cfp.english.upenn.edu

Graduate Student Conference Natural and National Crises: Re-thinking the Relationship between Literature and Crisis
Date: May 5th, 6th 2006.

Université de Montréal,

Département d’études anglaises.

Guest lecturer: Dionne Brand

Deadline for submitting panel proposals: September 26th 2005
Deadline for submitting papers: January 15th 2006

The contemporary world system of global capitalist expansion that is producing new imperialisms around the globe will remain imperialist throughout the visible future, unless we learn how to "cross borders" from a dominating and imperialising past and present to a more “democratic” and just future society.

This conference raises questions, first, about, the temporality of crisis, as reflected in the natural and national crises we are facing today in an age of rampant imperialism and ongoing coloniality. Second, the conference examines how these natural and
man-made disasters are reflected in literature, from the past to the present, by asking how scholars and critics in different areas are thinking disasters through literature.

 This conference proposes, not only to re-think the relationship between literature (music, film, architecture, theory, etc…) and/in/of crises, but also to ask about the ways in which literature simply represents crises, or signifies a crisis. We would like to ask what a literature of natural and national crisis is, and reflect on how literature reflects or causes crises, and how this relationship has evolved over time, and in different national spaces, by soliciting panels and papers that address not only postcolonial but also Elizabethan, Romantic, Victorian, and other perspectives on the question. Finally, we will ponder the effectiveness of literature itself in truly engaging these questions and creating viable solutions. What can literature accomplish? How is it a limited discipline? We welcome proposals for panels and papers with contributions focusing upon (but not limited to) experience and representations and discourses of:

· Natural Disasters versus National (Political) Disasters

   Ecology/ Environmental studies

· Ecopoetics

· Ecofeminism

· Writing about the environment

· Revolt/revolution as crisis

· Non-anthropomorphic crisis: how does the growing interest in animals unsettle our understanding of human crisis?

· New imperialisms

· The nation state

· Ethics and nationalism(s)

   Literature and Anti-globalization resistance

· Where does terrorism come from?

· Literature, Film, and narratives of violence

· Gendererd Crises

· Genocide

· Resistance Literature

· Issues of assimilation, displacement, location, dislocation as reflected in literature
 
 Please send a c.200-300 word abstract by January15 2006 to:

amy.kebe_at_umontreal.ca

Papers may also be given in French.

If you wish to submit a proposal for a Panel, please complete the form
below.

Full name

Affiliation

Email / Phone number

Contact address

Panel title

Short description of proposed Panel (maximum 300 words) by September 25th 2005

 
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Received on Sun Jul 03 2005 - 14:00:10 EDT