cfp.english.upenn.edu

People make cities and cities make people. Reductive as that claim is, it stands at the heart of much of the ethnic American experience. Immigrants originally inherit the cities in which they settle. Then, as they come to know their new culture and as their children grow and develop, they remake their communities, creating places that reflect the multiple strands of their origins. For scholars of ethnic literature, American cities stand, in part, as texts themselves. They reflect the immigrant experience as it has taken place, and they contextualize the possibility for future immigration.
We invite paper abstracts and complete panels, workshops, and roundtable proposals on all aspects of the multi-ethnic literatures of the United States. We are particularly interested in proposals for papers that explore literature of the city and theories of the urban experience in a multi-ethnic context.
Submissions should detail requests for specific audiovisual equipment, if needed. We also ask that a proposal for a complete panel, roundtable, or workshop include a brief description of the central topic, supplemented by brief abstracts of individual speakers’ contributions.
The deadline for abstracts and proposals
(250 words) is
December 21, 2009.

Please email abstracts to:
Prof. Joe Kraus & Prof. Susan Mendez
melus2010@gmail.com

More information at www.melus.org
Full PDF at http://webspace.ship.edu/kmlong/melus/Conference%20CFP%20for%20website.p...