Happy Holidays to all

Merry Christmas, Happy Hanukkah (I'm a little late, sorry), Blessed Be for this year's Winter Solstice (also late, sorry), a joyous Kwanzaa, and Happy New Year to all of you and your families.

May 2007 bring all of us peace and joy, and a few publications just to keep us all on track.  *S*

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CFP - Narratology in the Age of Interdisciplinary Narrative Research

CALL FOR PAPERS:  Narratology in the Age of Interdisciplinary Narrative Research (2/15/07;
6/25/07-6/26/07)

Papers are invited for the Inaugural Symposium of the Center for Narrative Research at Wuppertal University, Germany, 25-26 June, 2007.  The significance of narrative as a cognitive and communicative tool used to make sense of the world by creating personal and cultural identities or relating the present to the past and future is increasingly recognized in a variety of disciplines, ranging from literary studies and linguistics to anthropology, sociology, psychology, historiography and business studies, to name but a few. The growing interdisciplinary interest in narrative and storytelling, however, has so far not led to a convergence of theoretical frameworks and methodological approaches: Far from developing a 'lingua franca' for interdisciplinary discussions of narrative, the numerous studies of stories and storytelling in recent years seem to have contributed to a 'Babelisation' of narrative studies. This situation raises a number of questions which the contributions to the symposium will explore:

- What are the differences or similarities between (the analysis of) non-fictional and fictional storytelling?
- To what degree have the various disciplinary approaches to narrative acknowledged each other's findings? Do they proceed from the same premises?
- Can the terminology developed by narratological approaches to fiction serve as the basis for an interdisciplinary lingua franca in narrative research? Or is fictional narrative significantly different from non-fictional story-telling?
- How can (literary) narratology benefit from concepts and methods proposed by narrative researchers in other disciplines? Might the insights of narrative psychology, for instance, help to further shape the approach known as 'cognitive narratology'?
- Can 'narrative' and 'storytelling' function as 'travelling concepts' (Mieke Bal), facilitating interdisciplinary communication?
- Is there any common ground between hermeneutic, narratological and empirical methods of describing, analysing and interpreting narrative(s)?

We welcome contributions both from literary scholars and from narrative researchers in other disciplines. There will be keynote lectures by David Herman (Project Narrative, Ohio State University) and Bo Pettersson (Department of English, University of Helsinki). Please submit proposals for a 20-minute paper to Roy Sommer at rsommer@uni-wuppertal.de by February 15, 2007. Proposals should include both an abstract (150-250 words) and a short biographical note. All submissions will be considered for a prospective volume on the topic.

Prof. Dr. Roy Sommer
University of Wuppertal
English and American Studies
Gaussstrasse 20
D-42119 Wuppertal
Germany
E-mail: rsommer@uni-wuppertal.de

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CFP - The Spirit of the Age: Debating the Past, Present and Future of Life Writing

The Spirit of the Age:
Debating the Past, Present and Future of Life Writing

4-6 July 2007, Kingston University

Call for Papers

Speakers to include: Neal Ascherson, John Fuegi, Victoria Glendinning, Kathryn Hughes, Hanif Kureishi, Laura Marcus, Blake Morrison, Hilary Spurling, Claire Tomalin and Francis Wheen.

This, the first international interdisciplinary Conference on the Writing of Lives to be hosted jointly by the new Life Narratives Research Centre and the Faculties of Art and Social Science, and Art, Design and Architecture at Kingston University, aims to invite debate across these disciplines on the particular issues that have surrounded
the writing of lives in the past, and to foster discussion on the challenges and opportunities facing such endeavours today and tomorrow.

Hegel famously suggested, "the great man of the age is the one who can put into words the will of his age, tell his age what its will is and accomplish it. What he does is the heart and the essence of his age, he actualises his age". The Spirit of the Age conference is seeking to bring about interdisciplinary discussions and debates around the notion of Hegel's model of the making of an age by calling for papers from academics and practitioners working on life writing in any area of the arts or the academy on the topics listed below.

* Life Writing that defines an Age
* Marginal Lives and Historical Revision
* Witness/Survivor Memoirs
* Writing Lives in the Arts
* The Author as Subject: Writing Literary Lives
* Group Work: Writing on Multiple Subjects
* Writing Political Lives
* Short Lives/The Obituary
* Objects as Subjects: Writing Lives of the Material World

Proposals for panels, papers, workshops, round tables, film and interview presentations by practitioners and researchers should be submitted as abstracts of up to 300 words by Thursday 1st March 2007 to:

Penny Tribe,
'Spirit of the Age' Abstracts Administrator,
Kingston University,
Faculty of Art and Social Sciences
Penrhyn Road Kingston
KT1 2EE
Tel: +44 (0)208 547 2000
Email: fass-conferences@kingston.ac.uk

Conference Organisers: Dr Meg Jensen, Dr Jane Jordan and Professor Brian Brivati

http://fass.kingston.ac.uk/conferences/spirit_of_the_age/

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