The sixth annual Liberal Arts Conference at Auburn University at Montgomery invites panel and paper proposals on the literature of the American South. Topics might include:

DSC'14 is now accepting papers on the following topics through its OpenConf system. Shall you have a paper on an additional topic, please write an email to info@DSCconference.com. The current topics include but are not limited to:

Bullying has been a hot topic in recent years in terms of education, social media, and garnering awareness and protection of all persons from bullying. While being bullied or picked on used to be considered something of a rite of passage of elementary and high school, it is now considered a serious offense and can result in school expulsion and criminal charges. The scope of bullying within popular culture has also changed radically; depicting scenes in television or movies regarding bullying is now considered offensive and come with a warning at the start of an episode.

In her July 2012 Atlantic article "Trickle-Down Distress," Maura Kelly argues that anxiety might well be considered a "peculiarly American phenomenon." And in fact, the interrelation between American culture(s) and notions of individual and collective anxiety--from a sense of unease to the experience of crisis to full-blown panic--has proven to be a stimulating topic of interrogation. Accordingly, anxiety, understood not solely as a state, mood, or emotion but also as a phenomenon indicative of larger social dynamics and as a concept capable of performing cultural work, has continuously gained prevalence in scholarly debates.

The Geek and Popular Culture
Southwest Popular / American Culture Association (Southwest PCA/ACA)
Area: The Geek and Popular Culture

Join us for the 35th annual conference of the Southwest Popular/American Culture Association, February 19-22, 2014, at the Hyatt Regency Hotel and Conference Center in beautiful Albuquerque, New Mexico.
http://www.southwestpca.org

Conference Theme: Popular and American Culture Studies: Yesterday, Today, and Tomorrow

Submission Deadline: November 1, 2013

The Geek and Popular Culture: A Love/Hate Relationship

This panel at the 2014 NeMLA conference seeks to re-engage with Charles Brockden Brown, one of America's earliest novelists and a literary icon in Pennsylvania. As a practitioner of experimental writing that anticipates much of post-structural and post-colonial thought, Brown forces us to question the contemporary status of these critical frameworks. His shift toward conservatism, his later interrogations of History, and his importance as a particularly 'American' voice (praised by Hawthorne and Poe alike) makes Brown a figure worthy of continued study. Please submit brief 250 - 500 word abstract to Michael Blouin at MJBlouin@milligan.edu by no later than September 30th, 2013.

2014 will mark ten years since the final episode of Sex and the City (HBO 1998-2004) was broadcast. During the programme's six seasons, and throughout the decade following its finale, Sex and the City has continued to be recognised as one of the most contentious and cherished series in recent television history, having tapped into a zeitgeist consumed by postfeminism to become a cultural touchstone. In a July 2013 New Yorker article, Emily Nussbaum lamented the manner in which the show has been 'downgraded to a 'guilty pleasure'' by some, while male-centred series are readily revered, reminding readers that this was 'sharp, iconoclastic television.