___________

Vol. III

No.12

issue no 31: November/December 2006

Revised for removal from www.irishdiaspora.net to www.oscholars.com January 2010

To the Table of Contents | To hub page | To THE OSCHOLARS home page

Being Talked About : Calls for Papers

A monthly page advertising Conference and Journal Calls, of interest or potential interest to Wilde scholars.

« There's only one thing in the world worse than being talked about and that is not being talked about »

These Calls are posted in a rolling list, in chronological order of deadline, with the Table of Contents in alphabetical order of subject, linked directly to each CfP. Calls are removed on expiry. Those without deadline have the month of entry printed and will remain posted for three months. Those with expired deadlines are included as we received them too late for the last issue of THE OSCHOLARS, and we hope that the deadline may be extended, or at least to alert readers of the conference to which they refer. These Conferences will in turn be listed when their programmes are published, in our Forthcoming Conferences page, now edited by Dr Florina Tufescu.

All details should be checked for changes with the organisers, not with THE OSCHOLARS.

Please mention THE OSCHOLARS if you are applying. Readers who give papers may publish their abstracts in THE OSCHOLARS.

Click on for quick access to any of these calls.

Calls in bold have a specific reference to Wilde.

TABLE OF CONTENTS
British 19thc Literature and Film		Modern Language Studies
Camp		Music Theatre / Dance / Opera
Children’s fantasy literature		Octave Mirbeau
Children’s Literature		Parrhesia
Collectors and Collecting		Poets & Poetry
Edith Wharton		Satire: From Swift to The Daily Show
English Language Notes		Sex
Folly		Time and the Victorian Press
Gender in Ireland		Venice in the Literary Imagination
Irish Feminism		Varieties of Irishness
Irish Gothic		Victorian Emotions
Language & Literature		Victorian Humour
Literary London		Victorian Materialities
Literary Tourism & 19thc Culture		Victorian Science Fiction
Modern Drama
Go to column 2

STOP PRESS:

Romantic and Victorian Entertainments
(UPDATE: Deadline Extension: December 20)
   Graduate Student Literature Conference
University of South Carolina, Columbia
23rd-24th March 2007
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Barry J. Faulk, Florida State University, author of Music Hall and Modernity: The Late-Victorian Discovery of Popular Culture
    Plenary Speakers: David S. Shields, Professor of English and McClintock Professor of Southern Letters at the University of South Carolina
Anthony Jarrells, Associate Professor of English at the University of South Carolina
From the Grand Tour to gambling, and grand balls to opium dens, nineteenth-century authors represented entertainment in various ways. The virtues and vices of nineteenth-century amusements and leisure activities were themes in both British and American literature of the period, and these areas of life reflected and defined the historical, social, and literary climate of the century.

Our fifth annual graduate conference hopes to examine issues related to entertainment and leisure in the nineteenth century, as well as their relationship to both contemporary and modern literary creation, criticism, and reception. How was play and playfulness represented by different authors in different periods of the nineteenth century? How did writers on opposite sides of the Atlantic or on opposite sides of the world react to the growing possibilities for "free time"? How did the Industrial Revolution both help and hinder chances for leisure? What effects did legislative action have on entertainment? What were the differences between "high" and "low" entertainments? How did print function as an amusement? We invite papers that explore the theme of entertainments and amusements in nineteenth-century American, British, and World literature.

Papers which address Trans-Atlantic topics are especially encouraged.

Possible topics could include but are not limited to:

Gaming	Gambling and speculating	Sports	Hunting
Drinking	The Grand Tour	The idea of ‘free time’	Artistic pastimes
The idea of ‘creativity’	Recreational use of opium	Prostitution	Pornography
Inventions	Hobbies	Fashion	Reading aloud
Story-telling	Riddles and other word games	Fairs and carnivals	Seances
Gardening and landscaping	Cooking	Theatre	Closet dramas
Music and dancing	Collecting	Freak shows	Tourist stops and popular resorts
Parties and balls	Charades and other parlor games

A scholarly press has expressed interest in publishing selected essays from the conference.
Abstracts of 250 words or less are due by 20th December 2006. Please include your name, the name of your institution and program, and any A/V needs that you may have. Submit abstracts electronically via email to:
Melissa Edmundson
(British Literature and Comparative or non-English Literature)
edmundrm@mailbox.sc.edu
Celeste Pottier
(American Literature)
pottier@gwm.sc.edu

Deadline expired

(but included as important)

1. Octave Mirbeau

Voyage à travers l’europe autour de la 628-e8, d’Octave Mirbeau: Colloque international et pluridisciplinaire. Strasbourg, 28-30 septembre 2007.

Sous le haut patronage de l’Académie Goncourt, en relation avec le service de la culture et du patrimoine du Conseil de l’Europe, et avec le parrainage de Glauco Mattoso, Bernard Noël, Marius Noguès, Michel Onfray, Michel Ragon, Louis Forestier et Henri Mitterand.

En novembre 1907, Octave Mirbeau (1848-1917) a publié chez Fasquelle une œuvre originale au titre énigmatique, La 628-E8, qui se présente comme un des premiers récits de voyage en automobile : il nous conduit à travers le nord de la France, la Belgique de Léopold II, la Hollande de Van Gogh et des Boers et l’Allemagne wilhelminienne. Illustrant les découvertes géographiques et psychologiques qu’entraîne l’usage de la vitesse, on y trouve une évocation vivante et diverse de l’Europe de la Belle Époque : politique nationale et internationale, littérature, beaux-arts, automobile, mœurs, nombreux sont les thèmes abordés par le voyageur curieux de tout, et d’abord de ses réactions à ce nouveau mode de transport. Européen avant la lettre, Mirbeau met également en lumière le patrimoine culturel européen et plaide pour la paix et l’amitié franco-allemande.

Tels seront les deux axes principaux du colloque universitaire dont la Société Octave Mirbeau a pris l’initiative et qui aura lieu à Strasbourg, du 28 au 30 septembre 2007, à l’occasion du centième anniversaire de cette œuvre novatrice qu’est La 628-E8. Ce colloque pluridisciplinaire à dimension européenne devrait permettre de confronter diverses approches (littéraires, comparatistes, historiques, esthétiques, sociologiques, pédagogiques...) et de tracer un tableau contrasté de l’Europe du début du vingtième siècle, confrontée aux menaces de guerre et aux prises avec des bouleversements culturels et des révolutions techniques apportées en particulier par l’automobile.

Nous lançons donc un appel à communication afin que puissent être notamment abordés les points suivants :

- La 628-E8 sous tous les aspects envisageables, en tant qu’objet littéraire, bien sûr, mais aussi comme moyen de découverte de soi et de l’autre et comme représentation de l’Europe à la veille de la guerre.

- La place et le rôle d’Octave Mirbeau dans les années précédant la Première Guerre Mondiale : dans l’histoire littéraire, dans l’évolution des formes esthétiques, dans le mouvement des idées, dans les luttes politiques de l’époque.

- La réception d’Octave Mirbeau en Europe, notamment en Allemagne et en Russie, et, inversement, la façon dont il perçoit l’Europe, son patrimoine culturel, son organisation politique et son avenir.

- Le rôle joué par les intellectuels européens de la Belle Époque, particulièrement ceux qui, dans leur pays, ont adopté des positions susceptibles d’être comparées à celles de Mirbeau, face à la montée des périls en Europe, et la façon dont leurs œuvres reflètent leurs positions.

- La révolution apportée par l’automobile en Europe au début du vingtième siècle et la manière dont les diverses littératures s’en sont emparées.

Les propositions de communication, accompagnées d’un résumé d’une douzaine de lignes, sont à envoyer avant le 30 octobre 2006 à Pierre MICHEL, Société Octave Mirbeau, 10 bis rue André Gautier, 49000 – Angers (michel.mirbeau@free.fr). Les propositions qui ne seraient pas acceptées par le comité scientifique, parce que le nombre des communications est impérativement limité à trente, pourraient néanmoins donner lieu à des publications dans les Cahiers Octave Mirbeau.

Signataires de cet appel

Mesdames

• Lola BERMÚDEZ, pour le Departamento de Filología Francesa e Inglesa. Universidad de Cádiz (Espagne).

• Arlette BOULOUMIÉ, pour le C.E.R.I.E.C., Université d’Angers (France).

• Simone CLAUDÉ, pour l’Institut International d’Études Françaises, Strasbourg (France).

• Anna GURAL-MIGDAL, université de l’Alberta, Edmonton (Canada), pour l’A.I.Z.E.N. (Association Internationale Zola et le Naturalisme).

• Marie-Thérèse JACQUET, pour le Dipartimento di Lingue e Letterature Romanze e Mediterranee dell'Università degli Studi di Bari (Italie).

• Ida MERELLO, pour la Facultà delle Lettere, Università di Genova (Italie).

• Jelena NOVAKOVIC, pour le Département d’études romanes, université de Belgrade (Serbie-Montenegro).

• Éléonore REVERZY, pour le C.E.R.I.E.L., Université de Strasbourg (France).

• Anita STARON, pour la Chaire de Philologie Romane de l'Université de Lódz (Pologne).

• Gabriella TEGYEY, pour le Francia Tanszek (département d'études françaises), Université de Veszprém (Hongrie).

Messieurs

• Wolfgang ASHOLT, pour le département de Romanistik de l’Université d’Osnabrück (Allemagne).

• Norbert BACHLEITNER, pour le Département des langues et littératures européennes, Section de Littérature comparée, Université de Vienne (Autriche).

• Jean-Pierre BERTRAND, pour le Département de Langues et Littératures romanes, Faculté de Philosophie et Lettres, Université de Liège (Belgique).

• Reg CARR, pour l’Oxford University (Grande-Bretagne).

• Guy DUCREY, professeur de littérature comparée, Université Marc Bloch de Strasbourg (France).

• Leo H. HOEK, pour le Département de Français de la Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam (Pays-Bas).

• Sándor KÁLAI, pour le Francia Tanszek (département d'études françaises) et pour la Faculté des Lettres de l’Université de Debrecen (Hongrie).

• Richard KELLER, Conservateur du Musée national de l'Automobile - Collection Schlumpf, de Mulhouse (France).

• Christopher LLOYD, pour le Modern Languages & Cultures, Durham University (Grande-Bretagne).

• Franck MICHEL, pour l’association ‘Déroutes et détours’, Strasbourg (France).

• Pierre MICHEL, pour la Société Octave Mirbeau, Angers (France).

• Ratko NESKOVIC, Doyen de la Faculté de Philologie de Belgrade (Serbie-Monténégro).

• Gérard POULOUIN, responsable ‘Erasmus’, Centre d'Enseignement du Français pour Étrangers, Université de Caen Basse-Normandie (France).

• Henri VIEILLE-GROSJEAN, L.I.S.E.C. (Laboratoire Inter-universitaire de Sciences de l’Éducation et de la Communication), Université Louis Pasteur de Strasbourg (France).

• François WIOLAND, Directeur de l’Institut International d’Études Françaises, Strasbourg (France).

No deadline specified

2. Modern Language Studies

Modern Language Studies (MLS) would like to solicit reviews of significant,intriguing, or unusual primary source materials for upcoming issues.Reviewers must be members of the Northeast Modern Language Association
(www.nemla.org) by the time of publication.

Reviews of scholarly editions, hypertext/internet literatures, visual culture, popular culture, and, of course, novels, short stories, poetry, plays, films, and creative non-fiction are all welcome. We also welcome reviews that emphasize interdisciplinary approaches or primary sources that cross disciplinary boundaries. Reviews should range from 1000-3000 words. Please provide complete bibliographic information for each reviewed work. Please send submissions or inquiries to mls@susqu.edu

[Posted November 2006]

3. MODERN DRAMA Special Issue on Recent Drama from ENGLAND and Ireland

A special issue of MODERN DRAMA (50.3, Fall 2007) considers British and Irish drama of the last fifteen years. The guest editor, R. Darren Gobert, invites papers on significant plays from this period, such as those of Marina Carr, Caryl Churchill, Martin Crimp, Martin McDonagh, Sarah Kane, and Mark Ravenhill.

Submitted articles should not normally exceed 9000 words, should include all appropriate documentation, and should conform to THE MLA HANDBOOK, 6th Edition. Submissions, including Notes and Works Cited, should be double spaced. Submissions considered for publication will be blind vetted by readers in the field; please include your name on a top sheet only.

Please submit articles by diskette plus three hard copies, or by email attachment, to:

Modern Drama Editorial Office R. Darren Gobert, Guest Editor c/o Graduate Centre for Study of Drama 214 College Street, 3rd Floor University of Toronto Toronto, Ontario Canada M5T 2Z9. FAX 416-971-1378 Email: moddrama@chass.utoronto.ca

Please note that neither diskette nor hard copies will be returned.

[Posted October 2006]

4. Victorian Science Fiction

Proposals for 20 minute papers are sought for a one day conference to take place at Anglia Ruskin University, Cambridge, England on Saturday 24th March 2007. The conference seeks to explore interfaces between the genre of science fiction (often studied in isolation or not at all) and more traditional, canonical literatures and discourses. There will be panels on SF and the classical tradition, SF and Shakespeare and SF and the Victorians. Confirmed speakers include Michael Bywater, Joss Hands, Tony Keen, Genevieve Liveley, Nick Lowe, Katy Price, Jonathan Sawday, Peter Stockwell and Rowlie Wymer. Please send proposals (approx. 300 words) to Professor Sarah Annes Brown, Department of English, Communication, Film and Media, Anglia Ruskin University, East Road, Cambridge, CB1 1PT. (sarah.brown@anglia.ac.England).

Proposals on topics for a Victorian panel would be very welcome.

[Posted November 2006]

5. Parrhesia: a journal of critical philosophy

http://www.parrhesiajournal.org/

editors: Matthew Sharpe, Alex Murray, Jon Roffe

Michel Foucault’s last works tell us that parrhesia is the act of fearlessly speaking the truth. To engage in parrhesia is never, however, a ‘neutral’ act. Parrhesia simultaneously incorporates aesthetic and ethical dimensions. The parrhesiast is someone whose fidelity to the truth becomes the pivot of a process of self-transformation.

Parrhesia is affiliated with the Departments of English and Philosophy at the University of Melbourne, and with the Melbourne School of Continental Philosophy. The journal will be published twice a year in June and November.

At this stage the submissions are directly solicited by the editors, however from September 2007 we will be taking more general submissions. If you would like to propose a paper, please send a 250 word abstract to one of the editors.

[Posted October 2006]

2006

December

6. Language & Literature

The Midwestern Conference on Literature, Language, and Media (MCLLM) is hosting its annual conference on March 30 and 31, 2007. The conference will be held at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois. We would like to solicit proposals for 20 minute papers from scholars at all career stages, from beginning graduate students to established and senior scholars. The confirmed keynote speaker for this year's conference is Toril Moi, James B. Duke Professor of Literature and Romance Studies at Duke University.

MCLLM invites papers on all areas of literary, language, and media studies, ranging from Medieval and Renaissance studies to popular culture and technology studies. We especially welcome proposals for papers that innovatively treat the study of feminist theory and women's writing, the interconnections between literature and philosophy, and 19th and
20th century European literature. Individual or panel (3-4 people) proposals are welcome.

The deadline for submissions is 1st December 2006. Please include a cover page with your name, affiliation, mailing address, and email address. Accepted contributors will be notified via email by January 1st, 2007.

Please submit your 250-word (1 page) abstracts as an attachment to mcllm2007@gmail.com

7. Venice in the Literary Imagination

AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF ITALIAN STUDIES

We seek proposals for our panel on ‘Venice in the Literary Imagination’ for the upcoming American Association for Italian Studies conference, taking place in Colorado Springs from 3rd-6th May 2007. ‘Venice has loomed large in the imagination of writers from the medieval period to postmodernity. Papers which examine the city's literary significance might explore such areas as aesthetics, gender, identity, leisure, politics, or travel, or representations of the libertine, libro d'oro, Carnevale, political prisoners, the Rialto, or the terra firma. We welcome research on authors of all periods and genres.’

Proposals for twenty-minute papers due by 1st December 2006; please include brief bio and audiovisual/technology needs. The vagaries of email being what they are, send copies of proposals to both panel organizers:
Alan Powers (Bristol Community College) apowers@bristol.mass.edu; Arnold Schmidt (California State University) aschmidt@csustan.edu. Please feel free to contact us with any questions. For more information, see the conference website (http://faculty1.coloradocollege.edu/~drenga/aais/index.html).

Arnold A. Schmidt, Ph.D., Professor of English, California State University, http://www.csustan.edu/ENGLISH/schmidt/schmidt.htm

8. POETS & POETRY : L'ENVERS DU DECOR: A WALK ON THE WILD SIDE

47th Annual SAES (Société des Anglicistes de l'Enseignement Supérieur) Congress Avignon, France : 11th, 12th and 13th May 2007 Université d'Avignon et des Pays de Vaucluse.

What takes place centre-stage starts life behind the scenes. The chaotic become disciplined, the underground overground, expressions of freedom are constrained. What are we to make, however, of this flipside and of those that choose to walk on the wild side? The aim of this year's Poets & Poetry panel is to focus discussion on how and why poets deal with the disorderly. We invite proposals for papers which examine particular poems, so that the panel debate can build up around an emerging series of tableaux salvaged from 'Desolation Row'.

Possible topics include (but are not limited to): Disorder The Antisocial Chaos Mess The underground Counterculture Anti-establishment Subculture Autonomy Independence Counter-power

You may address any type of English language poetry from any period. Papers should be no longer than 30 minutes.

Please send your title and 300 word abstract by 1st December 2006 to: Raphaël Costambeys-Kempczynski, Maître de Conférences UFR du Monde Anglophone - Télé3 Université de la Sorbonne Nouvelle, Paris III 13, rue Santeuil 75005 Paris. raphael.costambeys@univ-paris3.fr

9. Gender in Ireland

The 9th Annual Grian Conference 1st to 3rd March 2006, Glucksman Ireland House, New York University.

Gender in Ireland has traditionally been discussed in terms of the personification of Ireland as woman and the role of women in a conservative, Catholic country. Recent scholarship on gender and Irish subjects, however, has expanded the discourse to include issues of masculinity, sexuality, queer identities, and the role gender plays in a rapidly changing society (in both the Republic and Northern Ireland). GRIAN invites papers from scholars in all fields that address gender from contemporary and historical perspectives, including, but not limited to, the following areas:

o Gender, Sexuality, and Surveillance Queer Identities

o Gay Rights

o Domestic Space Domesticity Domestic Violence Incest

o Church/Clergy Marriage/Divorce/Separation Abortion/Reproductive Rights

o Fear and the Racialized (M)other Cult of Mary Ireland as Woman: Maps and Bodies Political Rhetoric

o Policy/Legislation/Law

o Colonial/Feminized Bodies

o Celts/Feminine vs. Saxon/Masculine

o (Hyper)masculinities (IRA, GAA)

o Mother/Land/Famine Viagra (made in Ireland)

Please send abstracts for 20 minute papers to both Elizabeth Gilmartin, EGilmar100@aol.com and Kerri Anne Burke kab350@yahoo.com by 1st December 2006.

10. Satire: From Swift to The Daily Show

LSU EGSA Mardi Gras Conference on Language and Literature. 11th to 17th February 2007, Lod Cook Alumni Center, Baton Rouge, LA.

Keynote Speaker: Timothy Brennan, Professor of Comparative Literature, Cultural Studies, and English, The University of Minnesota.

The 17th Annual EGSA Mardi Gras Conference is seeking papers on the role and effect of satire in the academic, political, and religious spheres. In particular, this panel is interested in exploring the subverting capacity of the satirical mode, in response to ideas, methodologies, and power. As the title suggests, papers can address satire in any period, including the ancient and contemporary worlds.

A detailed 250-word abstract should be submitted by 1st December 2006, to Matthew Landers <middlestate@gmail.com>. Papers should be 15 minutes in length. Please submit your abstract in the body of your email. No attachments, please. In case you were wondering, the Mardi Gras conference takes place during the weekend of Mardi Gras. Baton Rouge is 50 minutes from New Orleans, by car.

11. The Child and the Fantastic: Readings in children’s fantasy literature

Children's Literature Association - India (CLAI) first international conference will be held from 26th to 28th March 2007 at Trichur Towers Hotel, Thrissur, Kerala, Southern India.

Fantasy stories have fascinated the child audience perennially. They are always enchanted to the alluring world of British writers like Lewis Carol’s Alice in Wonderland, The Wind in the Willows of Kenneth Grahame, C. S. Lewis’ Narnia Series; The Oz novels of the American writer Frank L Baum or to P. L Travers the Australian writer who has immortalized Mary Poppins. Fantasies top the best sellers list in the contemporary children’s book market all over the world: Harry Potter Series (ENGLAND), Lemony Snicket Series and Eragon Series (USA), the works of the German author Cornelia Funke, Margaret Mahy from New Zealand, John Hanagan the Australian children’s writer of fantasy fiction, etc. Of late children’s authors from India too are faring well with their fantasy fiction. We have Chatura Rao with her Amie and the Chawl of Colour, Suniti Namjoshi with the Aditi Series, and Vandana Singh’s Young Uncle Comes to Town, which has invigorated the US reading world recently. The examples are limited to the writings in English. Each country will have their fantasy stories to share. What’s your story? The first international Children’s Literature Association India conference intends to provide a platform for scholars interested in children’s literature from all over the world to come together to share their fantastic experiences of reading.

The keynote address will be by Alida Allison, Professor, Children’s Literature Program, National Center for the Study of Children’s Literature, San Diego State University, USA. The exclusive item of the fantastic entertainment in the conference will be a performance of Alice in Wonderland transformed to the Kathakali art form. Some thoughts include,

· Why do children love fantasy fiction so much?

· Does fantasy literature for children culturally differ? *

· Lewis Carol was a professor of math. Vandana Singh is a teacher of science in a college in Massachusetts. Why do some persons with an essential scientific bend of mind tend to write fantasy fiction, that too for children?

· Does a fantasy get transformed when it is translated to another culture?

In order to facilitate a broad spectrum of topics for our deliberations papers can include but not limited to studies on, - theorizing fantasy literature for children - literary theory and children’s fantasies - high fantasy fiction for children - science fiction for children - fantastic picture books - children’s fantasy films, etc.

Proposals for Paper presentations, panels or posters can be emailed to antoct@yahoo.co.in before 10th December 2006. Kindly follow the submission requirements stated below:

1. Proposals should be of maximum 500-word limit.

2. Every electronic submission should also include : a) Name b) Institutional affiliation, if any c) Complete mailing address with zip code, phone number and email id d) A-V requirements if any

3. Kindly give to the email submissions CLAI Conference as the subject

4. Selected participants will receive their communication before December 30, 2006.

The venue of the conference will be standard hotel in Thrissur, Kerala. CLAI cannot fund travel or participant costs. All presentations of papers must be made in English. Participants will have to be invited members of CLAI and pay the conference fee. Hotel accommodations can be arranged as per request. Conference registration material and the mode of payment of the fee and the details regarding the hotel tariff and details regarding the accommodation will be intimated to the selected participants later. CLAI offers different types of fee structure: 1) To scholars from India, other parts of Asia, from African continent and the South American countries the conference fee and invitation member fee include Rs. 900/ 2) To all other international scholars the afore said fee is $ 50/ (Fifty US dollars) 3) To students from the countries mentioned in category 1) the fee is Rs. 500/ 4) To other international students it is & 25/ (Twenty-five USD) Anto Thomas Chakramakkil Senior Lecturer Department of English St. Thomas College, Trichur, Kerala, India.

12. Folly

The British Comparative Literature Association, XI International Conference, Goldsmiths College, University of London, 2nd-5th July 2007.

Plenary speakers: Piero Boitani (Università La Sapienza, Rome); Rachel Bowlby (University College London); John Dixon Hunt (University of Pennsylvania); Alberto Manguel (Paris, Toronto); Susan Stewart (Princeton University)

Paper proposals of a comparative / interdisciplinary nature are invited, covering any genre or historical period. The following list is intended to suggest a possible range of subject areas: madness, dunces, Erasmus, architectural and garden follies, rage, Quixotism, romantic love, fools and sages, lunacy, free association, ship of fools, error, holy fools, scientific folly, naivety/silliness, play, fools and jesters, carnival, delirium, poetic frenzy.

Please send paper proposals (title + 200 word abstract) by 15th December 2006 to:

BCLA FOLLY CONFERENCE, Department of English and Comparative Literature, Goldsmiths College New Cross, London SE14 6NW, England. Fax: +44 (0)20 79197453 e-mail: folly@gold.ac.England; for more information: www.blca.org

13. English Language Notes

Call for Publications, ELN 45.1, Spring 2007: The Specter of the Archive

A respected forum since 1962 for new work in English literary studies, ELN (English Language Notes) has undergone a change in editorship and an extensive makeover as a biannual journal devoted exclusively to special topics in all fields of literary and cultural studies. The new ELN is particularly determined to revive and reenergize its traditional commitment to featuring shorter notes, often no more than 3-4 pages in print, an attribute of the journal that will provide a unique forum for cutting-edge scholarly debate and exchange in the humanities.

The Specter of the Archive

How does the archive haunt the literary and cultural study of the past? This ELN issue invites papers that will engage this question and that will investigate what demarcates the archive of literary culture. Broadly, then, this ELN issue invites papers that will theoretically, creatively, and methodologically engage the representational power of the archive. In addition to critical papers that explore cultural forms, we also invite contributors to submit creative non-fiction, short stories, poetry, analysis of museum collections, and archival projects that expand our understanding of the archive. Contributors may also address the politics of the archive through some of the following questions: How does the archive facilitate knowledge? Since our post-modern turn, has the archive become nothing more than an abstract signifier, a ghost, if you will, that haunts our current social imaginary? How does the archive maintain or disrupt power relations? Is there a racial, gendered or sexual archive? What is the relationship between the archive and historical time? How is subjectivity formed through the archive? What is the relationship between aesthetics and the archive. How have archives been subjugated and what ghosts have we all encountered in our recovery of the past? What role do archives play in the abstract and mostly metacritical idea of the nation or the hemisphere? Can we ever understand the interconnections among people, nations and places without archives? How do archives reinvent the contours of the political? Position papers, notes, essays, book reviews, and provocations are invited from scholars and artists in all fields of study.

The deadline for submissions for ELN issue 45.1 (Spring 2007) is 15th December 2006.

Please send contributions and/or proposals to: The Editors English Language Notes University of Colorado at Boulder, 226 UCB Boulder, CO 80309-0226 Specific inquires regarding volume two may be directed to the issue editor, John-Michael Rivera, at John-Michael.Rivera@colorado.edu.

14. Adaptation: British Literature of the Nineteenth Century and Film

A Collection of Essays.

The recent surge of literature and film courses and use of film clips in the classroom has led to an increase in studies on adaptation. By bringing together many different approaches to the topic, this book will provide a overview of the subject of the adaptation of nineteenth-century British works, as well as examinations into the creation of adaptations and their use in the classroom. Although a wide range of critical approaches will be considered, the emphasis should be on what particular adaptations reveal about the ways in which nineteenth-century British texts are understood, responded to, and analyzed depending on particular cultural contexts. Consequently, this book will be a valuable resource for researchers, educators in both literature and film studies, adaptors, and everyone interested in adaptation.

Possible topics include, but need not be limited to: Theoretical Approaches: Types of adaptations History of adaptation Early history of the cinema Film-historical perspective Analysis of Adaptations: Individual works Genre studies National studies Directors and auteurs Practical Approaches: The process of adaptation Using adaptations in the classroom How film informs our understanding of literary texts.

Send original papers or proposals (approximately 600 words), with a short academic bio, to Abigail Burnham Bloom (abiga52088@aol.com) by 31st December 2006. Submissions may be made by email or surface mail. Abigail Burnham Bloom, 54 Riverside Drive, 15D New York, NY 10024.

15. The Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies

The Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies is an interdisciplinary, biannual electronic publication intended to function as a high-quality forum for the discussion of horror and Gothic themed literature, film, new media and television. As an Irish-based journal we are especially conscious of the richness of our nation's Gothic heritage and will make a particular effort to showcase articles and reviews which deal with Irish authors and topics as they come to our attention. However, the journal is also international in scope and will publish pieces on relevant themes and subjects from anywhere in the world, by researchers and enthusiasts of every nationality.

We are currently looking for submission for our second issue. 6,000 - 8,000 word articles and 1,000 word reviews in MLA format may be submitted to Elizabeth McCarthy and Bernice Murphy at the following email address: irish_gothic_journal@yahoo.ie. Submissions deadline 31st December 2006.

To find out more about the journal and its staff and contributors please visit us at http://irishgothichorrorjournal.homestead.com/

2007

January

16. Edith Wharton

Edith Wharton in the Work of Other Writers and Artists

American Literature Association Conference Boston, 24th to 27th May 2007.

In the broadest possible way this panel, organized by the Edith Wharton Society, seeks to explore the influence Wharton’s work had on other writers and artists. Papers could be about Wharton as a character or historical figure appearing in the work of other artists (writers, painter, photographers, filmmakers), or they could be about revisions of Wharton’s work, or about significant allusions to her work in the work of other writers and artists. Please send proposals to Hildegard Hoeller, at hoeller@mail.csi.cuny.edu or at 29 Gail Court, Staten Island, NY 10306 by 5th January 2007.

17. Camp

From Oscar Wilde to Kelly Osborne, Jean Genet to Judy Garland, 'Querelle' to 'the Sound of Music', Forum, the University of Edinburgh's postgraduate online journal, invites papers for its spring 2007 issue: Camp!

Susan Sontag's 'Notes on Camp' of 1964 initiated a series of debates on Camp and its politics. According to Sontag, 'it goes without saying that the Camp sensibility is disengaged, depoliticized - or at least apolitical'. Sontag took camp away from its roots in gay male culture and made it accessible to all. Gay male theorists fought to reclaim the term, laying claim to Camp as a highly political means of expression, resistance and empowerment for gay men. As Andy Medhurst claimed, 'it's ours, all ours, just ours, and the time has come to bring it back home'. How does this essentialised view sit in today's postmodern world? Is there still the need for identity politics in the current queer climate? Who has access to Camp and the Camp sensibility? Is lesbian, queer or heterosexual Camp possible? Is Camp a useful and empowering concept for women or is it perhaps inherently misogynist? How politically useful is Camp in a world where identities and lifestyles are commodified? Does it still have meaning and the potential to empower or has it been co-opted by the mainstream? And where exactly does Campness lie? Can anything or anyone be seen as Camp? Is it in the eye of the beholder, or intrinsic to the object or person? Perhaps it's both; 'a coded, ironic 'wink', a knowing glance shared between a cognizant perceiver - who can read and appreciate this wink - and a performative agent' (George Piggford). Finally, how unCamp is it to write about Camp?

We are seeking articles from a variety of disciplines, which engage with Camp in literature, art, film, theatre, popular culture and the media. Submissions could consider, but are not limited to, any of the following:

- 'Being-as-playing-a-role' (Sontag) - High Camp - 'The Sound of Camp Music' - The Camp Nation/Camping the nation - Lip gloss and latex: the commodification of Camp - Queer Camp - Feminist Camp - Straight Camp/Metrosexual Camp - Stars/ divas/ icons - Camping the mainstream - Men in tights: Camp in the theatre - Camp as resistance / empowerment - The politics of Camp - Tantrums and tiaras: camping the Monarchy - Camp: bad taste?

The deadline for article submissions is 12th January 2007. Papers should be between 3,000 and 5,000 words and formatted in accordance with the MLA guidelines and should be submitted to artsjournal.forum@ed.ac.uk.

18. Victorian Humour

Joking Apart: Gender, Literature and Humour 1850-Present

Hosted by the Centre for Modernist Studies, University of Sussex, ENGLAND. 28th-29th June, 2007

Confirmed Keynote Speakers: Prof Maria DiBattista (Princeton University, author of Fast-Talking Dames, 2001.) Prof Christopher Reed (Lake Forest College, author of Bloomsbury Rooms, 2004.)

Following the publication of her novel in October 1928, Virginia Woolf asked: ‘Why is Orlando difficult? It was a joke, I thought. Perhaps a bad one.’ Woolf’s question exposes many other concerns about the ways in which humour both enlivens and problematises literary and gendered subjects. To what extent is the idea of the ‘bad’ joke an aesthetic, moral, or specifically gendered judgement? What might it mean to theorise, analyse, or historicise laughter from a gendered perspective? Can humour itself be understood as a form of culturally encoded sexual difference?

This conference aims to explore the dangerous, difficult, provocative, and potentially hysterical interactions between gender, literature and humour from the mid-C19th to the present. While Humour Studies has fast been emerging as a productive and energetic field of cultural and critical enquiry in the United States, an equivalent network of scholars has still to be identified within the ENGLAND. A central aim of this two-day conference, therefore, is to provide a lively forum for academics, researchers and graduate students to engage in an intellectual exchange of current projects and ideas.

Papers are welcome on any aspect of gender, literature and humour in the period, although possible topics might include: · comedy and sexual difference · humour and morality in the Victorian novel · satire and sexuality · the body as a site of humour · queer comedies · modernist mirth · ‘middlebrow’ humour and the comedy of manners · jokes and the unconscious · feminist ‘funny women’ · transatlantic comedy connections · postmodernism and the literary joke.

Proposals of 300 words for 15-20 minute papers should be sent via e-mail to the conference organiser at S.Blanch@sussex.ac.England, or by post to Dr Sophie Blanch, Arts B275, University of Sussex, Brighton, BN1 9QN. The deadline for proposals is 12th January 2007.

19. Irish Feminism

Irish Feminist Thought

13th-14th April 2007

Women’s Studies Centre, Centre for Irish Studies,

Moore Institute (formerly CSHSHC)

National University of Ireland, Galway

Guest Speakers: Patricia Coughlan, University College Cork; Myrtle Hill, Queen’s University Belfast

According to Margaret Ward, ‘For women in Ireland, the Act of Union of 1800 not only defined the constitutional relationship between Britain and Ireland, it also largely determined the nature of feminism within Ireland and ensured a differentiation of Irish from British feminism’. In the last fifteen to twenty years, Irish historians, sociologists, and literary critics have recovered figures and events previously lost to history, but central to Irish feminism and women’s history. This conference seeks to build on and extend this vital work, and invites proposals that argue for (or against!) a body of specifically Irish feminist thought which has developed over the course of the last two centuries following the Act of Union, though contributions siting Irish feminism prior to 1800 will also be welcome. While twentieth-century Irish feminist issues and debates have received detailed critical attention, some less known contributions to contemporary Irish feminism include Owenite socialist and west Cork landlord William Thompson’s 1824 treatise on feminism, the most significant to appear between Wollstonecraft and Mill; nationalist historian Alice Stopford Green’s participation in the increasingly gendered debate about the professionalization of her discipline; influential suffragist and animal advocate Frances Power Cobbe’s conservative radicalism, shaped by Ireland’s sectarian tensions; and New Woman writer George Egerton’s ecocritical fiction which drew on Irish folklore and is frequently situated in an Irish landscape.

20. Music Theatre / Dance / Opera

The Music Theatre/Dance Focus Group of The Association for Theatre in Higher Education (ATHE) announces its call for papers for the Emerging Scholarship Panel for the ATHE conference in New Orleans, 26th-29th July 2007. Papers can address any area in the purview of the Music Theatre/Dance Focus group, which includes opera, operettas, musicals, dance theatre, performance art with music or dance elements, and pedagogy in music theatre and dance. Submissions are open to graduate students and scholars who have not presented at a national conference, as well as established scholars who have not presented or published in the areas of Music Theatre or Dance. For consideration for this panel, please submit your 10-12 page paper by 15th January to Jessica Hillman at Jessica.Hillman@colorado.edu or Jessica Hillman, Department of Theatre and Dance, 261 UCB, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO 80309-0261. (Email submission of documents in Word format is preferable, but hard copies will be accepted as well). Three will be selected for inclusion on this competitive panel. If you have any questions, please email Jessica Hillman at Jessica.Hillman@colorado.edu. For more information on the ATHE conference visit http://www.athe.org/.

21. Collectors and Collecting: Private Collections and their Role in Libraries

Proposals are invited for papers for a conference to be held at Chawton House Library on 19th and 20th July 2007. The event is jointly organised by Chawton House Library, the University of Southampton English Department, and Goucher College, Baltimore.

There are many examples of collections put together by individuals that are now valuable assets of the libraries to which they have been donated and to the wider cultural heritage. Such collections include the Henry and Alberta Hirshheimer Burke collection of rare editions of Jane Austen's novels and related materials at Goucher College, and the John Charles Hardy collection of eighteenth-century novels, a substantial part of which now forms a part of Chawton House Library.

This conference will focus on individual collectors of books and manuscripts and their collections. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

* the role of such collections within the context of the libraries where they may now be accommodated

* the way in which libraries manage an individual's collection

* the act and process of private collecting

* the motivation of the individual collector

* the book or manuscript as artifact in the context of private collections

Plenary speakers are Reg Carr (Director of University Library Services and Bodley's Librarian at the University of Oxford), Robert H. Jackson (Collector, author, and lecturer on literature, rare books, and collecting; founding member of the Fellowship of American Bibliophilic Societies), James Raven (Professor of Modern History, University of Essex) and Bruce Whiteman (Head Librarian, William Andrews Clark Memorial Library, Center for 17th and 18th Century Studies, University of California - Los Angeles).

Proposals of no more than 500 words for individual papers of twenty minutes, or for entire panels of three/four papers should be sent to the conference organizers Gillian Dow, Gail McCormick and Helen Scott at the following email addresses: gail.mccormick@goucher.edu and helen.scott@chawton.net or by post to Chawton House Library, Chawton, Hampshire, ENGLAND GU34 1SJ.

Deadline for proposals: 15th January 2007

22. Varieties of Irishness

The 2007 IASIL conference takes place at University College Dublin, Monday 16th July - Friday 20th July

FIRST CALL FOR PAPERS - Deadline 20th January 2007

Varieties of Irishness

The International Association for the Study of Irish Literatures invites you to attend the 2007 conference at University College Dublin. The Conference theme is designed to highlight the diversity which has always been at the heart of Irish writing and to accommodate the widespread interests of IASIL delegates. The Conference activities will take place on the extensive campus of University College Dublin located at Belfield, Dublin, 4, four miles from the city centre. The conference activities will chiefly take place in the Global Irish Institute Building near the entrance to campus; the closing dinner will be held in the O'Reilly Hall. Accommodation choices will include five-star student accommodation in the Glenomena Residences and the Montrose Hotel beside the campus, which will be offering a special rate to delegates. Proposals for papers of twenty minutes' duration (i.e. papers that, when completed, will be approx. 2,800 words in length) are welcome on any aspect of the literatures of Ireland, especially those on the conference theme. Please include the following information with your proposal: . A 300 word description of your paper; . The full title of your paper; . Your name, postal address and e-mail address; . Your institutional affiliation and position (e.g. Professor, Lecturer, Postgraduate Student, etc.); . Any AV requirements you might have; . Your IASIL membership status (i.e. present member, membership to be renewed, membership application submitted/to be submitted). Most participants in the conference will submit individual papers and be allocated to panels by the conference organisers. We are also offering participants the opportunity to form their own panels. Panel proposals are being accepted from: . Groups of 3 or 4 people who wish to deliver papers around one theme; . Individuals who will issue their own calls for papers for the conference. At present, we are asking the latter to submit proposals only. Details of speakers, when available, are welcome - but these need not be finalised until a later date. All speakers must be members of IASIL. To join IASIL, go to the membership page. All speakers must pay the conference registration fee in advance. Registration details will be posted online in April 2007. All speakers are responsible for their own registration, travel and visa arrangements, and accommodation. We will provide relevant information on this site.

If you are making your submission by e-mail, please do so the conference organiser, Professor Anthony Roche, at avroche@eircom.net. Please send your proposal in plain text in the body of your e-mail and as an attachment in a Word document. E-mailed confirmation of receipt of all e-mails will be sent within 10 working days. If you are making your submission by post, please do so to: Professor Anthony Roche, School of English and Drama, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin, 4, Ireland. Organising panel: Dr. John Brannigan; Professor Andrew Carpenter; Professor Anne Fogarty; Professor Gerardine Meaney. IASIL 2007 is hosted by the School of English and Drama and the Global Irish Institute at University College Dublin.

Keynote Speakers: Professor Anne Fogarty (University College Dublin), Professor Nicholas Grene (Trinity College Dublin), Professor Cheryl Herr (University of Iowa), Professor Declan Kiberd (University College Dublin)

http://www.iasil.org/conferences/ http://www.iasil.org/ucd/

23. Children’s Literature

IRSCL 18th BIENNIAL CONGRESS--CALL FOR PAPERS:
(International Research Society for Children's Literature)

The 18th Biennial Congress is to be held 25th-29th August 2007 in Kyoto, Japan.
Now, proposals are invited for papers, panels and posters exploring the
2007 IRSCL conference theme:

POWER AND CHILDREN'S LITERATURE: PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Children's literature has the power to help child readers to create diverse and free images of themselves, and to recognize the process of growing up and forming their identities. It can also give them consolation and vital energy. On the other hand, children's literature has the aspect of serving state propaganda, imposing the social and moral codes of the dominant culture on child readers, and depriving them of their imaginative power, sensitivity and ability to think for themselves. Bearing these positive and negative aspects in mind, we will examine the power of children's literature in the past and the present, and explore the possibility of children's literature in the future.

Suggested sub-themes are:
A: Representations of Power in Children's Literature
B: Production and Power in Children's Literature
C: Visual Images and Power in Children's Literature
D: Theories of Power and Children's Literature

Keynote speakers will include:
Tadashi Matsui Japanese Board on Books for Young People,
International Insititute for Children's Literature, Osaka
Susan Napier (University of Texas)
Masahiko Nishi (Ritsumeikan University)
Roberta Seelinger Trites (Illinois State University)

[Guidelines for Proposals]
-All contributions will be made in English and should be given in person.

-Proposals for papers and posters should be approximately 300 words in length. They should indicate the title of the contribution, the primary texts under consideration, a description of the paper content and the arguments to be developed.
-Proposals for panels should include a list of all presenters, and an approximately 500 words outline of the form which the panel will take.
-Proposals must adhere to the theme of the congress and should indicate under which strand of the theme they should be considered. Work presented must be new which means it should not previously have been presented or published in public in any form.
-20 minutes will be allocated for each paper, and up to 2 hours for each panel presentation. In the case of panels, presentations will not exceed 20 minutes and time must be allocated for discussion.
-For poster presentations each author will be given a space of 120 cm by 90 cm and present their work on posters. This mode of presentation will offer the presenters the opportunity to have close conversations with those who attend the session, receiving comments and discussing the work.
-Proposals should be written on the form which can be downloaded from:
http://www.irscl.info/e-callforpapers.htm and should be submitted electronically to: Akiko Yamazaki, Email: yamaz@sit.ac.jp

The closing date for proposals is 31st January 2007 (Wed).

For further information:
http://www.irscl.info/index.htm

Inquiry : IRSCL Japan Committee
irscl2007_kyoto@hotmail.co.jp

February

24. Victorian Emotions

Victorian Studies seeks essays for a special issue on ‘Victorian Emotions.’ Possible topics include -- but are not limited to -- the role of the emotions in Victorian notions of psychology, physiology, science, history, politics, or art. This special issue will provide a forum for discussing Victorian concerns about the emotions that remain at issue today: What are the political stakes involved in the emotions? What is the relation between the emotions and reason? What is the role of historical specificity in emotional experience? It will also engage questions that arise for intellectual, literary, and social historians of the emotions - as well as for those working in the field of Victorian studies more generally: What are the limits to what we can know about other historical moments? What tools are available to us for reconstructing past understandings or experiences? To what extent do these tools necessarily cross or complicate disciplinary boundaries?Deadline for submissions: 1st February 2007. Please direct all queries to guest editor Rachel Ablow (rablow@buffalo.edu). Essays may not exceed 8,000 words. Please send hard copies of each submission to Rachel Ablow, Department of English, University at Buffalo, SUNY, Buffalo, NY 14260.

25. TIME AND THE VICTORIAN PRESS

The Research Society for Victorian Periodicals (RSVP) will be holding its annual conference at Virginia Commonwealth University, Richmond, Virginia, from 14th-16th September 2007. In addition to considering proposals on all aspects of research into nineteenth century periodicals and serials, RSVP particularly welcomes papers that address the broad topic 'Time and the Victorian Press', including areas such as:

periodical rhythms and periodicities - local, national, global time- modernities - technologies and time - memory - presentism then and now - historical pasts and projected futures -historicity - signs of the times - time and space - synchronicity and/or simultaneity - visual culture and time – speed dailiness, weekliness, monthliness, etc. - timeliness - nostalgia -topicality - time and reading - time warps, gaps, duration - leisure time, work time.

We welcome proposals for individual papers or panels of three. Papers should be 15-20 minutes in length (no longer), and panels should plan on an hour and a half session. We hope to build in as much time as possible for conversation. Please email a two-page (maximum) abstract of the paper/panel, and a one-page c.v. for each participant to the Programme Chair, Mark Turner, King's College London: mark.2.turner@kcl.ac.England

The deadline for submission is 1st February 2007. RSVP is pleased to be able to waive fees for a select number of graduate students presenting papers at the conference. If you wish to be considered for such an award, please indicate so on a cover letter attached to your proposal. Recipients will be notified in early spring of 2007. Please direct all queries about local arrangements to David Latané at dlatane@vcu.edu. For further information about RSVP and the conference, please consult our website: http://www.rs4vp.org/

26. Victorian Materialities

The North American Victorian Studies Association and the Victorian Studies Association of Western Canada will join forces for a joint conference to be hosted by the University of Victoria and held from 10th-13th October 2007.

The conference will take place at the Laurel Point Inn on Victoria's beautiful inner harbour. Featured presenters include Stephen Arata, Peter Bailey, Kirstie Blair, Nicholas Daly, Jennifer Green-Lewis, Donald E. Hall, Gail Turley Houston, Linda K. Hughes, Lorraine Janzen Kooistra, Philippa Levine, Lynda Nead, John Picker, Erika Rappaport, Talia Schaffer, and others.

The theme for the NAVSA/VSAWC 2007 conference is Victorian Materialities. Conference threads include all aspects of Victorian material culture: Victorian objects and things; the language of the material world; Victorians and the senses; Victorian sounds, smells, textures, tastes, and fluids; Victorian bodies; Victorian dress and costume; Victorian interiors and exteriors: homes, parks, parlours, cities, and cinemas; Victorian commodities, displays, advertising, and shopping; Victorian book history: page, print, printers, bindings, covers, and illustration; colonial materialities; Victorian anxieties about materialism; Victorian materiality and religion; Victorian dirt, dust, dung, rubbish, pollution, sewers, mud, rocks, fossils, cliffs, grottoes, germs, microbes, and bacteria; the digital world and Victorian materiality; teaching Victorian materialities; Victorian immaterialities.

We warmly invite proposals for papers on these and related threads. Proposals will be due on 15th February 2007. All proposals should be two pages (500 words) long; please include in addition a one-page curriculum vitae. Please submitted electronically as an attachment in .doc or .rtf format to navsa@uvic.ca>navsa@uvic.ca. All participants must have paid 2007 NAVSA (http://www.cla.purdue.edu/academic/engl/navsa/) or VSAWC (http://web.uvic.ca/vsawc/about.html) dues. Questions should be directed to Dr. Lisa Surridge, University of Victoria: lsurridg@uvic.ca

Department of English University of Victoria P.O. Box 3070 Victoria B.C. V8W 3W1 Ph. 250-721-7246 Fax: 250-721-6498

27. Literary London

The 6th Annual Literary London conference will be hosted by the Department of English University of Westminster, London, at their 309 Regent Street building. (http://www.wmin.ac.England/page-42)

v London is one of the world's major cities with a long and rich literary tradition reflecting both its diversity and its significance as a cultural and commercial centre. Literary London 2007 aims to:

v Read literary and dramatic texts in their historical and social context and in relation to theoretical approaches to the study of the metropolis.

v Investigate the changing cultural and historical geography of London.

v Consider the social, political, and spiritual fears, hopes, and perceptions that have inspired representations of London.

v Trace different traditions of representing London and examine how the pluralism of London society is reflected in London literature and drama.

v Celebrate the contribution London and Londoners have made to English literature.

Proposals are invited for 20-minute papers which consider any period or genre of English literature about, set in, inspired by, or alluding to central and suburban London and its environs, from the city's roots in pre-Roman times to the present day.

While proposals on all topics and periods of London literature are encouraged, given the historical associations of Westminster's Regent Campus and the immediate area as a whole, this year we would especially welcome paper or panel proposals on the theme of the theatre and performance. Questions that might be addressed are: How has London been represented in theatre and performance from the middle ages to the present day? What role has the physical fabric of theatres, theatre companies and their associated institutions played in the life of London? How has London's theatrical life figured in theatrical and non-theatrical writing - as something useful and instructive, or as something dangerous and corrupting? Is there a sense in which literary and other texts suggest that London is a site of performance or itself in some way a type of performance? What role have different theatrical traditions (including such 'marginal' ones as clowning, street theatre, pantomime) played in the life of London? We welcome papers about the theatre and performance from central London to the suburbs and the streets. Though the main focus of the conference will be on literary, dramatic and performance texts, we actively encourage interdisciplinary contributions relating film, architecture, geography, theories of urban space, etc., to literary/dramatic representations of London. Papers from postgraduate students are welcome for consideration.

Abstracts of 200 words for 20-minute papers by 28th February 2007 to: contact@literarylondon.org or the postal address below. Proposals for panels of three speakers are also welcome.

Dr Lawrence Phillips (University of Northampton) and Dr Brycchan Carey (Kingston University), Literary London Organising Committee Department of English School of Arts, University of Northampton, Avenue Campus, St Georges Avenue, Northampton, NN2 6JD. FAX E-mail: contact@literarylondon.org Web site: www.literarylondon.org

The Annual Literary London conference is mutually supportive of the e-journal of the same name.

March

28. English Language Notes: SEX

Volume 45.2 of the new ELN (Fall/Winter 2007) seeks to make a radical intervention in the discourses of both spatiality and sexuality studies. Contributors will explore gay, lesbian, bisexual, and queer definitions of space not only in relation to the built environment but in response to a range of boundaries and sites.

We invite analyses of conceptual, geographical, discursive, virtual, and metaphoric understandings of queer space, welcoming in particular interdisciplinary essays that move beyond extant work on the topic that deals primarily with male experience. Contributors may consider, for example, any of the following: how homosexual desire inverts or complicates the logic of inside/outside; how representations of queer space intercede in the relations between visibility and power; how erotic connections construct a queer counter-public; how spaces such as streets, sex clubs, tearooms, and parks complicate notions of public and private; how the meaning of interior design and domestic space shifts when considered in relation to the ideologies and institutions of sexuality; how intimate physical contact with geographical spaces offers refuge from the perceived tyranny of heterosexuality; and how the mapping of a gay, lesbian, or bisexual subculture onto local, national, and international communities potentially reframes the categories of sex, gender, sexuality, nationality, and race. This ELN issue welcomes considerations of queer space that provide more than strictly sexual definitions of the term, and move beyond arguments that disclaim ‘queer’ either as excessively capacious or exclusionary (as it seeks to embrace readings of the ways women and lesbians occupy these spaces).

By broadening the conceptual framework of spatiality and sexuality studies beyond the parameters that typically have defined it for the past decade, we aim to examine how the obsessions, anxieties, and taboos that characterize what we might call amoral sensual spaces come to be linked with gay and lesbian sensibilities. The editors solicit original work that seeks to challenge heteronormative understandings of ‘space’ while problematizing the term ‘queer.’

Position papers, notes, and essays of no longer than 20 manuscript pages are invited on this subject from scholars in all fields of literary and cultural studies; the editors would be delighted to consider together two or more related contributions engaging one another on particular themes to be published as topical clusters. Book reviews on queer space topics are also welcome.

Please send contributions and/or proposals to The Editors, English Language Notes, University of Colorado at Boulder, 226 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309-0226. Deadline for final submissions is 1st March 2007. Specific inquires regarding volume 45.2 may be directed to the issue editor, Jane Garrity, via e-mail garrity@buffmail.Colorado.EDU.

29. LITERARY TOURISM & NINETEENTH-CENTURY CULTURE

An International One-Day Conference to be held on Friday, 8th June 2007. Institute for English Studies, University of London, England.

This conference aims to consider in a panoramic and synthetic fashion the emergence of nineteenth-century interest in literary sites, and the development of literary genres associated with this interest. Literary tourism, the visiting of places associated with writers and their writings, becomes a cultural commonplace over the course of the nineteenth century. This period saw the invention of 'Wordsworth's Lake District', 'The Land of Burns', 'Dickens's London' and 'Hardy's Wessex', among other imagined territories (together with the retrospective reification of 'Shakespeare's Stratford'), and with them emerged the practice of preserving and displaying the houses of dead writers. Literary tourism made over the landscapes of the nation variously as source, ground, glossary, and appendix to the literary canon, and has continued to do so. Attending to the traces of its emergence and refinement can provide unusually intimate glimpses of the history of reading, revealing how nineteenth-century readers imbued real places with emotional associations derived from imaginative texts. It allows us to examine the ways in which nineteenth-century literary modes, perhaps most especially biography and fictional realism, seem to have produced a new relation between reader and text, soliciting the reader to locate and visit the locations of the book as a supplementary reading practice.

Confirmed speakers include: Alison Booth (University of Virginia), Simon Bainbridge (Lancaster University & Wordsworth Centre), Juliet John (University of Liverpool and Gladstone Centre for Victorian Studies), Pamela Corpron Parker (Whitworth College), Nicola J Watson (Open University).

We welcome offers of individual papers or paper panels from both new and established scholars from the disciplines of literature, cultural geography, cultural history, heritage and tourism studies. Topics may include (but are not confined to): changing views on the relations between texts and landscapes; literary tourism and the idea of nation (both within Britain and beyond); literary pilgrimage and transatlantic cultural affairs; the literary canon, travel and the colonial subject; the cult of the writer's grave, the writer's birthplace, the writer's desk; the text and the souvenir; literary tourism and its relationships to novelistic realism; the writer as tourist and/or tourist guide; the invention of 'literary London'; the development of genres associated with literary tourism, ranging from plaques, memorials, and monuments, to the periodical essay, to relics, souvenirs and guidebooks, to literary maps and 'rambles', to personal accounts of 'pilgrimages', and to the forerunners of the illustrated coffee-table book.

Abstracts of no more than 300 words together with short speaker biographies and full contact details to be sent electronically by 1st March 2007 to the organiser at the following address: Dr Nicola J. Watson (n.j.watson@open.ac.England). Organised by the Literature Department of the Open University and the Institute of English Studies, University of London.

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