What is the place and role of the voice in academic literary inquiry? How is orality treated in disciplinary and institutional contexts which identify most closely with text-based practices? How do we think of the relationships between orality and textuality without subscribing to a progressivist or evolutionary model that privileges text over voice? How is the voice and vocal performance treated and represented in literature? How do the voices of the translator, editor, critic, reader, and student of literature intersect to create literary disciplinary discourse?

What are the implications of privileging textual models of communication over the oral in our disciplines, and what could alternative approaches to the voice and orality contribute to literary inquiry?

The Literature & Critical Theory Student Union is pleased to announce our second annual Undergraduate Research Conference on the theme of “The Voice: Resonances in Literary Studies.” We invite students of all disciplines to submit papers that engage with our theme.

Any form of work is welcome so long as it demonstrates an academic impulse and includes a treatment of literature.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

●  Orality in literature, intersections and conflicts between orality and textuality
●  Representations of the voice and vocal performance (speech, singing, nonverbal expression) in literature
●  Gendered, racialized, queer, disabled voices in literature
●  Voices in and around literary production, scholarship, and criticism: the voice of the translator, the editor, the critic, the reader
●  Silence and silencing of voices
●  Periodization, genre, and the voice
●  Autobiography and autofiction: how do we represent our own voices in literature?

Submission instructions:

Submit your abstract at: bit.ly/thevoicecfp

●  The deadline for submission is December 21st, 2019, at 11:59pm.
●  Please submit an abstract of up to 300 words that details your research.
●  Please make sure to remove all identifying information from your abstract.
●  You may submit a maximum of two abstracts (only one will be selected for presentation at the conference).
●  If your submission is selected, you will be expected to give a 15-minute presentation on the day of the conference (Friday January 17th 2020). Details about panels will be sent out closer to this date. The conference will be taking place from 10am-5pm (with a closing reception at 5pm) in the Senior Common Room at Burwash Hall (89 Charles Street West).

If you have any questions or concerns about the conference or the submission process, please email Maral Attar-Zadeh at maral.attar.zadeh@mail.utoronto.ca