THE OSCHOLARS
___________
Vol. IV No. 2
issue no 33: February
2007
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 
for the main pages of this issue of THE OSCHOLARS
To hub page 
|To THE OSCHOLARS
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For the Table of Contents, click 
Click on 
for quick access to any of these calls.
Calls in bold have a specific reference to Wilde.
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1. Victorian Emotions |
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2. Time and the Victorian
Press |
8. Ruskinian
Theatre |
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3. Victorian Materialities
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9. Victorian Art Criticism |
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4. Sex
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10. George Gissing |
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5. Literary Tourism &
19thc Culture |
11. Victorian Women &
The Occult |
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6. Literary |
12. Ford Madox Ford
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2007
February
I. 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:
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
II. TIME AND THE VICTORIAN PRESS
The Research Society for Victorian
Periodicals (RSVP) will be holding its annual conference at
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
III. 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
The conference will take place at the
Laurel Point Inn on
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
Department of English
March
IV. 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,
V. LITERARY TOURISM & NINETEENTH-CENTURY CULTURE
An International One-Day Conference to be
held on
Institute for English Studies,
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
(
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
Organised by the Literature Department of the Open University
and the
VI. Literary London
The 6th Annual Literary London conference
will be hosted by the Department of English University of
v
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
v
Consider the
social, political, and spiritual fears, hopes, and perceptions that have
inspired representations of
v
Trace different
traditions of representing
v
Celebrate the
contribution
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
Abstracts of 200 words for 20-minute papers
by
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 Telephone: 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.
April
VII. Symbiosis
From Dr. Philip Tew:
I am contacting you in my capacity as the new joint managing editor of Symbiosis: A Journal of Anglo-American Literary & Cultural Studies. Our website is at http://www.symbiosisonline.org.uk/.
We are organizing our sixth biennial conference at Brunel University in July 2007 in which you may be interested. Submission deadline: Sunday 8th April, 2007.
VIII. Ruskinian Theatre Contemporary Issues in Theatre Historiography
University of Birmingham, 6th-7th July, 2007
Proposals are invited for papers and respondents for a two day colloquium sponsored by the History Department at Lancaster University, the Department of Drama and Theatre Arts, University of Birmingham, and the AHRC.
This colloquium is part of the AHRC funded project: Ruskinian Theatre: the Aesthetics of the Nineteenth-Century London Popular Stage, 1870-1900, which seeks to investigate the interrelationships and influences of John Ruskin’s aesthetic and social theories on the popular London stage in the late nineteenth-century. Our meeting in 2005 focussed on “Ruskin, Shakespeare, and the Victorian Theatre” and was part of the “Victorian Life Writing” conference at Lancaster University.
In 2006, we met at Lancaster University for a colloquium on the Victorian Theatre and Visual Culture, and a collection of essays has been developed from this meeting. In 2007, in our final meeting at the University of Birmingham, we'll be exploring the historiographical issues to arise from this and other innovative work in theatre history and historiography. In 2007, our focus is on the re-visionings and rethinkings of theatre history and historiography. In the last 20 years, there has been a significant movement in developing new approaches to theatre history and historiography which has been labelled "The New Theatre History." Much of this work has focused on the theatre of Britain in the nineteenth century, in particular in the first three decades of the century, and its final years, as significant moments of the transition into modernity.
The Ruskinian Theatre project takes as its rationale a revision of the standard narratives of theatre and cultural history in this period which ignore the popular theatre: we challenge the focus of standard theatre histories on the ‘literary drama’ and an emergent Modernist aesthetic. In this call for papers we seek offers of original work in theatre history and historiography which seek to examine new standard narratives of theatre history. While the focus of the project is on the period 1870- 1901, in this call for papers, we do not preclude work dealing with other national theatre culture or time periods. We are particularly interested in new theatre history and historiographical research which attempts to marry detailed archival work within new theoretical formulations, particularly those emerging after the "linguistic turn" of poststructuralism. We also interested in the insights derived from cross- and interdisciplinary work, particularly from scholars whose work is concerned with the relationships between theatre history and cultural history. Papers of 30 minutes length are invited which address these themes:
• debates over the ‘literary’ and/or ‘legitimate’ drama vs. the popular and the spectacular
• relationships of practice between literary theatre, Modernist theatre, and popular and spectacular theatre
• the concept of a ‘National Theatre’ and/or a ‘National Drama’
• studies of the interactions of theatre managements and contemporary artists
• regional theatre histories
• the self-representation of women theatre practitioners
• the relationship between theatre history and cultural history and cultural studies
• the use of theatre and performance history by historians of society and culture
Proposals should reach the convenors by 30th April 2007.
We particularly encourage offers of papers from postgraduate students, and expect that there will be two postgraduate bursaries subsidising attendance.
Further enquiries, applications for postgraduate bursaries and proposals should be directed to: Peter Yeandle, Ruskinian Theatre Research Associate, Department of History, Lancaster University, Lancaster, LA1 4YG, p.yeandle@lancaster.ac.uk
Website: http://www.lancs.ac.uk/fass/centres/ruskin/research/ruskiniantheatre.htm
Convenors: Peter Yeandle Kate Newey Jeffrey Richards
May
IX. Don’t Mind the Gap: Continuities in British Art Criticism, 1880–1914
The 96th Annual Conference of the College Art Association will be held 20th to 23rd February 2008 Dallas for the first time in history.
Deadline for proposals for papers: 11th May 2007.
The transition from the Victorian era to twentieth-century modernism has proved difficult to bridge in histories of British art. Indeed, the study of art before and after 1900 still constitutes two largely distinct fields. This session seeks a more fluid approach by examining continuities and ruptures in art criticism ca. 1880– 1914. Commentators such as J. Comyns Carr, Edmund Gosse, D. S. MacColl, George Moore, Claude Phillips, George Bernard Shaw, and Marion Spielmann were involved in it at least by the 1880s, and we seek proposals that connect the roles such writers played in Victorian art to their positions within modernism. How did critics’ changing or unchanging opinions influence artists’ reputations?
How did this determine their own standing and that of their publications? In what ways were loyalties between critics and artists tested or maintained as tastes changed? The cochairs intend to develop for publication a collection of papers addressing these and related questions.
More details at http://conference.collegeart.org/2008/
Martina Droth, Henry Moore Institute, martina@henry-moore.ac.uk and Peter Trippi, Fine Art Connoisseur, peter@fineartconnoisseur.com
June
X. THIRD INTERNATIONAL GEORGE GISSING CONFERENCE "WRITING OTHERNESS: THE PATHWAYS OF GEORGE GISSING'S IMAGINATION"
LILLE, FRANCE 27th-28th MARCH 2008 (Thursday & Friday following the Easter weekend)
The efforts of scholars in the last half-century have served to confirm George Gissing's ranking among the major writers of fiction of his age. The steady flow in recent years of multifaceted comment on his writings speaks for itself, and the impressive amount of unpublished material made available over the last two decades is providing invaluable new clues to his artistic practices. Interestingly, Gissing's growing pertinence is not merely that of a leading exponent and translator of late Victorian culture. His art is also increasingly regarded as rooted in his recognition of separateness, understood as aesthetic gesture as much as theme. Papers are therefore sought on all aspects of Gissing's contacts and/or confrontations with the Other, on his receptiveness to and negotiation of, ego-threatening novelty, to be defined in a variety of ways: cultural, intellectual, ideological, artistic. Discussions of his (mis-)representation of the defamiliarized self in his fictional constructs and personal writings, are also invited: the venue being Lille in France, Gissing's last homeland, papers on the correlative issue of his reading of Englishness and foreignness will be most welcome.
Advisory Committee: Professor Pierre Coustillas (University of Lille 3); Professor Constance Harsh (Colgate University); Dr Christine Huguet (University of Lille 3); Dr Simon J. James (Durham University); Dr Emma Liggins (Manchester Metropolitan University); Dr Diana Maltz (Southern Oregon University); Dr Bouwe Postmus (University of Amsterdam); Dr John Sloan (Harris Manchester College, Oxford).
Proposals (200-300 words), together with brief CV, should be sent to Christine Huguet (Conference organiser) at the following address: christine.huguet-meriaux@univ-lille3.fr.
Deadline for submission of proposals: 4th June 2007
Conference Venue and Enquiries: Maison de la Recherche, Université Charles de Gaulle-Lille 3 (CECILLE Research Centre, University of Lille, with the academic support of IES, University of London). Conference information and registration forms available at: www.evenements.univ-lille3.fr/recherche/colloque-george-gissing.
October
XI. Victorian Women and the Occult
Special issue of Women’s Writing
Increasingly, contemporary scholarship reveals the strong connection between Victorian women and the world of the nineteenth-century supernatural. Women were intrinsically bound to the occult and the esoteric, from mediums who materialised spirits to the epiphanic experiences of the new woman, from theosophy to telepathy. This special issue of Women’s Writing seeks to address the various ways in which Victorian women expressed themselves and were constructed by the occult through a broad range of texts.
Topics may include but are not limited to:
v Women and Spiritualism
v Women authors and the Victorian ghost story
v Women as investigators of the supernatural
v The representation of the occult on the Victorian stage by actresses and women playwrights
v Crystal gazing and writing
v Women and Theosophy
v Mesmerism, healing and women practitioners
v Women, transcendent experience and madness
v Women and secret societies
Please submit papers for consideration between 3000-7000 words to Dr Tatiana Kontou, T.Kontou@sussex.ac.uk, University of Sussex, by 31st October 2007.
Contributors should follow the journal’s house style details of which are to be found on the Women’s Writing web site http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/titles/0999082.asp.
2008
XII. Ford Madox Ford
Conference in 2008
A conference is planned for 2008 at the Åbo Academy, Turku, Finland, on ‘Ford Madox Ford as Editor: Literary Magazines, Collaboration and Community-Making’; to be organized by Jason Harding.
In order to celebrate the centenary of the founding of the English Review this conference will seek to re-examine Ford Madox Ford's impact as editor. The conference will focus specifically on contextualizing Ford's role on the English Review and the transatlantic review in light of his editorial principles and his collaboration with many important writers of the age. The conference will explore Ford's associations with cosmopolitan coteries and expatriate networks in the service of building avant-garde 'communities'. The conference particularly encourages re-assessments of Ford's editorial influence on his collaborators: Conrad, Wells, Henry James, Hardy, Bennett, Galsworthy, Pound, Lewis and Lawrence on the English Review and Joyce, Hemingway, Stein, Rhys, Williams and E. E. Cummings on the transatlantic review. The conference also encourages papers examining the cross-cultural dimensions of Ford's editorship, in terms of literary translation (for example, Constance Garnett's Russian translations), modernist internationalism and expatriate 'community-making'.
A volume of IFMFS is planned for 2010 on the theme of Ford as Editor, or Ford and Literary Magazines, to be edited by Jason Harding.
For further information on the Conference
in 2008 or to offer a paper or essay please contact:
Jason Harding: jasondh90@hotmail.com
See also http://www.english.bham.ac.England/fordmadoxford2006/literarycontacts.htm
v For a note on the Ford Madox Ford Society, click here.
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