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<body class='hmmessage'><div dir='ltr'><font style="font-size: 12pt;" size="3">Dear colleagues,<br>
<br>
Please find below and attached a Call for Papers for a
postgraduate/early career researcher conference to be held at the
University of Melbourne between 22-23 September 2014. Please feel free
to forward this on to your respective networks.
<br>
<br>
<br>
<b>The View from Above: Cosmopolitan Culture and its Critics An
interdisciplinary conference for post-graduate students and early career
researchers</b><br>
Monday 22 and Tuesday 23 September 2014<br>
University of Melbourne<br>
<b><br>
Keynote speakers:</b> <br><br>Professor John M. Ganim, University of California, Riverside (on cosmopolitan medievalism)<br><br>Dr. Brigid Rooney, University of Sydney
(on cosmopolitanism and suburbia in literature)<br>
<br>
‘Cosmopolitanism’ connotes a dynamic, eclectic and sophisticated
cultural sphere, one that transcends borders and national differences.
Although the term is an ancient one, deriving from the Greek word
kosmopolitês, its meaning has never been stable. The notion
of the cosmopolitan is glamorous and in some respects elitist,
suggesting a ‘luxuriously free-floating view from above’ (Bruce Robbins,
Cosmopolitics, 1998). At the same time, it has utopian connotations of
pluralism and universality.<br>
<br>
In the last decade or so, discourses of cosmopolitanism have experienced
a resurgence. The term is increasingly associated with
multiculturalism, diasporic culture and the impact of globalisation.
Critics have advocated new forms of ‘rooted’, ‘vernacular’,
postcolonial and even ‘refugee’ cosmopolitanism, in an attempt to break
away from Eurocentric canons and outmoded nation-based identity
politics. But do these new accounts of cosmopolitanism resolve the
tension between its egalitarian and elitist impulses?
Are aspirations to cosmopolitanism still, as Simon Gikandi suggests,
‘an essential mark of bourgeois identity and privilege’?<br>
<br>
This conference invites participants to explore cosmopolitanism, both as
a utopian project and as an object of critique. While the focus of the
conference is on literature and literary criticism, we welcome papers
addressing theatre, the visual arts, popular
culture, translation and other forms of cultural expression in either
contemporary or historical settings. We also strongly encourage
contributions from creative writers.
<br>
<br>
Presenters may choose to focus on Australian cosmopolitanisms or address
broader categories such as the postcolonial or the transnational.<br>
<br>
Topics for discussion might include:<br>
<br>
* old and new cosmopolitanisms (including the influence of classical,
medieval and early modern texts on more recent understandings of the
cosmopolitan)<br>
* cosmopolitan sensibilities in colonial, postcolonial and diasporic literatures<br>
* cosmopolitanism and class<br>
* cosmopolitanism and the metropolitan/regional<br>
* feminist engagements with cosmopolitanism<br>
* cosmopolitanism and sexuality<br>
* cosmopolitanism, advertising, popular culture and everyday life<br>
* transnationalism and globalisation, parochialism and provinciality<br>
* cosmopolitan readerships and polities; the role of translation<br>
* creative practice and the cosmopolitan<br>
* the text as a cosmopolitan space<br>
* utopianism and cosmopolitan futures<br>
<br>
The convenors welcome abstracts from postgraduate and early career
researchers working in any field of the humanities, particularly
literary studies, creative writing, theatre studies, history (including
art history), cultural studies and translation studies.
Please forward an abstract of no more than 250 words to
viewfromaboveconference@gmail.com <b>by Monday 19 May 2014.</b><br>
<b><br>
Co-convenors:</b><br>
Dr. Katie Hansord <br>
Catherine Noske <br>
Lucinda O’Brien <br>
Dr. Jay Daniel Thompson<br>
<br>
<br>
Supported by the Association for the Study of Australian Literature</font><br><br><br>Warm regards, <br><br><b>Dr. Jay Daniel Thompson<br>Book Reviews Editor <br>Journal of the Association for the Study of Australian Literature<br>Research Services Office<br>Level 2, David Myers Building<br>La Trobe University<br>Bundoora, Vic. 3086<br><strong>Telephone: 0439 488 046</strong></b><strong><br></strong> </div></body>
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