Call for presenters to join panel, "Black and White and Red All Over: Literary Lineages and Allegiances between African America and Russia," at the 2014 Annual M.E.L.U.S. Conference, which is being held in conjunction with the Ralph Ellison Centennial Symposium at Oklahoma City University, March 6-9.

Inspired by Ralph Ellison's lifelong engagement with Dostoevsky (among numerous other Russian authors), this panel seeks to highlight comparative scholarship on these two literary traditions and their many intersections. Possible topics include the influence of Russian writers on the African American literary tradition, African American and Russian drama in the twentieth century, African American authors' engagement with the Soviet Union (e.g. Hughes, McKay, Du Bois), slave and serf narratives, comparative abolitionist literature, folk cultures (especially songs) of slaves and serfs, Russian Formalism in African American literary criticism (e.g. Gilroy, Gates, Baker), Pushkin's blackness, and others.

Please contact Nicholas Rinehart (ntrinehart@gmail.com) with 300-500-word abstract ASAP, preferably by February 14.

For more information on MELUS Conference and Symposium, please visit: http://www.melus.org/currentconference.htm