American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA) Conference 
Palais des congrès, Montreal, March 14-17, 2024

Co-organizers: Christine Xiong (Stanford) and Fiana Kawane (University of British Columbia)

Édouard Glissant, in Poetics of Relation (1990), famously emphasizes that “Cultures develop in a single planetary space but to different ‘times.’ It would be impossible to determine either a real chronological order or an unquestionable hierarchical order for these times.”

ACLA Annual Meeting 2024: March 14-17, Montreal, Canada
Figuring the Lyric Across Media Seminar 
Co-organized with Frances Grace Fyfe, Concordia University

ACLA 2024 CfP: Bodies in Crises, Crises as Bodies in the Middle East and North Africa

ACLA 2024: Thinking the “Unthinkable World”: Theories of Horror, Horrors of Theory

American Comparative Literature Association Seminar

Masculinity is in crisis. This comes as no surprise to anyone following current events, taking note that the perpetrators of violent crimes (most significantly mass shootings, terrorism, and domestic violence) are overwhelmingly male. It becomes clear that, despite their dominant status in American culture, a significant proportion of men are lonely, violent, and repressed. 

Remembering “the magic of the B.B.C. box” long after he had left for London, George Lamming described the event of a Caribbean Voices broadcast: “West Indian writers would meet in the same house and listen to these programmes,” absorbing “the curriculum for a serious all-night argument” and then wrangling “among themselves and against the absent English critic.” With venues for print often vanishingly small, radio assumed an outsized importance for postcolonial writers in the middle of the twentieth century, offering larger audiences, steadier remuneration, and programming with a generative mix of stories, poems, drama, and criticism. How did wireless outlets, and networks, shape literatures emerging from the protracted end of European empires?

Cary Nelson’s stance on archival work in his 1989 book Repression and Recovery applies to the intimate, frustrating, and rewarding practice of archival research’s potential to offer literary scholars the chance to rehabilitate both author and text. He states, “For texts previously ignored or belittled, our greatest appreciative act may be to give them fresh opportunities for an influential life. That discourse can include new constructions of the cultural work those texts may have done in their own time” (14). When archival research uncovers voices that showcase underrepresented voices, the outcome is tremendous in how it results in new ways of reading the past in contemporary culture. But what about historically problematic constructions?

The Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA) Convention will be held in Boston March 7-10 2024.

We are soliciting papers for our roundtable, entitled "Mentoring Scholars of Color." The roundtable was very popular at last year's session, and we want to resume conversations about best practices for mentoring diverse scholars today. The goal is to create a safe space for scholars of color to meet and discuss the challenges and opportunities in the area of mentorship among scholars of color.

Dear Language Educators and Researchers, We hope this message finds you well. We are thrilled to announce two exciting panels at the upcoming NeMLA Convention 2024 in Boston, chaired by two colleagues from the University of Chicago.

This roundtable examines the re-location of Shakespeare in America from the angle of regional production, performance, pedagogy, culture, and impact with a focus on race, class, gender, history, and culture.

War Literature and Trauma (CEA 3/21/24–3/23/24)

deadline for submissions: 

November 1, 2023

full name / name of organization: 

College English Association (CEA)

contact email for questions:

andrea.vannort@afacademy.af.edu

Subject: Call for Papers: War Literature and Trauma at CEA 2024

Call for Papers, War Literature and Trauma at CEA 2024

March 21-23, 2024 | Atlanta, GA

Archival research has always been a cornerstone of medieval studies, but recent work has  reinvigorated the field by transforming our understanding of the lives of late-medieval authors  and people alike. The discovery of new evidence in the case of Cecily Chaumpaigne and  Geoffrey Chaucer, contentious debates around identifying "Chaucer's Scribe" Adam Pinkhurst  and recovery of figures such as Eleanor Rykener and the rebels of 1381 all demonstrate how  archival research enriches our understanding of the medieval past. This thread invites  contributions that foster new understandings of lives in the archives and bring a theoretical eye to  the practice of archival research itself.

This edited volume seeks to collect scholarship on how Studio Ghibli has adapted stories from other media to film. Many of the Japanese animation powerhouse’s films have their origins in novels or comics, such as Diana Wynne Jones Howl's Moving Castle. Studio Ghibli cofounder and director Hayao Miyazaki even adapted his own manga, Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind, into a feature film. We seek proposals — from a variety of disciplines and perspectives — for essays exploring how Studio Ghibli’s storytellers have approached adaptation, as well as what the study of Studio Ghibli’s filmography can contribute to the broader field of adaptation studies. 

Possible / Suggested Topics:

                 Marginalities in South Asian Literature

                           Text, Context and Theory

Call for book chapters

Editors: Dr. Arunima Ray (Lady Shri Ram College for Women, University of Delhi), Dr. Karuna Rajeev (Lady Shri Ram College for Women, University of Delhi) and Dr. Goutam Karmakar (NRF Postdoctoral Fellow, University of the Western Cape, South Africa, Routledge Book Series Editor on South Asian Literature & Visiting Scholar Rachel Carson Centre for Environment and Society LMU München, Germany)