CFP: Autobiographical Lit Crit (3/15/03; e-journal)

full name / name of organization: 
Lisa Johnson
contact email: 

CALL FOR PAPERS

The online journal, Women Writers: An E-Zine <http://www.womenwriters.net>,
seeks original essays in literary and cultural studies for its upcoming May
issue. This issue will be guest edited by Dr. Lisa Johnson, a professor of
women's writing at Lenoir-Rhyne College and editor of Jane Sexes It Up: True
Confessions of Feminist Desire. The special issue will be devoted to
experimental work in the "autotheoretical" realm, a hybrid genre that mixes
autobiography with rigorous critical analysis of literary and cultural
texts. Many feminist writers have contributed to this field, including Jane
Tompkins in "Me and My Shadow," anthologized in The Intimate Critique:
Autobiographical Literary Criticism, edited by Diane Freedman, Olivia Frey,
and Frances Murphy Zauher. For Women Writers, your focus must be on a
woman-authored text or a cultural image in which a woman figures centrally
(see, for example, Kim Wells' response to the Oprah Book Club Phenomenon or
Nicole Griffith's exploration of the Ph.D. student as mother). Beyond
simply framing a textual discussion with an autobiographical narrative, this
issue seeks to explore more innovative ways of bringing personal experience
to bear on literary and cultural analysis. What is the effect of reading
through the body? How might one represent this interpenetration? What
forms might such hybridization take? One value of personal narrative as a
theoretical tool is its emphasis on writing well, replacing abstract
critical jargon with concrete creative nonfiction, making room for the
poetry of experience inside the prose of academic theory. In this way,
Women Writers: An E-Zine will use this special issue to showcase the writing
of women writers writing about women writers.

TECHNICAL MATTERS:
Papers should be submitted in Word Perfect (.wpd) Microsoft Word (.doc) or
Rich Text Format (.rtf). No zip files will be accepted. Remove any
"running headers" you may have in the document. Use MLA parenthetical
documentation style and include a works cited page. We also invite
experimentation with digital/web and/or hypertext.

DEADLINE: March 15, 2003.

CONTACT: Please direct inquiries and submit essays to Lisa Johnson at
guesteditor_at_womenwriters.net. Book review queries should be directed to
Natasha Whitton at (nwhitton_at_selu.edu).

Women Writers is peer-reviewed by an editorial board. The ISSN# is:
1535-8402.

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Received on Mon Feb 03 2003 - 16:57:38 EST