BAMS Conference 'Modernism Now'
26–28 June 2014
Institute of English Studies, Senate House, London
http://www.ies.sas.ac.uk/events/ies-conferences/ModernismNow

Call for Papers | Deadline 28 January 2014
Panel title: 'Modernism in the Magazines: 1945-Present'

This panel will extend recent developments in modernist periodical studies—following work by Scholes and Wulfman, Morrisson, Churchill, Marek, Latham, Ardis, Bornstein—by thinking about how we can theorise (late-)modernist magazines 'now' after such seminal research into material modernism and print culture, in order to read modernity, avant-garde and (late-) modernist discourses in journals that do not fall within customary period- or time-based models of modernism. Knowing that we can read (late-) modernist texts of the post-1945 period differently when reading them through/within little magazines, what larger theoretical implications do these insights have for the study of modernism today? How can we take these studies further?

For this panel, we encourage work with digital archives as well as material archives that are subject to accessing restrictions (copyright or unprocessed/"hidden collections" that constitute 44% of existing holdings according to one recent survey). This panel wants to extend the chronological framework to include late-modernist magazines published after the key period of 1910-30, in particular post-1945. We want to think about the development of the little magazines of modernism through changes in print and distribution technologies, such as the Mimeo Revolution, phototypesetting, photocopying, the continued interest in the letterpress, and now digital publishing, and to address and reconsider the territorial debates right now over the reach of modernist studies.

Suggested topics for papers:
—contemporary North American/UK little magazines and small presses that extend or deliberately resist (late-)modernist aesthetics and/or politics of the page. How is the cultural print legacy visible in contemporary magazines? How do poets especially engage with modernism both theoretically and practically in the form of editorial statements or the design, contents, material of their publications?
—comparative approaches between historical little magazines and contemporary magazines—as well as magazines published in non-English languages e.g. Spanish, Russian, Italian, etc.—that consider the little magazine as an international network of distribution and exchange.
—how can little magazines help us trace the emergence of modernism/modernity and complicate existing histories of its developments, divergences and alternative routes?
— how can we think of late modernism and little magazines as a continuity (e.g. the magazine Poetry is still running today; the magazine as blog, e.g. Harriet blog; several post-war and contemporary journals are in direct dialogue with 'early' modernist periodicals)
— we are also interested in examining late modernist magazines through the agency of editors, publishers, subscribers, financers, booksellers, literary agents, and other forms of non-authorial human capital
—what is the new canon in periodical studies?

Proposals should be no longer than 250 words and should include a short biography, including contact details.

Please send your abstracts to the two panel chairs by 28 January 2014.

Contact information:

Kaplan Harris (St. Bonaventure U / Brock U)
kharris[at]sbu.edu

Sophie Seita (Columbia U / U of London)
ss4459[at]columbia.edu