graduate conferences

Per(form)ance: A Graduate Symposium on Performance and Form

Harvard University Theatre and Performance Colloquium

April 26, 2019

CALL FOR PAPERS

The Harvard University Theater and Performance Colloquium seeks fifteen-minute papers from graduate students for a symposium on the topic of “performance and form.” We will gather during the day on Friday, April 26th to share work and work-in-progress. Papers will be grouped into panels of three or four participants by topic.

How does ‘the state’ generate material force in everyday life? Over the last four decades, scholars of South Asia have invigorated theorization of the state by resituating Eurocentric accounts in an imperial and postcolonial frame. In recent years, scholars have foregrounded the materiality of state-making by examining the bureaucratic circulation of archival records, minoritized subjects’ encounters with law, the remaking of bodily norms through colonial institutions, transnational flows of aid and expertise, and interplays of routine and exception in governance. “Matters of State” will bring together scholarship that builds on these exciting, interdisciplinary approaches to conceptualize the paradoxes of state power in South Asia.

Boston University’s American and New England Studies Program is proud to announce a call for papers for its upcoming Graduate Student Conference to be held on April 13, 2019 in Boston, MA.

This conference’s theme, “Framing Narratives,” asks people to think through the establishment, circulation, and contestation of the stories that "frame" American life. What stories give shape to, constrain, border, bolster, or animate American visions of selfhood and community? These might be literal stories (or literal frames!), but could also be some of the unspoken, but demonstrably real narratives that shore up national identity.

The world has started to change drastically and everything seems to be a ganie of chance, as higher powers and accountability are amok. The more changes occur, the more everything seems to be going in a circle. The games, sins and powers, like the Mafia, have and continue to shape societies. This is a time when we are faced with looking to the past for potential answers and at unlikely sources for guidance. The goal for this conference is to examine these three tenets and create a conversation about Latin American and Iberian literature from all centuries and genres where either one or all have shaped people, places and beliefs. Ultimately, what was the result and what answers and guidance can be found?

How does ‘the state’ generate material force in everyday life? Over the last four decades, scholars of South Asia have invigorated theorization of the state by resituating Eurocentric accounts in an imperial and postcolonial frame. In recent years, scholars have foregrounded the materiality of state-making by examining the bureaucratic circulation of archival records, minoritized subjects’ encounters with law, the remaking of bodily norms through colonial institutions, transnational flows of aid and expertise, and interplays of routine and exception in governance. “Matters of State” will bring together scholarship that builds on these exciting, interdisciplinary approaches to conceptualize the paradoxes of state power in South Asia.