CALL FOR PAPERS: NORTHERN EXPOSURE: QUIRKY QUALITY TV

Edited by Jimmie Cain and David Lavery, Middle Tennessee State
University, John Zubizarreta, Columbia College

The editors of an in-development collection of essays on the television
series NORTHERN EXPOSURE (1990-1995) seek your proposals.

In TELEVISION'S SECOND GOLDEN AGE: FROM HILL STREET BLUES TO ER, Robert
J. Thompson offers the following capsule account of the CBS Dramedy
NORTHERN EXPOSURE.

"In July 1990, CBS offered up something for all those viewers who were
spending the summer wondering who killed Laura Palmer. Though NORTHERN
EXPOSURE was set in the fictional town of Cicely, Alaska, it was filmed
in Roslyn, Washington, just down the road a piece from Snoqualmie, the
town that stood in for Twin Peaks. The similarities between the two
shows didn't stop with the scenery either. NORTHERN EXPOSURE had its
own rural quirkiness, surreal story lines, and ensemble of off-centered
characters. It wasn't just an imitation, however. NORTHERN EXPOSURE had
already been conceived and developed before TWIN PEAKS premiered. The
striking similarities between these two independently created series
suggest that quality TV was following a distinct evolutionary path. The
artistic mandate for innovation that had engendered TWIN PEAKS had
apparently been yielding similar results elsewhere as well. Still, the
writers of NORTHERN EXPOSURE began reacting to TWIN PEAKS early in
their first season. EXPOSURE'S fifth episode even featured a scene shot
at Snoqualmie, in which the characters gaze at the waterfall as
PEAKSESQUE music plays in the background and mentions are made of
coffee and cherry pie."

We want to reassess NE's contribution to the development of quality
television. NORTHERN EXPOSURE: QUIRKY QUALITY TV will be aimed at an
educated but not highly-specialized audience. The essays chosen for the
volume will be scholarly but not obscure, knowledgeable but not
erudite. A publisher will be sought among both mainstream and
university presses.

The following list of topics is meant only to be suggestive and not
exclusionary.

*advertising/marketing NE
*Alaska in NE
*ancillary texts
*Character studies: Dr. Joel Fleischman | Maurice J. Minnifield |
Mary-Margaret 'Maggie' O'Connell | Holling Gustaf Vincoeur | Edward
'Ed' Chigliak | Christopher 'Chris' Stevens | Shelly Marie Tambo
Vincoeur | Marilyn Whirlwind | Ruth-Anne Miller
*David Chase and NE
*dreams in NE
*ethnicity
*fan fiction
*gender
*genre
*high culture references
*humor in NE
*individual episodes
*language
*Major NE Directors (i.e. Adam Arkin, Daniel Attias, Jack Bender,
Joshua Brand, Michael Lange, Nick Marck, Dean Parisot)
*minor characters on NE
*music
*NE & CBS
*NE & television scheduling
*NE & the American television industry
*NE & the critics
*NE & TV auterism
*NE abroad
*NE and law
*NE and postmodernism
*NE and Quality TV
*NE and religion
*NE credit sequence
*NE fan communities
*NE in the media
*NE influences
*NE merchandise
*NE on the web
*NE scholarship
*NE with and without Rob Morrow
*NE'S audience
*pop culture references
*Seasons 1-5
*self-referentiality
*slash fan fiction
*story arcs
*subplots

ASAP, but by no later than the end of January 2004, please send either
your completed essay or a 500-750 word account of the essay you would
like to contribute as an e-mail attachment (in Word or as a Rich Text
File) to jcain_at_mtsu.edu. Be sure to include with your proposal a brief
bio of yourself. If your essay is chosen for final consideration, you
will have until the end of May to complete it.

Dr. Jimmie Cain is Associate Professor of English at Middle Tennessee
State University, where he teaches courses in composition, war and
literature, European literature, and Victorian literature. His book on
Bram Stoker (BRAM STOKER AND RUSSOPHOBIA) is forthcoming from McFarland.

Dr. David Lavery is professor of English at Middle Tennessee State
University, where he teaches courses on American literature, science
fiction, modern poetry, popular culture, and film. He is the author,
editor, or co-editor of LATE FOR THE SKY: THE MENTALITY OF THE SPACE
AGE (1992), FULL OF SECRETS: CRITICAL APPROACHES TO TWIN PEAKS (1994),
?DENY ALL KNOWLEDGE?: READING THE X-FILES (1996), FIGHTING THE FORCES:
WHAT?S AT STAKE IN BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER (2002), TELEPARODY:
PREDICTING/PREVENTING THE TV DISCOURSE OF TOMORROW (2002), and THIS
THING OF OURS: INVESTIGATING THE SOPRANOS (2002).

Dr. John Zubizarreta is Professor of English, Director of Honors and
Faculty Development, and former Dean of Undergraduate Studies at
Columbia College. A Carnegie Foundation/C.A.S.E. Professor for South
Carolina, he has also earned honors for teaching and scholarly
excellence from the American Association for Higher Education, the
South Atlantic Association of Departments of English, the National
Methodist Board of Higher Education, the South Carolina Commission on
Higher Education, the Southeastern Conference on Christianity and
Literature, and Columbia College. He is the author of THE LEARNING
PORTFOLIO: REFLECTIVE PRACTICE FOR IMPROVING STUDENT LEARNING (2004)
and co-author OF THE ROBERT FROST ENCYCLOPEDIA (2001), John is widely
published in American and comparative literatures, popular culture,
pedagogy, and teaching improvement.

---------------------------------------
Dr. David Lavery
English Department, Box 70
Middle Tennessee State University
Murfreesboro, TN 37132
Homepage: http://www.mtsu.edu/~dlavery/
Co-Convenor, The Slayage Conference on
BTVS: slayage.tv/conference

         ===============================================
         From the Literary Calls for Papers Mailing List
                      CFP_at_english.upenn.edu
                       Full Information at
                http://www.english.upenn.edu/CFP/
          or write Erika Lin: elin_at_english.upenn.edu
         ===============================================
Received on Tue Nov 25 2003 - 01:10:28 EST