
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Host: Susquehanna University

Always a prominent text in Western culture, the book of Revelations has been in the spotlight during the past year in particular due to the 2012 publication of Elaine Pagel’s Revelations: Visions, Prophecy, and Politics in the Book of Revelation. Pagel, like many before her, recognizes the largely political nature of Revelations as she considers it from a historical and typological perspective.

This seminar will explore how Revelations has been either commented on or alluded to in works by prominent literary authors coming from a variety of historical and cultural contexts. I want to look at the book of Revelations and its wide-ranging literary legacy with a specific focus on the political or environmental significance of the texts that have made use of it. How have writers altered, adapted, challenged, or capitalized on Revelations?

The influence of Revelations is evident in countless literary works from the Middle Ages to the present day. Writers considered in this seminar might include, but certainly are not limited to, Dante Alighieri, Edmund Spencer, John Milton, the English Romantics, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Christina Rossetti, Gerard Manley Hopkins, W. B. Yeats, Flannery O’Connor, William Faulkner, D. H. Lawrence, James Baldwin, Ngugi Wa Thiong’o, Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman, and Tim LaHaye. Ideally, this seminar will include papers representing a variety of writers from different countries, time-periods, ethnicities, and classes; and representing different religious and ideological perspectives.

For the seminar format, participants will submit 10-15 page papers early in 2014. Papers will be circulated and read by all participants. During the two-hour seminar, each presenter will give a five-minute or so presentation—please, no AV. The rest of the seminar will be focused on a structured discussion between all participants.

Please send a 200 word abstract and a one page CV to Todd Williams at williams@kutztown.edu by September 30, 2013.

Deadline: September 30, 2013
Please include with your abstract and CV:
Name and Affiliation
Email address
Postal address
Telephone number

The 2014 NeMLA convention continues the Association's tradition of sharing innovative scholarship in an engaging and generative location. This capitol city set on the Susquehanna River is known for its vibrant restaurant scene, historical sites, the National Civil War museum, and nearby Amish Country, antique shops and Hershey Park. NeMLA has arranged low hotel rates of $104-$124.

The 2014 event will include guest speakers, literary readings, professional events, and workshops. A reading by George Saunders will open the Convention. His 2013 collection of short fiction, The Tenth of December, has been acclaimed by the New York Times as “the best book you’ll read this year.” The Keynote speaker will be David Staller of Project Shaw.

Literature and Medicine in the Eighteenth Century: NEMLA 2014, Harrisburg, Pennsylvania; April 3-6

Sat, 18 May 2013 06:13:57 -0400

Literature and Medicine in the Eighteenth Century
The eighteenth century has been described as an era of increasing medicalization. Bodies became the subject of extensive political intervention, from mass inoculations to centralized responses to epidemics. For Michel Foucault, medicalization promoted disciplinary control and surveillance into the fabric of the body. With the expansion of print, lay people took responsibility for managing their health through their own knowledge of physiology and medicine. Self-regimen or preventative medicine, based on Hippocratic and Galenic principles, was contingent on the patient’s knowledge of their own lifestyle and constitution. E.C. Spary writes, “the body is central to the transformations of eighteenth-century medical historiography. Once the unproblematic subject of medical interventions, it has become the site of lived experience, a palimpsest on which medical, political, and personal authority are inscribed, and a key locus for the fashioning of identity, subjectivity, and selfhood.” Therefore, the imbrication of medical language and literary composition provide a useful frame for understanding the articulation of the body as a sign. This panel explores the complex intersections between literature and eighteenth century medical discourse, and considers their relation to our understanding of gender studies, gender politics, science, medicine, and literature.

This panel seeks papers that explore the complex intersections between eighteenth-century literature and medical discourse. How does the imbrication of medical language and literary composition provide a frame for understanding the articulation of the body as a sign? How has medical discourse influenced the fashioning of identity, subjectivity, and selfhood? Please submit 300-400 word abstracts and brief biographical statements to Kathleen Alves at kalves@qcc.cuny.edu by September 30.

Re-Imagining Communities and Civil Society Conference [UPDATE: Deadline Extended]

Fri, 17 May 2013 15:23:52 -0400

The aim of this conference is to explore what role social movements, artists, intellectuals, writers, cultural institutions and others play in shaping our ideas of community, civil society and the connections between the two. We are especially interested in papers and panels that examine how the creation and strengthening of ties between communities and civil society promote democratization in Europe and/or Latin America. However, we welcome abstracts on any aspect of community and civil society.

Civil society is the nongovernmental space of associational life. As Philip Oxhorn, author of "Organizing Civil Society," explains, civil society is composed of groups that “simultaneously resist subordination to the state and demand inclusion in national political structures” (252). These groups can be grassroots political associations, church groups, bowling leagues, book clubs, etc. While academics in the humanities are familiar with the concept of “community,” the term “civil society” has largely remained in the realm of the social sciences. This conference seeks to expand the boundaries of the terms and to explore relationships of communities and civil society by considering the following topics:

• What role do civil-society organizations play in the formation of (artistic, ethnic, sexual, local, etc.) communities?
• Who sponsors civil societies? How are communities and civil-society organizations funded and maintained?
• How have philosophers, artists and producers of culture defined the concepts of community, civil society, and the interplay between the two? What is/has been the role of culture in shaping and bringing together communities and civil society?
• How do cultural institutions (academies, literary and artistic prizes, cultural festivals) contribute to civil society? As civil society organizations, what role do cultural institutions play in the creation of new communities or preserving communities? How is a community shaped by its inclusion or exclusion from canonical/ mainstream/ recognized cultural events sponsored by cultural institutions? What are the relationships between cultural institutions and the communities they are intended to serve? How do communities and civil society define cultural value?
• What has been, and what is likely to be, the role of both mainstream and alternative news media in shaping our understanding of civil society? Do social media strengthen civil societies and empower organized societal actors to assert claims vis-à-vis the state and corporations? How does this vary within and between societies in the Americas and Europe?
• What effect has the discourse of civil society had on language policy, linguistic rights, language revitalization, and identity? What are the roles of marginalized speech communities in the construction of a civil society?
• Are think-tanks part of civil society in Europe and the Americas? What role do they play, and what role should they play, in efforts to make the term “civil society” known to a broader cross-section of society, for example through University courses and programs? What role do think tanks play in organizing and shaping the claims-making by collective actors toward the state and corporations?
• How do artists, writers, and other cultural producers shape community or a civil society into arenas in which non-citizens can participate?
• Can civil society usher in new forms of art and/or enable artists to reclaim public spaces for social action? Can forging a connection between civil society and communities also bridge the space between politics and aesthetics?
• How can we create forms of collective action that are attentive to class and racial differences by forging connections between local communities and civil society?
• How do NGOs help enrich civil society? How can NGOs mediate the relationship between community and government?
• Has the discourse of culture been displaced by the discourse of civil society (David Chandler 2010), particularly in multiethnic communities in Latin America?

October 25-27, 2013

Languages of the conference: English, French and Spanish.

Papers will be considered for publication

Guelph is 80 km from Toronto and 50 km from the Toronto airport. Greyhound departs almost every other hour from Toronto to the University of Guelph campus.

Keynote Speakers: James F. English, John Welsh Centennial Professor of English and Director of the Penn Humanities Forum, Judith Adler Hellman, Professor, Coordinator of Latin American and Caribbean Studies Program, York University, Philip Oxhorn, Professor, Founding Director of the Institute for the Study of International Development, McGill University.

A 500 word abstract of individual papers or sessions should be sent by June 30, 2013 to the conference committee at gyovanov@uoguelph.ca

[UPDATE] Keynote Speaker Jasbir Puar - 'Containers' Graduate Student Conference, NYC, October 18th & 19th,

Fri, 17 May 2013 12:10:01 -0400

Call for Papers
4th Annual Graduate Student Conference
Stony Brook University, The State University of New York
Cultural Analysis and Theory Department

Stony Brook Manhattan
October 18th & 19th, 2013

Keynote Lecture to be delivered by:
Jasbir Puar (Rutgers University)

“Containers”

Containers have a dual function - to store and to deliver - and thus an inherent provisionality. Unlike a boundary, a container denotes some kind of material object or thing. Both may imply delimitation, but while boundaries suggest an abstract notion of crossing, breaking and transgressing, containers draw attention to what is being contained, the tensile strength needed to hold it, the function of the lid and the physical force needed to unfasten that lid. The question of containment is also inherently political: it suggests a potential volatility, ephemerality or threat of the matter contained. We propose four main conceptual frames for thinking what containers are and what they do: (1) the contained object (2) the uncontainable/immaterial ephemera (3) the container’s (im)materiality and design (4) the temporality of storage and delivery. We propose that these frames offer new and unforeseen critical paradigms to certain disciplinary and theoretical perspectives.

1) Our first frame prompts inquiry into the material conditions of the physical substance filling the container’s volumetric space. Object and thing theory, as well as new materialism, provide a range of differing analytical tools for thinking through the contained substance’s materiality, its agency and its structural integrity. Thinking of the contained in terms of content naturally draws attention to the historical conditions affecting that content, such that processes of technological development, modes of consumption and distribution affect the materiality of the contained object.

2) Containers are not only material structures containing solids or fluids, but also immaterial forms that contain ephemeral substances or concepts. Adorno, for instance, postulated thought as the attempt to contain its object via the identity of the concept. Likewise, affect theory conceives of language and representation more generally in terms of its attempt to contain experience; meanwhile, affect itself exceeds such containment. Additionally, the recent turn towards questions of bodies and embodiment underscores the inherently unstable opposition of material and immaterial phenomena: the body is, at least in part, socially produced as a container of both material and immaterial flows in a way that destabilizes the distinction between the two.

3) Containers are designed for the specific function of holding in something; they must be strong and durable. And yet, the container’s design also evokes the aesthetic mode. Among other fields, film and media studies have increasingly broached design studies in exploring the aesthetic dimensions of the consoles, housings, and packaging of technological components and audio/visual media. As Lynn Spigel reminds us, a television is equally important as a piece of furniture in the aesthetic production of the domestic space.

4) The temporal frame of containment calls our attention to the process in play as a container reverses from its storage to delivery function. Whereas ‘storage’ contains notions of material apparatus, structural design and archive or collection, ‘delivery’ carries a teleological function as well as the physical place or site in which a container opens, empties or interfaces. To give just two examples, both freight containers transporting commodities along the exchange circuits of global capitalism and fiber optic cables delivering information across national and transnational communication networks act in varying ways to produce the conditions for what David Harvey identifies as the experience of space-time compression that has marked modernity and postmodernity.

How, then, might these different frameworks for thinking about containers inform our involvement with material and immaterial phenomena? What affordances does the concept of the container provide for the humanities and social sciences in engaging with contemporary social, cultural, political and economic conditions? We invite graduate student submissions from a wide variety of disciplines to engage with these questions.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

• New materialisms of containers or contained
• Affect theory and the uncontainable
• Containers in/as cultural (literary, filmic, televisual, etc.) texts
• Object oriented ontology
• The body and (dis)embodiment
• Virality and containment
• Media objects as containers
• Urban space and containment
• Resistance to containment
• Thing theory of containers or contained
• Exhibition spaces as containers
• Transgression and limit experiences
• Design and containers
• The politics of containment
• ‘Trans’ -national/-gender/-disciplinary problematization of containment
• ‘Trans’ troubling of globalization, race, and the nation-state containment

Please send a 250-300 word abstract by June 15th, 2013 to catgradconf@gmail.com. We are tentatively planning on sending out acceptance and declination notices around the beginning of July. For updates and more information, visit http://catgradconference.com.

C21 Literature Journal: Twenty First Century Genre

Fri, 17 May 2013 10:04:26 -0400

CALL FOR PAPERS
C21 LITERATURE: ISSUE THREE AUTUMN 2014: TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY GENRE

Genre has become an increasingly significant part of academic and popular criticism since the year 2000. From Steampunk to Crunch Lit, Young Adult to Nordic Noir, new genres have arisen to sustain fiction and popular culture markets in the new millennium. Issue three of C21 Literature asks if the politics of genre can offer insights into developments across the first thirteen years of the twenty-first century. If genre development is a process of evolution then how and where do these genres originate – and what are the intertextual and historical frames in which they operate? The journal calls for articles examining developments in genre across the twenty-first century. Topics may include:

• the history of literary genre
• multi-platformed genre developments
• new genres and authors
• cultural studies and genre
• politics and genre
• humour and genre
• academia and genre
• technology and genre
• popular culture and parody
• alternative histories
• old genres, new millennium
•
C21 Literature also seeks reviews, features and opinion pieces from academics, readers and writers and conference reports relating to twenty-first century genres.
Articles should be 6000–7000 words.
Reviews and conference reports should be 1000–2000 words. The journal uses the author/date Chicago style referencing system.
Full article submission, abstracts only will not be considered.
Please send all submissions, questions or enquiries to journal editor Dr Katy Shaw at K.Shaw@brighton.ac.uk

About The Journal
C21 Literature is an international peer reviewed journal that aims to create a critical, discursive space for the promotion and exploration of 21-st century writings in English. It addresses a range of narratives in contemporary culture, from the novel, poem and play to hypertext, digital gaming and contemporary creative writing. The journal features engaged theoretical pieces alongside new unpublished creative works and investigates the challenges that new media present to traditional categorizations of literary writing.
Website: http://www.gylphi.co.uk/journals/C21Literature/
Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/C21Literature
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/c21literature
Blog: http://c21literature.blogspot.co.uk/

[REMINDER] Allegory Studies? (abstracts deadline 31 May)

Fri, 17 May 2013 05:48:16 -0400

CALL FOR PAPERS

ALLEGORY STUDIES?
University of Warwick
7 November 2013

KEYNOTE SPEAKER: Jon Whitman (English, The Hebrew University)

OTHER CONFIRMED SPEAKERS AND CHAIRS: Raymond W. Gibbs Jr. (Psychology, UCSC), Lisa Rosenthal (Art and Design, UIUC), Christiania Whitehead (English and CLS, Warwick)

CONFERENCE WEBSITE: http://www2.warwick.ac.uk/fac/arts/emforum/events/allegory

The one-day interdisciplinary conference seeks to bring together scholars of different disciplinary backgrounds who share an interest in the history and theory of allegory in order to explore and promote the notion of allegory studies as an emergent nexus of interdisciplinary scholarship.

Since the mid-twentieth century, allegory has increasingly been approached as a subject in its own right, informed by, but transcending particular disciplinary, periodical, or author-focused contexts. This development seems to have reached a critical point over the past two decades, which have seen a steady stream of articles and monographs, as well as such comprehensive reference works as an Encyclopedia of Allegorical Literature (Leeming and Drowne 1996), a Dictionary of Allegorical Meanings (Brumble 1999), a pioneering collaborative overview of allegorical interpretation in the West (Whitman 2000), and, most recently, volumes in the New Critical Idiom (Tambling 2010) and Cambridge Companions (Copeland and Struck 2010) series. A number of recent conferences and seminar panels have approached the subject without disciplinary or periodical restrictions, and the phrase “allegory studies” – although traceable at least to Gordon Teskey’s Allegory and Violence (1996) – has begun to appear in contemporary scholarship on the subject.

By all accounts, then, the current state or research on allegory seems to be marked by the consolidation of a long and extraordinarily productive tradition of scholarship – including contributions from such fields as art history, classics, intellectual history, linguistics and cognitive science, literary studies and literary theory, philosophy, theology, religion studies – into a coherent interdisciplinary formation in its own right. At this propitious moment, papers are invited from scholars of any disciplinary background to discuss the various issues raised by these developments, such as (but not limited to):

- Why allegory studies? What is it about this subject that seems to demand a dedicated interdisciplinary platform in its own right?

- What are the main achievements of allegory studies thus far? What are the most promising avenues of exploration?

- Theory and history in allegory studies – what light does theoretical work throw on the history of allegory, and conversely, how do historically contextualized perspectives bear on the theoretical approaches to the subject?

- What is the relation between the marked rise in allegory scholarship since c. 1950 and the roughly coextensive “revival of allegory” originating in the work of such thinkers as Walter Benjamin and Paul de Man and permeating various corners of the contemporary academic and cultural sphere?

Papers are solicited from scholars of any disciplinary background and career stage – proposals from graduates and junior academics are especially welcome. Applicants are encouraged to engage with the subject of allegory and allegory studies in ways which transcend traditional disciplinary and periodisational boundaries, and priority will be given to abstracts clearly demonstrating the ability to communicate effectively to the interdisciplinary audience the conference aims to attract. It is hoped that the conference will lead to a publication showcasing the wide array of current approaches to the subject and paving the way for further collaboration and research.

500-word abstracts for 20-minute papers, accompanied by a brief biographical note, to be sent to the convenor, Vladimir Brljak (English and CLS, Warwick), at v.brljak@warwick.ac.uk by 31 May 2013.

Coldnoon: Travel Poetics (www.coldnoon.com) Call for Entries (Research Papers/ Poetry), deadline 6th June 2013

Fri, 17 May 2013 04:22:21 -0400

Coldnoon: Travel Poetics is an International Print and Online Literary Journal published as a quarterly (online, ISSN 2278-9650) and bi-yearly (print, ISSN 2278-9642).

CALL FOR ENTRIES:

Coldnoon: Travel Poetics invites writers and researchers to submit their original works of poetry, creative non-fiction, art/book/film reviews or research papers on travel/travel poetics for publication in Coldnoon: Travel Poetics, Jun ‘13, Issue VII (online). The works published in the forthcoming issue will be republished in Coldnoon: Travel Poetics, Autumn 2013, along with the subsequent online issue of Sep ‘13, Issue VIII, in October, 2013.

The last date of sending submissions is 6th June, 2013.
To read about the concept of Coldnoon, travelogy and travel poetics please visit our website www.coldnoon.com.

The submission categories and criteria are:

POETRY – Submit at least 4 poems, and not more than 6, in MS Word Doc. format only. Please ensure your poems are properly formatted, and the lineation is as desired. Before you submit, we suggest you read our previous publications of poetry, once, so as to have a clear idea of the kinds of poetry we like, or tend to understand better.

NON FICTION, RESEARCH PAPERS & REVIEWS – Works may be based on travel in literature, cinema, culture, and more. Submit a full length essay not less than 2500 words, or review not less than 1500 words. Format your paper on standard A4 (8.3*11.7 sq. inch) paper, with 1 inch margin on each side. Citations, if any, should be in MLA format. Use endnotes instead of footnotes. Also check your paper for proper indentation before submitting. The works will be checked stringently for plagiarism; avoid any whatsoever. Attach your submission in MS Word doc. format only.

We accept only email submissions. In your email mark subject as “Submission”. Along with the submission attach your biographical details of not more than 100 words. Also state in the body of your email that you are the sole author/s of the work submitted and that no other person or institution may assert moral right over the work, but you.

Email your submissions to: submissions@coldnoon.com

LiNQ Special Journal Issue "Capture" calls for papers and writing, closing July 31, 2013

Thu, 16 May 2013 18:46:18 -0400

www.linq.org.au

LiNQ is a 40-year old print and online peer-reviewed literary journal associated with James Cook University in Australia. Each year we print a special issue and call for scholarly essays and fiction, poetry, and creative non-fiction that addresses our special theme.

This year's theme is Capture.

We call for academic articles and creative submissions (fiction, creative nonfiction, essays, and poems) that document and question the acts of capturing, selection, preservation and representation:

• What are the ethical implications of attempting to capture a life or event?
• Is there a point where capture becomes entrapment? Are there materials that are not meant to be caught and pinned down?
• How can events, lives, identities, topics or themes be captured in exhibitions, histories, short fiction, novels, digital media or nonfiction representations?
• Are some forms more suited to capturing certain experiences than others? Are there limitations of the form and how can they be negotiated?
• How can you capture an audience?
• Why do we engage in acts of capturing? What is the lure?
• What is the psychological impact of captivity?
• How does captivity relate to questions of race, the body and the natural world?

Submissions should be no longer than 6000 words. Include a brief abstract of the article or creative submission (no more than 75 words) and a 50-word biographical note. Book reviews of no longer than 1000 words are also welcome.

Follow MLA citation style and format. All contributions should be submitted as a Mircosoft
Word file, double-spaced 12pt font. All images used must be with permission only. Suitable papers will be double-blind peer reviewed.
Hard-copy submissions are not accepted and will not be returned. Send e-mail submissions to
Ariella Van Luyn: ariella.vanluyn@jcu.edu.au

Submissions close July 31, 2013 for our December 2013 issue.

Popular and Current Art Submissions and Criticism Wanted: Open Deadline

Thu, 16 May 2013 01:37:42 -0400

While great works of literature were written in the 19th century and prior, we live today in an age with major problems and solutions in the realm of art and communication that should be addressed by current artists and critics. The tri-annual Pennsylvania Literary Journal is in its 5th volume and 5th year in operation. It is available on EBSCO, ProQuest and in print from various distribution channels. It has published interviews with best-selling young adult authors like Cinda Williams Chima and Carrie Ryan, as well as with winners of the Brooklyn Film Festival, and top academic editors across the country. PLJ’s special issues have focused on film, fiction, British literature, formalism, new historicism, and various other fields. In the future years, PLJ would like to see primarily criticism of current research, fiction, poetry, film, and works of art. For example, the most recent issue of PLJ “Reviews of Popular Fiction” includes reviews of Twilight, A Kurt Wallander Novel, and The Last Boyfriend. Most of these reviews are very negative, as the editor-in-chief, Anna Faktorovich, Ph.D., is pretty pessimistic about the current state of literature. Thus, negative, sarcastic, and highly critical and detailed book reviews and essays are especially wanted. Reviews of films, TV series, as well as of photography and art are also of interest. Please remember to support your negative criticism with facts and details from the works, but don’t include quotes over 5 lines in length. In addition, if you can access a celebrity (living) author at a convention, a reading, or through their agent and they agree to do an interview with you – PLJ would be delighted to publish interviews with any recognizable or award-winning author. Interviews with filmmakers, poets, editors, and even businessmen are also of interest. Please review prior issues of PLJ for the interview style that PLJ prefers. Scholarly essays on popular, award-winning, or merited literature published since 1980 is also of special interest. Essays on methods for teaching literature, composition and other fields are also a good fit. Also send fiction, poetry, art, photography and other forms of art you’ve created. If you’ve published with a major academic publisher or with one of the best popular presses, and would like to be interviewed or reviewed, send a query. There is no payment for publication, but also no reading fees or publication fees for you. Only famous authors receive a free contributor copy. PLJ is a for-profit venture and subscriptions are what feeds its future success; so feel free to ask your school’s library to subscribe. If you have an idea for an essay, work of fiction, review, interview, work of art, or anything else that was not mentioned above (including criticism of 19th century and prior works), send a query to determine if it’s a good fit for PLJ. While PLJ is moving into popular art, it’s not yet fully there and a wide variety of other projects is still very welcomed. When submitting a project email a Word document with the full text of the work (with an abstract for scholarly articles), and a biography paragraph in the third-person for the author to director@anaphoraliterary.com, to the attention of Dr. Anna Faktorovich, Editor-in-Chief. PLJ is a part of the Anaphora Literary Press (www.anaphoraliterary.com), which has published over 50 book titles and is actively soliciting academic and creative book manuscripts. We are especially interested in books that will be taught as part of the writer’s class(es). To submit a book-length project email the full manuscript, bio, book summary paragraph, and a marketing paragraph (with specifics) to director@anaphoraliterary.com.

The Films of Robert Rodriguez

Wed, 15 May 2013 15:27:02 -0400

Call For Papers: The Films of Robert Rodriguez

POST SCRIPT: Essays in Film and the Humanities invites submissions for a special issue on the Films of Robert Rodriguez.

The issue will be guest edited by Professor Christopher González (Texas A&M University-Commerce).

Texas-based director Robert Rodriguez is arguably one of the most important Latino filmmaker of his time; his enterprising approach has now taken him into other forms of visual media, such as his El Ray television network and his latest “Project Green Screen” venture with the cell phone giant, BlackBerry. This special issue seeks to continue the exploration of this significant filmmaker first begun by Charles Ramírez Berg in his Latino Images in Film, and continued most recently by Frederick Luis Aldama’s Robert Rodriguez and the Cinema of Possibilities, to be published later this year. Submissions are open to a variety of theoretical approaches.

Post Script encourages original manuscripts of no more than 7,000 words in this area from scholars and academics as well as filmmakers. Essays will be subject to peer review. The guest editor invites submissions on the following topics or related topics:

• The impact of Rodriguez’s first feature film, El Mariachi, made for only $7,000
• Films such as The Faculty, where Rodriguez served as director only
• Directorial collaborations, such as Sin City, where he worked alongside Frank Miller
• Larger filmic canvases like the Spy Kids and Machete franchises, and the Mexico Trilogy
• Shorter films such as “Bedhead,” “The Black Mamba,” and “The Misbehavers”
• The “Ten Minute Film School” tutorials Rodriguez regularly features on his films’ DVDs
• Rodriguez’s filmmaking partnership with Quentin Tarantino, from cameos in Desperado, and Planet Terror, to more substantive collaborations in From Dusk Till Dawn and Grindhouse
• An exploration of Rodriguez’s filmmaking philosophy and technique, the speed at which he shoots; the economy of his productions; etc.
• The formal elements of Rodriguez’s films, including visual, sound, dialogue, and so on
• The politics of films like Machete, Planet Terror, and Once Upon a Time in Mexico
• Rodriguez’s penchant for using many of the same actors across his films; or example, Danny Trejo’s rise as voiceless villain in Desperado to brown superhero in Machete
• Rodriguez’s oft-criticized representation of women.
• An exploration of how Rodriguez’s films often engage in a Chuck Jones- or Tex Avery-style cartoon sensibility
• The adaptation of Frank Miller’s Sin City
• Rodriguez’s subversive use of stereotypes and cultural clichés
• Substantive interviews
• Book reviews (up to 1,000 words)

Please note that Post Script does not reprint previously published material.

Submit manuscripts via a virus-free attachment, with author identification on a separate page and not in the headers, by e-mail to guest editor Christopher González at the address below by November 1, 2013. Manuscripts must be in English and must conform to the MLA Style Manual, 3rd edition.

Professor Christopher González
Department of Literature and Languages
Texas A&M University-Commerce
Email: Chris.Gonzalez@tamuc.edu

For questions about Post Script not related to this special issue, contact the general editor:
Professor Gerald Duchovnay Gerald.Duchovnay@tamuc.edu

[UPDATE] SAMLA 2013: (Con)Textual Networks and the Globalized Caribbean (due June 10)

Wed, 15 May 2013 14:39:01 -0400

2013 SAMLA CONFERENCE, NOV 8-10, ATLANTA

SPECIAL SESSION: "(Con)Textual Networks and the Globalized Caribbean"

We often think of globalization as a contemporary phenomenon, characterized by the way high-speed technologies have changed everything from market dynamics to social relations. Many scholars, however, see the current phase of globalization as part of an historical process beginning as early as the sixteenth century. The Caribbean has, indeed, been a transnational site from the time of its original European colonization, soon followed by the importation of coerced labor from Africa, South Asia, and China. Today, the region remains populated by a wide variety of ethnic groups, highly trafficked by tourists from around the world, and economically tied to foreign currencies and markets. Additionally, high rates of migration from the Caribbean to North America and Europe have created an immense Caribbean diaspora that retains cultural and economic ties to the region, facilitated in part by new technologies and alliances.

Images of the Caribbean have thus been documented, constructed, and circulated globally from the rise of print culture to the dawn of the digital age. This panel seeks proposals engaging any aspect of the conference theme, “Cultures, Contexts, Images, Texts: Making Meaning in Print, Digital, and Networked Worlds,” in relation to literature and/or other media from any part of the Anglophone Caribbean.

Some possible topics include:

The “digital humanities” and Caribbean studies
Visual images of the Caribbean
Cartographic representations of the Caribbean
Caribbean service economies—tourism, textiles and “free trade” zones, data mining, banking, etc.
Regionalism, Nationalism, Transnationalism
Marketing the Caribbean/the Caribbean market
Intra-Caribbean exchange and migration
Local and regional grassroots activist networks in the Caribbean
Caribbean diasporas—cultural, economic, and/or social networks

Please submit an abstract of 200-300 words and a brief bio (not CV) of <100 words, in Word or PDF, to Kristine A. Wilson (wilson67@purdue.edu). DEADLINE EXTENDED TO JUNE 10, 2013.

Apollon eJournal - Undergraduate Submissions deadline 6/15/2013

Wed, 15 May 2013 11:43:39 -0400

Check the website, apollonejournal.org, for submission details on publication, or for an application to work with us

CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
Apollon invites undergraduate students to get published in, review submissions for, or help edit a the third issue of our peer-reviewed eJournal, Apollon. By publishing superior examples of undergraduate academic work, Apollon highlights the importance of undergraduate research in the humanities. Apollon welcomes submissions that feature image, text, sound, and a variety of presentation platforms in the process of showcasing the many species of undergraduate research.

ABOUT THE PROJECT
Apollon, an undergraduate humanities eJournal, is a peer-reviewed publication for undergraduate humanities majors. Apollon features undergraduate research developed in humanities courses, and thus emphasizes faculty-student collaborations beyond the classroom. We invite interested students to join us by contributing leadership or original work to Apollon. Our student team participates at all levels of this ongoing project (design, review, and publication) to offer their peers a real outlet for intellectual work in the humanities. For more information you can go to the program website, www.apollonejournal.org, talk to your professors, or contact the Faculty Director, Jason Cohen, at (859) 985-3765 or cohenj@berea.edu.

[UPDATE] Irish Gothic Conference 5-6 December, 2013

Wed, 15 May 2013 09:35:56 -0400

Confirmed Speakers:

• Professor W. J. McCormack (Former Professor of Literary History at Goldsmiths College, University of London)
• Dr Laura Pelaschiar (Senior Lecturer in English Literature, Università di Trieste)
• Dr Derek Hand (Senior Lecturer in English, Saint' Patrick's College, Dublin City University)

Gothic studies have recently been expanding previous limits of what was once thought to be an historically well defined genre. The extent of continual change in Gothic denotation is such that it is now approaching the status of an inter-genre inter-semiotic category. This is even more the case with Irish literature. Not only because a remarkable number of Gothic writers are Irish, but also, and more significantly, because Ireland has provided an extremely fruitful cultural background for the particular narrative forms and devices that are usually associated with the Gothic. Moreover, Irish literature presents a “gothicness” of its own, whereby it seems to simultaneously adhere to and reject the ideological and aesthetic models implied by the very notion of Gothic.

At this conference we will explore the ways in which Irish Gothic can/cannot be considered part of the mainstream Gothic tradition, as well as investigating the origins and evolution of the genre in an Irish context.

We welcome submissions addressing any topic relevant to Irish studies, and encourage papers, which explore any aspect of the Irish Gothic in literature, film, and other media.

Topics include, but are not limited to:

• Irish Gothic vs English Gothic
• The Birth of Irish Gothic
• Theorising Irish Gothic
• Irish Gothic Modernisms
• The Uncanny in Irish Fiction
• Victorian Irish Gothic
• Irish Gothic Geography
• Irish Gothic in the Media
• Irish Gothic Art
• Irish Gothic and Psychology
• Irish Gothic and Imperialism
• Irish Gothic and Science
• Irish Gothic and Technology
• Irish Gothic and Popular “Goth” Culture
• Irish Gothic and History

Abstracts (250 words max) for 20 minute papers and a short bio-sketch may be submitted to Enrico Terrinoni (Università per Stranieri di Perugia) and Annalisa Volpone (Università degli Studi di Perugia): perugiairishgothic@gmail.com.
Deadline for submissions: September 1, 2013.
Accepted speakers will be notified by September 20.
Conference fee: Euro 25; Euro 15 for students and the unwaged

CFP: Aloha at Risk: Education in Hawaii (Edited Collection)

Wed, 15 May 2013 08:51:27 -0400

Since the release of “A Nation At Risk” in 1983, public education has been subjected to increased scrutiny from political officials, parents, and concerned citizens. In recent years, such scrutiny has given way to calls for comprehensive education reform. Both the federal No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 and Race to the Top program, respectively inaugurated under Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama, focus on increasing standards for public schools throughout the United States, while more local initiatives like private school voucher systems and parent “trigger” laws attempt to increase learning opportunities for children by maximizing parental choice and administrative participation.

Yet, these reforms—or 'deforms' as they're called by opponents—have been condemned for being undemocratic, corporatist, and overly punitive. NCLB, for example, has been said to subsume diverse groups of children under reductionist statistical metrics, failing to account for demographic and developmental variances. RTTT continued this trend, according to critics, and added pressure for local school districts to implement costly teacher evaluation protocols based largely on standardized achievement tests, rather than holistic measures of learning growth and professional practice. In an ironic display of political harmony, small-government 'conservatives' and labor-minded 'liberals' alike have attacked national education reforms, the former for impugning states' rights and the latter for undermining collective bargaining.

Hawaii, considered by some political pundits to be the most labor-friendly state in the nation, has been on the frontlines of the battle over public education. One year after receiving an RTTT grant award in 2010, the state was placed on “high risk” status by the U.S. Department of Education for failing to implement reforms quickly enough and prolonging a regressive contract dispute with the Hawaii State Teachers Association. Education reforms are further complicated by events from Hawaii's historical trajectory, including settler colonialism, imperial overthrow of native governance, suppression of indigenous culture, and plantation economics, each of which inform the state's current sociopolitical structure and discursive condition.

This interdisciplinary essay collection seeks to engage the theme of “education in Hawaii” from a critical vantage point. Submissions will be accepted for each of the book's four sections: “Pedagogy of Aloha” (critical pedagogical studies); “Decolonizing Aloha” (colonialism in/and the classroom); “Re/Deforming Aloha” (general education theory, including social, political, and philosophical analysis); and “Teaching Aloha” (classroom stories). Potential topics might include:

- How do socioeconomic and ethnic inequality affect Hawaii's classrooms and education politics?

- To what extent does money drive education reform in Hawaii? Do reforms (re)produce corporate infrastructure and economic division, rather than quality learning experiences?

- How does Hawaii's history, including settler colonialism and plantation development, impact the present state and future direction of the state's education system?

- In what ways are native or marginalized knowledge(s) suppressed by standards-based education reforms? What pedagogical techniques might be used to advance such knowledge(s)?

- What progressive teaching modalities (i.e. feminist composition, queer- and eco-pedagogy, or ethnomathematics) might be employed to address Hawaii's diverse student populations?

Educator and author Doug Robertson will serve as editor for this collection. Essays should be approximately 4,000 to 8,000 words in length and employ Chicago Manual of Style formatting (using endnotes). Submissions should be sent to editors@interstitialjournal.com. Initial inquiries are welcome. Deadline for submissions is December 31, 2013.

(Re)thinking Global Connectedness: Critical Perspectives on Globalization

Wed, 15 May 2013 02:24:26 -0400

Proposals Due: 15 September 2013
Conference Dates: 26-28 January 2014
Location: Doha, Qatar

The Liberal Arts Program at Texas A&M University at Qatar is pleased to announce the Call for Proposals for its Second Annual Liberal Arts International Conference. Following the success of last year’s Ethical Engagement with Globalization, Citizenship, and Multiculturalism: Multidisciplinary Perspectives, this second annual conference will explore the impacts of globalization from a variety of disciplinary lenses.

How has globalization transformed us individually and collectively? How is globalization shaping notions of ethics? Is globalization merely a shrinking of the world or is it transforming human experience? What challenges does globalization pose to understandings of the self and the other? How do we sustain a globalized world in terms of food, energy, and education? Are we already living in a post-globalized world?

We welcome submissions from across the spectrum of academic fields, including composition and rhetoric, linguistic, politics, history, technology, language studies, sociology, anthropology, geography, economics, philosophy, ethics, law, religion, and cultural studies. We especially encourage contributions from PhD students and scholars working in non-western and/or underrepresented regions.

Possible Conference Panels and Discussions:
Conceptualizing Globalization
Connections: Globalization and Technology
(Re)Thinking Ethics in a Globalized World
Linguistic Perspectives on Globalization
Education in a Globalized World
Historical Perspectives on Globalization
Globalization: Comparative East-West Perspectives
Global Movements: Environment, Peace, Violence
Legal Concerns of a Bordered/Borderless World
Gendering Globalization

The conference can provide substantial travel bursaries for international participants who need funding.Submission of individual papers and complete panel proposals on these or other related themes are welcome. Select papers will be considered for publication in a peer-reviewed volume or a special issue of an international journal.

In order to be considered, please submit a panel proposal or individual paper proposal to include author(s) names, institution affiliation, email address, and an abstract of 250 words with 5 keywords by September 15, 2013 to LAIC2014@qatar.tamu.edu

Organizing Committee:
Dr. Leslie Seawright
Dr. Hassan Bashir
Dr. Phillip W. Gray
Dr. Troy Bickham
Liberal Arts Program ,Texas A&M University at Qatar
LAIC2014@qatar.tamu.edu
liberalarts.qatar.tamu.edu

Special Issue on Contemporary Drama [July 15, 2013]

Wed, 15 May 2013 00:41:09 -0400

Special Issue on Contemporary Drama

In the past twenty years Irish society has experienced a range of cultural, political and, centrally, financial upheaval. To what extent has Irish theatre responded to these tumultuous events? How far have traditional forms and subjects maintained their position? Or have experiment and innovation become the new distinguishing features? The guest editors of this special issue of Breac, Lindsay Haney and Shaun Richards, invite submissions addressing any aspect of recent Irish drama. In keeping with Breac’s interdisciplinary goals and digital form, we encourage submissions informed by any approach to drama and theatre and rendered as conventional essays or works in any audio or visual medium.

The issue will include essays from Brian Singleton on ANU productions, Emilie Pine on theatre’s response to abuse revelations, Niamh Malone on theatre and urban regeneration, and Susan Cannon Harris on Conor McPherson’s supernaturalism; an interview with Colm Tóibín, conducted by Paige Reynolds; and a video feature from Róise Goan, director of the Dublin Fringe Festival, on incubators and space in New Theatrical Dublin.

Breac is a peer-reviewed, open-access, paperless journal that publishes critical and creative work relating to Ireland and Irish Studies. Among its many features is a forum section that seeks to cultivate a global conversation around the published articles among its readers, students, and scholars. It also periodically streams live events through the website’s BreaCam. Subscribing to the journal is entirely free, and we encourage you to visit the website at breac.nd.edu.

We suggest a length of 4000-5000 words, but will happily consider longer articles. Deadline is July 15, 2013.

Full submission instructions are available at http://breac.nd.edu/submissions/. Questions to breac.djis@gmail.com.

SAMLA Special Session on Creating or Expanding a BA Program in English During Uncertain Times (June 20th- Abstract Deadline)

Tue, 14 May 2013 21:05:03 -0400

This panel invites participants from any college or university where there is an interest in building a B.A. in English or establishing a new programmatic track within the discipline. Participants need not be at any particular point in the process, and we hope to incorporate a diverse array of experiences and viewpoints. In other words, participants may only be thinking about the possibility of creating a program or they might be on the other side of the process. This panel will also consider what types of programs should/need to be created to meet the changing needs of students in the 21st century. We hope that this session will produce a vibrant dialogue that will serve as a bridge to future cooperation.

Because of the collaborative nature of this panel, we would like to create a roundtable atmosphere in which the audience plays an active role. Participants will each provide an informal 5-10 minute talk about their experiences and the advice they have about the process and then the rest of the session will be dedicated to having an open dialogue.

Instead of traditional proposals, those interested should send a brief 250 word description of their experiences and what they would like to gain from participating in the panel. Accepted descriptions will be shared with all participants to help generate a productive discussion. In order to be considered, these descriptions should be sent to SOrtolano@Edison.edu by June 20th.

Featured Speaker: Dr. Kristie Fleckenstein, Professor of English at Florida State University; co-collaborator in the creation and administration of FSU's undergraduate program in Editing, Writing, and Media

Call for Papers - Patents for Humanity Special Issue - August 23 2013

Tue, 14 May 2013 15:08:55 -0400

In recognition of the USPTO’s Patents for Humanity program, Technology and Innovation - Proceedings of the National Academy of Inventors, will be publishing a special issue highlighting influential humanitarian technologies, including the innovation and imagination seen in the Patents for Humanity contest submissions.

To this end, T&I is soliciting abstracts for articles or commentaries on humanitarian patents. We hope that all finalists of the Patents for Humanity contest will consider contributing to the issue.

Abstracts should be submitted by June 8, 2013. The abstract submission should contain: title, author affiliation, abstract of no more than 250 words, key words, and corresponding author’s contact information. Upon approval, full manuscripts will be due by August 23, 2013.

All submissions should meet Technology and Innovation’s author instructions and should be submitted through T&I’s website, http://submissions.academyofinventors.org/index.php/journal/about/.

Articles should concern patented technologies or innovations that have made/have the potential for making significant contributions to humanity. Articles may include commentaries by field experts concerning patents, original articles describing the development and research towards a technology or patent, and/or narrative-like stories that emphasize the societal benefits of select innovations.

Submissions may include (but are not limited to) the following topics:
• Economics of a technology, governmental and policy action, and innovation
• Environmental impact of various technologies/patent types
• Health impacts of technologies and innovations
• Analyses of the distribution and access to technology

If you have any questions, please contact Editorial Assistant Diana Vergara at TIJournal@research.usf.edu.

Technology and Innovation is published by Cognizant Communication Corporation.

International Journal of Welsh Writing in English (deadline September 2013)

Tue, 14 May 2013 10:39:20 -0400

International Journal for Welsh Writing in English

Call for Papers

The International Journal of Welsh Writing in English invites submissions for a special issue on the theme ‘Literary Topographies: Place, spatiality, cartography and Welsh Writing in English.

Guest Editors: Kirsti Bohata & Matthew Jarvis.

Welsh writing in English has a long tradition of writing ‘place’. The recent spatial turn in literary criticism has led to a productive exchange of ideas with new geography, cultural history and digital technologies. The complex ways in which literature engages with place have begun to challenge and expand methodologies in other fields at the same time as they have presented literary scholars with dynamic new avenues of critical enquiry. Innovative approaches exploring the intersections between literary texts and cartographic representations of place are being enabled by digital Geographical Information Systems (GIS). Alongside such scholarly developments, there has been a clearly identifiable resurgence in new writing from Wales that addresses the topographical, geo-political, personal and historical dimensions of our ongoing relationship with place and space.

The editors would welcome essays based on papers delivered at the recent conference on the theme of literary topographies, but new submissions on this topic are encouraged.

We also invite contributions on the other main areas of interest of the journal, particularly Dylan Thomas’s centenary (2014).

International Journal of Welsh Writing in English

The remit of the journal is to publish new research within the field of Welsh writing in English. We explicitly encourage comparative approaches, drawing not only on cognate disciplines (such as cultural studies, history, drama/performance, creative writing, film/media studies) but also making entirely new connections with disciplines such as medicine (medical humanities), computer science (digital humanities), (applied) mathematics (statistical methodologies within the humanities), and environmental science (environment, culture, place). The journal seeks to promote work, which brings English-language material into the richest of dialogues with Welsh-language literary culture. It also seeks to make connections between Welsh writing in English and applied/non-academic areas of literary life, such as the creative industries, heritage, publishing and policy-making.

The next issue of the journal is going to be published in September/October 2014.
The deadline for submissions is 1 September 2013.
For submission guidelines please see http://ijwwe.wordpress.com.
Please send any queries to the editor Dr Alyce von Rothkirch at ijwwe.editor@gmail.com.