12 June 2013 |
Narratives of Ageing in Contemporary Britain
Fiction and the Cultural Mediation of Ageing (FCMAP): New Narratives of Ageing in Contemporary Britain investigates (a) the relationship between cultural representations of, and social attitudes to, ageing, and (b) the potential of critical reflection and elective reading by older subjects for engendering new ways of thinking about ageing. The objectives of the FCMAP project are to compile a mass-market paperback anthology, entitled In Our Age, weaving together a number of ordinary people’s diary-type narratives, and to organise a public day event in central London in June 2013 designed to attract user groups, stakeholders, policy makers, academics and the general public. |
13 - 15 June 2013 |
New Elizabethans 1953-2013: Nation, Culture, and Modern Identity
Papers are invited for a major international, interdisciplinary conference coinciding with the 60-year anniversary of the Coronation. This conference will explore the ways in which the ideal of a new (or second) Elizabethan age has been variously defined, promoted, and challenged in Britain and the Commonwealth. Following closely after the London Olympics and Jubilee celebrations, it will also offer a fitting opportunity to explore the ways in which these values continue to present themselves in contemporary definitions of national identity, culture, and character. |
19 June 2013 |
Research Symposium on the Cowell Manuscript
A KEY DOCUMENT IN THE HISTORY OF THE SHAKESPEARE AUTHORSHIP CONTROVERSY: A Research Symposium upon the Cowell Manuscript in the Durning-Lawrence Library, Senate House Library. Sponsored by: The Institute of English Studies, the Senate House Library and The Friends of Senate House Library The theory that Francis Bacon wrote Shakespeare’s plays was given a dramatic boost when the Cowell Manuscript (MS294) at the University of London came to light in 1932. Here, it seemed, was evidence in the form of two lectures by James Corton Cowell from 1805 that the Warwickshire clergyman James Wilmot had been a Baconian in about 1785. When the manuscript was publicised, it transformed scholarship, moving the theory back by over sixty years. But in 2010 Professor James Shapiro of Columbia University used textual evidence to expose the manuscript as an early-twentieth-century forgery in his Contested Will (Faber). In this symposium we explore the Cowell manuscript and its background from four contributors. New insights on the manuscript’s provenance from its editor, Karen Attar, its editor, and from the recent forensic examination of the manuscript’s paper by the paper historian and analyst, Peter Bower, and its ink by Nicholas Eastaugh of Art Access and Research will augment the textual and literary findings of James Shapiro, currently S. T. Lee Visiting Professor in the School of Advanced Study, thus shedding new light on a longstanding and fiercely contested theory. |
21 - 22 June 2013 |
Sherlock Holmes: Past and Present
This conference offers a serious opportunity to bring together academics, enthusiasts, creative practitioners and popular writers in a shared discussion about the cultural legacy of Sherlock Holmes. |
22 June 2013 |
Rushdie in the 21st Century
Keynote speakers: Dr Nick Bentley (Keele), Dr Stephen Morton (Southampton) ‘[H]e will dream about this scene, understanding that his story is a sort of prologue: the tale of the moment when the first blackbird lands’ – Salman Rushdie In his recently published memoir, Joseph Anton, Salman Rushdie makes a connection between the fatwa placed upon him in 1989 and the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001. Borrowing an image from the opening sequence of Hitchcock’s The Birds, he suggests that that the conflict with Islamist extremism that characterises discourse around the current ‘war on terror’ first made itself felt in the West during the Satanic Verses affair. More than a decade on from 9/11, the attacks now sit at the midpoint of Rushdie’s post-fatwa career, from the moment he was forced into hiding to the publication of his memoir in 2012. Some critics have identified a rightwards shift in Rushdie’s politics over the second half of this period, while others have argued that it would be more accurate to identify a shift in the political world around him. This symposium aims to contribute to this debate by questioning Rushdie’s work – both fictional and non-fictional – throughout the last decade. In doing so, it seeks to answer the following: What changes have taken place in Rushdie’s writing in the early 21st Century? What can his recent writing tell us about the contemporary world? And what might it tell us about the role of literature in an age of conflicting fundamentalisms? |
06 July 2013 |
How To Get Published
In association with the Institute of English Studies, this all-day conference by Writers & Artists (Bloomsbury Publishing) will include panel discussions from editorial directors at some of the UK’s leading publishing houses, advice on how to pitch your novel with literary agents, chats with authors and a seminar on editorial dos and don’ts. |
10 - 12 July 2013 |
Victorian Popular Fiction Association: 5th Annual Conference
Theme: 'Bodies' and Victorian Popular Culture Keynote Speakers: Dr Elizabeth Hurren (University of Leicester) and Professor Pamela K. Gilbert (University of Florida) The Victorian Popular Fiction Association conference is recognized as an important event on the annual conference circuit and offers a friendly and invigorating opportunity for established academics and post graduate students to share their current research. Our theme this year is ‘Bodies’ and Victorian Popular Culture. This theme enables us to develop the interdisciplinary study of nineteenth-century popular culture and explore a wide range of nineteenth century ‘bodies’ - social, political, financial, charitable, voluntary, campaigning, workplace and work organisations, trade, trade unions, industry, education, guilds, literary and scientific associations - as well as the more obvious human body. |
15 July 2013 |
Literature, Community and its Limits: Romanticism to Today
On the 30th anniversary of both La communauté désoeuvrée and Imagined Communities, this conference seeks to explore current ways that "community" and literature (in its widest acceptation) are and have been conceived over the last 250 years. Through exploration of the past, the conference hopes to begin formulating new ways of thinking about how we do and can live together in an environment mediated by words on a page. |
17 - 19 July 2013 |
Literary London 2013: Representations of London in Literature
The 2013 conference theme is 'London in Crisis and Disorder', and the conference will feature keynote talks by Vic Gattrell, Courttia Newland, and Matthew Rubery as well as a plenary roundtable on 'London Fictions' hosted by BBC journalist Philippa Thomas. |
22 - 23 July 2013 |
Language, Culture and Society in Russian/English Studies
Organised and sponsored by the Moscow Institute of Foreign Languages, the Russian Academy of Sciences, the Russian Academy of Linguistics and The Journal of Philology. The conference is devoted to the development of English and Russian studies, lexicography, sociolinguistics, English teaching in Russia, and the History of the Book. |
07 - 10 August 2013 |
Word and Music Studies: Ninth International Conference (2013)
It is our pleasure to invite you to London for this Ninth International Conference of the International Association for Word and Music Studies (WMA). The conference is hosted by the Literature and Music Research Group of the Open University. It will take place in Senate House, University of London, in association with The Institute of Musical Research and The Institute of English Studies. The conference will be held at the Senate House of the University of London, in Bloomsbury. The conference will open with a welcoming reception, followed by an inaugural concert by WMA members, from 6.00–8.30 p.m. on Wednesday 7 August. There will also be a river cruise on the Thames on the afternoon of Saturday 10 August. The conference is taking place during the celebrated BBC Proms concerts, held at the Royal Albert Hall in South Kensington (approximately 30 minutes travel from the conference venue). To book a place, download and complete the booking form available at http://music.sas.ac.uk/events/conferences. Please send your completed booking form with a sterling cheque for the full amount made payable to the ‘University of London’ to Valerie James, Institute of Musical Research, Senate House, Malet Street, London WC1E 7HU. To arrive no later than Friday 5 July 2013. Those registering from overseas who wish to pay by credit card should email music@sas.ac.uk so that we can email a credit card payment form to them. The conference fee is £30 UK sterling (£20 for students and unwaged). If you are a member of WMA, the conference fee is included in your annual membership subscription. Single-day registration is available for £15 (£10 for students and unwaged). The fee includes the registration pack, attendance at conference papers and recitals, and refreshments. It does not include accommodation or meals. For the excursion on Saturday, an additional fee of £25 is payable. Download the conference circular (available at http://wordmusicstudies.org/events.htm) for information about accommodation and travel to London. We look forward to welcoming you at the conference. Local organizers: Robert Samuels, of the Department of Music at The Open University, and Delia da Sousa Correa, of the Department of English at The Open University. |
28 August 2013 |
Anti-Communism: Culture, Literature, Propaganda
Organisers: Dr Benjamin Kohlmann (Columbia University/Freiburg University) and Dr Matthew Taunton (University of East Anglia) Some two decades after the fall of the Soviet Union, this symposium will explore the complex literary and cultural legacies of one of the twentieth century's most influential and under-theorised political philosophies. |
12 - 14 September 2013 |
The Power of the Word: Poetry: Word Made Flesh: Flesh Made Word
Organised jointly by Heythrop College, University of London; the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study, University of London; and the Faculty of Languages of the University of Gdańsk. Venue: University of Gdańsk, Poland The third Power of the Word conference focuses on the themes of revelation, incarnation and human embodiment in relation to poetry. It seeks to take further a dialogue inaugurated by Heythrop College, University of London, in 2011, where the first conference was held, and continued at the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Study (also University of London) in 2012, between theologians, philosophers, literary scholars and creative writers. The beautiful Hanseatic city of Gdańsk provides a fitting setting for such reflection. Its rich cultural history involves diverse religious traditions, well evoked, for example, in Gunter Grass’s The Tin Drum. The home of the Solidarity movement, it has always been a hospitable city that has welcomed visitors and enjoyed cultural variety; while its connections with literature in English go back to Shakespeare’s time, when the city had an Elizabethan theatre stage that was used by English itinerant players. The University of Gdańsk is situated midway between the city centre and the spa town of Sopot, not far from the historic cathedral of Oliwa. Confirmed keynote speakers: Revd Professor David Brown (Institute for Theology, Imagination & the Arts, St Mary's College, University of St Andrews), Professor Michael Edwards (Collège de France), Professor Angela Leighton (Trinity College, Cambridge), Professor Tadeusz Sławek (University of Silesia), Professor Andrzej Wierciński (University of Freiburg). |
12 - 13 September 2013 |
The Marginalised Mainstream: Fading and Emerging: Tracing the Mainstream in Literature and Popular Culture
Keynote Speakers include: Dr Kate Macdonald (Ghent University, Brussels) and Dr Nicola Humble (University of Roehampton, London) ‘Fading and Emerging: Tracing the Mainstream in Literature and Popular Culture’, the second annual Marginalised Mainstream conference, is seeking submissions from postgraduate students, early career academics and established researchers working in the fields of Literature, Cultural Studies and elsewhere in the Humanities. This conference will consider the phenomenon of academic marginalisation of popular culture and the mainstream. Specifically, the conference seeks to explore the issue of fading and emerging in culturally significant forms of popular fiction that have been subject to critical marginalisation. How does the mainstream itself foster fading and emerging? How are fading and emerging dealt with in popular fictions? |
01 - 04 October 2013 |
AfroEurope@ns IV: Black Cultures and Identities in Europe. Continental Shifts, Shifts in Perception
Afroeurope@s/Afroeurope@ns is an international research and development group funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation. The group is holding its Fourth International Conference in London, 1-4 October 2013 at Senate House, Malet House, London WC1E 7HU. The conference is supported by the Institute of English Studies, School of Advanced Studies at the University of London, and by the Postcolonial Literatures Research Group, Department of English at The Open University. The fourth conference will be a focus for the many strands of this dynamic field of study, and aims to include presentations on both established and emerging research areas of a trans - and multidisciplinary nature. CLICK HERE FOR CALL FOR PAPERS
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12 October 2013 |
Dickens Day 2013: Dickens and History
Dickens Day, now in its 27th year, is looking at how history, in all its manifold forms, features in Dickens’s life and work. Dickens’s early career was overshadowed by his intense desire to write a historical novel, emulating the success, literary kudos and profits of Sir Walter Scott. The result, Barnaby Rudge, was only moderately successful and has been unduly neglected by readers and students alike. At the other end of his career, his second historical novel, A Tale of Two Cities, was an immediate success and remains one of his most famous, read and studied works. The Victorians were profoundly exercised by the idea of history: the historical novel remained one of the most popular and prestigious literary genres; history and historiography were professionalised, theorised and institutionalised as objects of academic concern; and the period itself was shaped by epochal events of nation building, imperial rise and fall, and an increasing sense of historical progress and destiny. How did Dickens understand, represent and use history in his work and what were his political and personal investments in the idea of history? How can we account for the diametric fortunes of his two historical novels? What are the specific features of the Dickensian historical novel, and how do these relate to Dickens’s own professional and personal aspirations? Finally, what happens when we consider Dickens’s life and work within the context of Victorian history? These are some of the questions that the Day will address. |
01 - 02 November 2013 |
Dante and Milton: National Visionaries and Visionary Nationalists
Dante Alighieri and John Milton, the two vernacular composers of epic poems, hold firm positions in the literary canons of Italy and England respectively. Both authors have also become universal cultural icons deeply engrained in the world‘s cultural memory, with their importance extending vastly beyond their literary and political influence: on the one hand, Dante as the exiled avenger of sins and crimes, on the other, Milton as the blind polemicist and observer of current political affairs. This conference aims to explore the synchronic as well as the diachronic constructions of Dante and Milton as cultural icons, and so the main focus of analysis is the production of cultural memory, national and transnational alike. What makes this production and perpetuation of cultural memory so interesting is the variety of cultural techniques and media involved, from the highbrow to the lowbrow, scholarly articles to computer games. We invite papers that explore the motivations, mechanics, and symbolic processes that perpetuate certain images of Dante, Milton, and the relationship of both. The juxtaposition and comparison of Dante and Milton should invite a broader perspective that goes beyond the merely national contexts and also touches on the question of the emergence of a European Dante and a European Milton. At the same time, this comparison allows us to explore the opposite of cultural memory, namely processes of forgetting and side-lining authors or parts of their respective histories, which both authors have been subjected to throughout their literary reception. We therefore invite papers on the respective relations of these authors to, and their translation into, cultural icons as well as case-studies on the inter-relation or comparison of both. Please send an abstract (max 300 words) by 28 June 2013 to christoph.lehner@daad-alumni.de or csinger@mail.uni-paderborn.de See the conference page here. |
08 November 2013 |
The Weird: Fugitive Fictions/Hybrid Genres
Until recently weird fiction, if acknowledged at all, was usually considered to be a marginal mode in the already lowly Gothic tradition - less a genre than a particular affect. In the last ten years, however, it has come to be regarded as a separate and distinct form with an increasingly important role to play in the theory of popular genre. The debate has broadened its scope to perceive and explore connections with discourses, literary traditions and cultures not previously associated with the Weird. |
03 - 05 September 2014 |
Old and Middle English Studies: Texts and Sources
The study of Old and Middle English sources is critical for an understanding of early medieval language and literature in the British Isles. This joint conference aims to open up and explore new ways for intellectual exchange and collaboration between scholars working in any aspect of medieval English, in the UK and Japan especially. The theme for the 2014 conference is 'Texts and Sources'. Papers selected will be done so for their ability to link various branches of learning which are cognature to the study of medieval English, History, Language, Literature, Philology, to name just a few. |