cfp.english.upenn.edu

Deadline for Abstracts: 30 April 2012

Keynote Speaker: Dr Matthew Beaumont
UCL English Department and The City Centre
Author of Utopia Ltd.: Ideologies of Social Dreaming in England and Editor of A Concise Companion to Realism.

The committee invites submissions for papers by UK-based postgraduate students across a wide spectrum of interests and disciplines on perspectives relating to studies of reality. In particular, we encourage papers that interrogate ideas of the real in an interdisciplinary manner and explore the critical possibilities of the theme.

We invite graduate researchers working in fields connected to European languages, cultures & society to respond to this critical interrogation, and in doing so, reflect on how concepts of reality operate in different theoretical contexts, and whether interconnections between various fields may be achieved.

The conference will be organised as chaired panels dealing with specific themes under the broader umbrella of Reality. The suggested panel titles here are arranged broadly along the lines of literature, politics, history, and critical theory:
Representing Reality – Political and Media Discourse,
Mirroring Reality – Perceived and Constructed Self-image,
Tracing European Identities – Nation and Migration.

Additionally, a selection of papers from the conference will be published online and in a special print edition of Opticon1826, the multidisiplinary peer-reviewed academic journal based in UCL.

Please send submissions and queries to thoughtsforward@gmail.com by 30 April 2012.

Submissions should include the following:
- An abstract of no more than 250 words.
- 3 to 5 key words relating to the focus of the paper.
- A short bio of around 50 words.

We aim to respond to all submissions by 11 May 2012.

We are looking forward to receiving your submissions!

Warm regards,
Thoughtsforward organisers.

Organised by ThoughtsForward, a SELCS-based postgraduate student group interested in fostering interconnections and relationships between departments, as well as inviting researchers to push beyond their specialist areas.