CFP: Irish Literature and Irresponsibility (Singapore) (4/10/06; 9/28/06-9/30/06)

full name / name of organization: 
Cornelius Anthony Murphy \(Assoc Prof\)
contact email: 

Irish Literature Panel=20
English Literature Conference - Singapore:
IRRESPONSIBILITY
28-30 September 2006 NTU Singapore
Jorge Luis Borges once claimed that "the Irish have always been the =
iconoclasts of the British Isles." Bearing Borges' suggestion in mind, =
it is hoped that this panel will address the perception of Irish =
literature as a category of writing that has frequently been provocative =
to formal and social norms. As Irish writers have been pivotal in the =
dominant, frame-breaking, literary categories of this century, like =
Modernism (Yeats, Joyce, Beckett) and Postmodernism (Joyce, Beckett, =
Flann O'Brien, Banville), a discussion on irresponsibility has =
particular resonance, particularly in the sense that Irish literature =
has frequently refused to accept social, aesthetic, formal and political =
modes of established order.
Proposals (250 words) are invited on any conjunction of Irish literature =
and irresponsibility, or resistance to fixed standards, and should be =
forwarded to Neil Murphy at camurphy_at_ntu.edu.sg. This panel has been =
agreed by the conference committee.

Other suggestions for panels or papers related to any aspect of Irish =
literature in the context of (ir)responsibility are very welcome.=20
Deadline: 10 April 2006

Please find further details about the conference below.

Inaugural English Literature Conference: IRRESPONSIBILITY
Division of English, NTU, Singapore, 28-30 September 2006

Opening address by Professor Shirley Chew; Plenary address by Professor =
J. Hillis Miller; keynote address by Professor Eugene O'Brien.

Literature tells us-before psychoanalysis, before deconstruction-that =
our crimes are overdetermined, our ethical concepts unstable. Yet the =
facile deployment of the rhetoric of responsibility and =
irresponsibility, in all manner of debate, indicates the widespread =
abuse of the concept of responsibility, if not its bankruptcy. With our =
title "Irresponsibility," we hope to provoke a conversation aimed at =
assessing both the contribution of literature to our understanding of =
the concept of responsibility and its vicissitudes, and the possible =
resistance within literature and literary studies to cheap distinctions =
between responsibility and irresponsibility. We hope also to provide a =
forum for those interested in determining the responsibility of literary =
studies today, both within its own domain, and in its relation to other =
disciplines. We welcome a wide variety of approaches to our theme, and =
encourage a broad understanding of its scope.

We invite papers and proposals for panels (of 3-4 papers). Suggested =
topics include, but are not restricted to, the following:

* Representations of irresponsibility in the literature of any period or =
nationality
* Irresponsible characters, narrators, authors, or literary critics
* Responsibility after Freud (or Kierkegaard, or Sade, or Marx, or =
Nietzsche, or Derrida)
* Interdisciplinary irresponsibility: Literature and Philosophy, =
Literature and Science, Literature and Law, Literature and Film Studies, =
Literature and Cultural studies
* The pleasure of irresponsibility: Libertinism; Sadism; Pornography; =
Trash Cinema
* Irresponsibility and Postmodernism, Postcolonialism, Poststructuralism
* Irish Literature and Irresponsibility, or Subversion in the =
Anti-Realist tradition
* Moral didacticism, moral dilemmas, moral anxieties in Literature or =
Film
* Primal guilt: Adam, Eve, Oedipus, Antigone
* Victorianism and the rhetoric of responsibility
* Irresponsibility and Insanity, Dilettantism, Hypocrisy, Scepticism, =
Faith, the Sacred, Violence, Polemics, Politics, War
* Irresponsibility in responsible Singapore: Singapore literature, the =
arts, and culture
* Responsibility in the age of terror
* Culpatory and exculpatory rhetoric
* Irresponsibility as resistance
* The ethics of reading=20

Please send abstracts of 300 words either by email to =
<irresponsibility_at_ntu.edu.sg> or by mail to Conference Committee, =
English Division, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, NTU, Nanyang =
Avenue, Singapore 639798. Further information will soon be available at =
our conference website: www.hss.ntu.edu.sg/english/eng_conference.asp=20
Deadline: 10 April 2006

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Received on Fri Feb 24 2006 - 11:28:38 EST