Tag Archives: cultural memory

CFP: 54th Annual CompLit Conference: “Cultural Memory and Trauma: Literary and Visual Representations”

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The Comparative World Literature Program at California State University, Long Beach, invites abstracts for presentations at its 54th annual conference in Long Beach, California. This year we would like participants to consider the relationship between trauma and memory, both individual and collective memory and their intersections, within a variety of disciplinary contexts. How is a cultural memory formed, or how do cultures remember the past? How do different voices/media contribute to constructing a cultural memory? How does the act of commemorating trauma affect or even alter the way that an experience is remembered?

We invite papers on the following topics, which can include but are not limited to:

between memory and history: cultural memory as representation
in tension with the past: absence and memory
embodied memory: the body as container and conveyer of memory
the role of objects in preserving cultural memory
cultural memory, trauma, and ritual: the role of religion
individual experience and cultural memory: post-colonial approaches
transmitting traumatic memories: the role of culture
the female/trans/queer/etc. body as a carrier of memory
the phenomenon of Holocaust deniers / deniers in general: contesting cultural memory
testimonials / bearing witness: the importance of oral tradition within cultural memory
cultural cognition: how cultural values shape risk perception
the role of culture in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
dealing with trauma through comedy & mediated memory

Proposals for 15-20 minute presentations should clearly explain the relationship of the paper to the conference theme, describe the evidence to be examined, and offer tentative conclusions. Abstracts of no more than 300 words (not including optional bibliography) should be submitted by January 31, 2019. Please submit abstracts as a Word document as an email attachment to comparativeworldliterature@gmail.com. Please do not embed proposals in the text of the email. The conference committee will review all proposals, with accepted papers receiving notification by February 21, 2019.

Event: Seeing War: War and Cultural Memory

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Friday 25 May, St. Luke’s Chapel, TORCH, University of Oxford

The day will include a morning postgraduate seminar run by Laura Harrison, Rob Page, and Chris Kempshall, with readings circulated in advance. The afternoon includes a panel on Visualising War, with the photographer Jason Larkin discussing his project Past Perfect and the writer Robert Schultz talking about his collaborative project on memory of the American Civil War, War Memoranda. The keynote from Marita Sturken (whose work we read in our first seminar in Oxford) is on 9/11 memory, considering the the 9/11 memorial and the Flight 93 memorial comparatively. There’ll be a closing roundtable as usual featuring Mike Hammond. The venue this time is the lovely St. Luke’s Chapel on the Radcliffe Humanities site in Oxford.

The day is free and open to all and includes lunch, coffee and a reception. Please feel free to tweet about the event in advance using the hashtag #seeingwar

Registration is open; please register here.

Schedule
10.00: Coffee and Registration

10.15-12.00: Workshop led by ECRs – Rob Page, Laura Harrison, Chris Kempshall

12.00-13.00: Lunch

13.00-13.15: Opening Remarks – Alice Kelly

13.15-14.30: Panel: Visualising Conflict – Jason Larkin and Robert Schultz, chaired by Dominic Davies

14.30-15.00: Coffee

15.00-16.00: Keynote – Marita Sturken, chaired by Lucinda Borkett-Jones

16.00-17.00: Closing Roundtable – Marita Sturken, Michael Hammond, chaired by Alice Kelly

17.00: Wine Reception

For those of you on Twitter, check out the Twitter Takeover by Postgraduates and ECRs happening every week in the run up to this debate, featuring the Bright Young Things of war and memory studies. So far we’ve had week-long takeovers by Hanna Smyth, Louise Bell, Rob Page, Laura Harrison, and currently up is Jan Tattenberg. Still to come are Chris Kempshall, Eleanor Rowley and Doreen Pastor. Follow the conversation @cultcommwar

Survey: ‘Reflections on the Centenary of the First World War: Learning and Legacies for the Future’

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Between 2014 and 2018 Britain, together with many other nations, is commemorating the centenary of the First World War – the first ‘total’ war of the 20th century – the legacies of which live on in a range of institutional, educational, geographic, political, social and cultural forms. At the outset of the centenary, a particular ‘cultural memory’ of the war dominated in Britain, one described by the then Education Minister Michael Gove as a ‘Blackadder myth…designed to belittle Britain and its leaders’ (Daily Mail, 2 January 2014).
Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC), over the course of three years (2017 – 2020), this project sets out to both evaluate the extent to which the range of commemorative activities undertaken since 2014 has engaged with, challenged, or changed this ‘myth’, and the experience and outcomes of projects that are built on academic-public engagement and the co-production of knowledge, especially those involving the AHRC World War One Engagement Centres.

The three main aims of this research project are:
– to evaluate activities during the centenary period of the First World War in the United Kingdom in order to trace and analyse shifting patterns of cultural memory;
– to evaluate these activities in order to assess how successful they have been in involving diverse members of the community in their production and reception;
– and to consider the lessons and legacies of these projects for a range of stakeholders involved in planning for future anniversaries and events.

To complete the survey and find out more about the ‘Reflections on the Centenary of the First World War’ project, please visit:
http://reflections1418.exeter.ac.uk
@reflections1418
Download poster: Reflections on the Centenary of the FWW – Survey A4 Poster

For all enquiries about the ‘Reflections on the Centenary of the First World War’ project, please contact the Project PI, Professor Lucy Noakes: l.noakes@essex.ac.uk

Research is conducted under the guidelines of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). All survey responses will be highly confidential and the anonymity of all respondents is assured.

The ‘Reflections on the Centenary of the First World War’ project is run by Professor Lucy Noakes (University of Essex) alongside Dr Emma Hanna (Kent), Professor Lorna Hughes (Glasgow), Dr Catriona Pennell (Exeter), and Dr James Wallis (Essex).

CfP: Their Past, Their Memory? King’s College, London, 15 Sept, 2017

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King’s College London, 15 September 2017

A one-day interdisciplinary workshop hosted at King’s College, London as part of the AHRC-funded Teaching and Learning War Research Network to explore young people’s engagement with and receptivity to the cultural memory messages of the two world wars from an international comparative perspective. We welcome abstract submissions from academic researchers and educational practitioners in schools, museums, non-profit organisations, archives and heritage organisations.

The event will be structured around short presentations of no more than 15 minutes ensuring maximum time for group discussion.

General queries and abstracts of no more than 200 words should be sent to Catriona Pennell (C.L.Pennell@exeter.ac.uk) by 9 June 2017. Please include your name, organisation/institution and contact email in the abstract.

While the workshop is free to attend for all, the AHRC is also providing fifteen travel bursaries of up to £100pp for those travelling from outside the Greater London area – please indicate on your abstract/in your email whether you would like to be considered for the bursary. Priority will be given to PGRs, ECRs, and representatives of non-academic institutions/organisations.

Download call for papers: Their Past, Their Memory_CfP