New deadline and keynote announcement for the annual graduate
conference of the NYU Department of French:

Un/Common Experience: The Dross and the Glory of Everyday Life

February 16-17, 2007 with keynote speaker KRISTIN ROSS

The everyday is far from ordinary: within the banal lurks the sublime,
the familiar masks the strange. But does the quotidian confine,
define or liberate us?

Everyday life studies have taught us to find the extraordinary in the
ordinary, to seek out the common denominator within the existing
systems of our society, thereby allowing us to decode the present
while also opening a window onto the past. The theory of everyday
life is not, however, applicable only in the domain of the modern
world. An analysis of everyday life can occur at all levels of
civilization and is not only linked to the existence of the modern
subject. How, then, across the ages, have individuals confronted the
paradox of daily life in order to more fully understand their place
within a larger societal institution, whether that be family,
community, or country?

The aim of this conference is to explore the ways in which everyday
life has been experienced, mythologized and ignored from the Middle
Ages to the present day. How is this everydayness negotiated through
writing and art? How are its effects rendered by literature, history,
sociology or anthropology? By what means, using what language, to
what end?
        
We invite graduate students of all disciplines to present 15-minute
papers addressing the theme of everyday life within the context of
French and Francophone literary and cultural studies. 200 word
abstracts should be submitted to nyufrenchconference_at_gmail.com by
December 20, 2006. Papers and abstracts may be in French or English.
Selected papers will be considered for publication.

Topics may include, but are not limited to the following:

The individual: biography, autobiography, memoir, personal journals,
epistolarity
Community: ethnography, travel, customs, leisure
Political culture: conflict, violence, resistance
Cycles: routine, ritual, revolution, evolution
Consumption: fashion, art, comestibles, fetish
Corporality: scatology, sexuality, illness
Language: linguistic innovation, onomastics, dialogue
Dream: utopia, mythology, distraction, ennui

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Received on Mon Dec 11 2006 - 19:52:48 EST