cfp.english.upenn.edu

A conference at Bowdoin College, Brunswick, Maine

Call for Papers

On the bicentennial of her birth, the Stowe Society announces a conference celebrating Harriet Beecher Stowe—her life and works—at Bowdoin College, where she wrote Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Conference organizers welcome participation from scholars, artists, and members of the community.

In *The American Woman’s Home,* Catherine Beecher and her famous sister Harriet, figure “home” as the “family state.” In fact, the great domestic writer of the nineteenth century, Harriet Beecher Stowe, consistently imagines American cultural geography in terms of family and state—at the intersection of home and nation. This conference will examine how Stowe creates her own place in the world of American letters through her expansive consideration of familial and national life. Conference organizers solicit papers that broadly explore the theme of home, nation, and place in the work of Stowe through lenses such as politics, education, reform, race, and religion. Studies on the works of Stowe’s family members—Henry Ward Beecher, Calvin Stowe, and Catherine Beecher—are also welcome. Possible topics include:

The national divide: North and South
Justice in the home and/or nation
National religion/religion at home
Race and family and/or national life
National and transnational identities
Reform in the home and/or nation
Cosmopolitanism and citizenship
Stowe’s place in letters
Exile and conceptions of home
Education in the home and/or nation
Stowe’s literary lineage: literary ancestors and successors, black and white
Biological, political, and anthropological constructions of citizenship

In addition to scholarly presentations, dramatic performances, readings, and informal conversations are welcomed.

For further information about the conference, contact the conference director: Tess Chakkalakal (tchakkal@bowdoin.edu). Email 250-word proposals and 1-page CVs by October 1, 2010 to the chair of the program committee: Mary Wearn (marywearn@gmail.com).

All participants must be members of the Harriet Beecher Stowe Society at the time of registration.