cfp.english.upenn.edu

A half day symposium at Goldsmiths (University of London), Thursday 26th April 2012

Keynote Speaker: Bernardine Evaristo

At the close of the twentieth century, feminists such as Audre Lorde, Susan Stanford Friedman and Sara Ahmed urged women to look beyond their local and national communities. Since 2000, contemporary women’s writing has sought inspiration from the idea of an increasingly global community. Women from a variety of locations have produced a number of works that engage with transnational and global relationships, including Aminatta Forna, Bernardine Evaristo, Kamila Shamsie, Andrea Levy, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and Tahmima Anam, amongst many others. This half-day symposium seeks to both address and celebrate the global outlook of contemporary women’s writing.

Topics may include (but are not limited to):

Contemporary women’s writing in the diaspora
Friendship, family, romance and sexual relationships
Global influences on language, form and genre in the global era
Engagement with theories of transnational feminism
The global legacies of slavery and colonialism and/or globalisation
Immigrant women and the cosmopolitan city
The contemporary portrayal of women and religion

Please submit abstracts of 250 words for 20 minute papers via email to women@pgcwwn.org. Please state ‘Goldsmiths’ in the title of your email. The deadline for proposals is 13 April 2012.