I am pleased to announce that the 121^st Annual PAMLA Conference is open for special sessions. We had a great WIF turnout at PAMLA 2023 in Portland, and are hoping to have three dedicated WIF panels and one roundtable represented at PAMLA this year.

If you are interested in chairing a WIF special session or have an idea for a session that someone else could chair, please be in touch by March 15 (first deadline to submit special sessions is March 18).

PAMLA 2024 will be held at the Margaritaville Resort in Palm Springs, CA, from Thursday, October 31 to Sunday, November 3, 2024. Given its date and location, it is sure to be well-attended. And the conference theme this year is “TRANSLATION IN ACTION”—a subject that no doubt many of you will find inspiring. However, special sessions are not required to stick to the conference theme and may advance any subject of your choosing.

Looking very much forward to hearing your ideas!

Best wishes in the leap year,

Youna Kwak

WIF Western Regional Representative

youna_kwak@redlands.edu

The Modern Languages Association Committee on Disability Issues in the Profession is hosting 2 panels at MLA in January 9-12, 2025 in New Orleans.  We treat topics of interest to those of us in French and Francophone Studies. While the required 35-word limit might make these topics seem limited, they are not. Please feel free to reach out to either organizer with questions.

A brief synopsis of context: The fact is that French Studies faculty also face issues of disability—these can range from being Deaf to being neurodivergent, needing crip time and so much more. The publishing world (and some conferences) may not address the needs of those with disabilities. For the first subject a colleague of mine at a private college who was in a wheelchair ended up leaving a great tenure track job, not due to job performance nor her students—she and they were excellent—but because the college provided no accommodations, no recognition that without proper access she could not get into the theatre on her campus, for instance. Other brilliant colleagues have voiced how a flare-up of their disability might interfere with a deadline, etc. In short, once hired—are access needs, etc. relevant to their daily lives addressed properly? Visibility is the theme of the conference, and some with disability find themselves “invisible” to administration and others that do not “see” any need to provide access.

The second panel below points to the intersection of various concerns, performance and literature, etc. The topics are given as examples, please do not hesitate to contact Dr. Nelson if interested. The topics should intrigue our colleagues whether in US or abroad.

Deadline: March 15, 2024

Panel 1:

Disability and Hiring: access, accommodation, belonging, and retention

We welcome perspectives on disability hiring and what comes after. How can institutions leave space for the disabled to fully participate? How can we create belonging and retain our talented colleagues? Email E. Nicole Meyer, nimeyer@augusta.edu 250-word maximum abstract.

Panel 2:

Deaf performance, language, and art

Intersections of Deaf performance, language, and art that foster discussions in language, literature and/or performance studies welcome. Possible topics: Deaf theater/translation, Deaf performance art, DeafBlind/protactile theater, ASL literature, interpreting body as text, and beyond. Abstracts.

Email Jennifer Nelson, jennifer.nelson@gallaudet.edu

Just so you know: we provide access copies, deaf interpretation, and CART at our sessions.

MLA 2025 (9-12 January, New Orleans.) - WIF Guaranteed Session 

“Reclaiming Joy as Political Visibility”

Bearing the brunt of intersecting forms of oppression, fiction and non-fiction by underrepresented authors have often focused on and highlighted the grimmer aspects of living in the margins or facing systemic and institutional violence. However, as feminists of color such as bell hooks, Audre Lorde, or Sarah Ahmed have underlined, reducing BIWOCs (Black, Indigenous, Women of Color) to hopeless victimhood utterly denies them agency and power, even when the latter is limited. Such an analysis can be extended to the experiences of communities that are shaped by intersections such as gender, sexual identity, age, race, disability, migrant or refugee status, and socioeconomic class. This explains why it has been critical for these communities to reclaim and assert joy: the joy of finding and bonding with peers, the joy of articulating resistance, the joy of asserting selfhood (including in writing and other forms of narrative or visual expression), the joy found in activism, etc. However, there is a necessity to acknowledge that joy and pain occupy a symbiotic and tenuous place for marginalized groups; one does not exist without the other. How have French-speaking authors, across borders, identities, eras, and media used and reclaimed joy as resistance? How is queer, Black, radical, or feminist joy represented in French-speaking cultural productions (literature, film, podcasts, graphic novels, etc.)? These are a few questions that this panel seeks to investigate in its discussions on the visibility of joy and/as resistance. Please send 250-word proposals in English or French to Adrienne Angelo (ama0002@auburn.edu) and Michèle A. Schaal (mschaal@iastate.edu) by March 20, 2024.

Women in French Session

2024 South Central Modern Language Association (SCMLA) Conference

New Orleans, LA

September 18-21, 2014

This panel proposal seeks to explore the intersection of women's writing and history, examining how women authors have used literature as a tool to challenge societal norms, document their experiences, and shape historical narratives. From memoirs to fiction, poetry to essays, women writers have played a crucial role in recording and interpreting history from their unique perspectives. Through this panel, we aim to celebrate and amplify the voices of women writers who have contributed to our understanding of history, literature, and society.

By exploring the diverse range of genres, themes, and perspectives represented in women's literary works, we hope to inspire further research, appreciation, and recognition of women's contributions to both literature and history. This panel welcomes papers that delve into the diverse range of literary works produced by women across different time periods, cultures, and genres, highlighting their contributions to our understanding of the past as they offer alternative perspectives and challenging dominant narratives.

Please send your abstract to Latifa Zoulagh at latifazoulagh@gmail.com by February 28^th, 2024.

2024 Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) Conference

Las Vegas, Nevada

October 10-12, 2024

 

I.              Taking Risks in Francophone Narratives of Selfhood 

The proliferation of narratives of selfhood in contemporary culture attests to the liberating potential that writing affords as life-writers harness their texts to speak out and to voice their truth about lived experiences. Nonetheless, choosing to lay bare intimate stories of selfhood is not without its own set of risks. Some of these perils include reliving trauma in the process of writing it and facing pushback or even disapprobation when these accounts enter the public domain. In Contemporary Feminist Life-Writing: The New Audacity (2020), Jennifer Cooke writes that “[new] audacity writers are experimenters in life and in the art of telling it” (3). Cooke focuses on the positive and transformative nuances of “audacity,” recognizing this word as “a public challenge to conventions, characterized by boldness and a disregard for decorum, protocol, or moral restraints” (1-2). 

This panel aims to shed light on Francophone writers who take risks with regard to crafting and divulging their personal stories of selfhood in narratives that explore activism, agency, (non-normative) identities and desires, illness, or trauma. This panel also considers Francophone writers who boldly engage with formal experimentation in their stories of selfhood. Please send 200-word proposals in English or French to Adrienne Angelo (ama0002@auburn.edu) by March 1, 2024. Chair: Adrienne Angelo, Auburn University, <ama0002@auburn.edu> 

 

II.            Hearing through the Hubbub: Noise and Silence in Francophone Literature and Culture

This year's RMMLA conference is being held in Las Vegas, Nevada where the lights and glamour of the strip draw over 30 million visitors per year. Often lost within all that noise are the individual stories, personal narratives, and life trajectories of those who come to take their chances in Sin city. This panel seeks to link Las Vegas and francophone literature and culture through the tropes of noise and silence. What do we gain by attending to the often nuanced interplay of noise and silence in francophone literature and culture? What can noisy narratives tell us about quieter stories? How might we understand noise differently when we center silence? How does silence help to frame noise? How does noise help to frame silence? Abstracts from any period of francophone literature and culture will be considered. Please send abstracts to cjgomolka@depauw.edu

 

III.          Teaching Women in French Roundtable: Integrating (or avoiding!) Technology

This panel seeks participants willing to share innovative teaching ideas for the French classroom at all levels. How can we engage students to learn about French and Francophone women writers using technology such as AI, virtual reality, or other technologies ? How can we discourage students from using technologies in ways that are not productive to their learning? What are the challenges to both instruction and learning regarding technology in the classroom? Presentations/interactive discussions limited to 12 minutes. Participation in roundtable does not preclude presenting a paper at another RMMLA session. We encourage graduate student applications. Send a brief proposal along with contact information to Julia Frengs at jfrengs2@unl.edu.

 

IV.           Revisiting the Past: Women of the French-Speaking World 

Panel organizer: Glenn Fetzer, New Mexico State University

In 2018 Eric Dussert published an anthology titled Cachées par la forêt: 138 femmes de lettres oubliées. This panel expands on Dussert’s list to give attention to women writers, artists, and personnages in a variety of fields who have been overlooked, forgotten, or those whose contributions have been neglected. Inquiries and proposals in English or French to Glenn Fetzer (gwfetzer@nmsu.edu). 

1. Mapping Invisibility in Francophone Narratives of “Difference”

This panel aims to foster critical discussions on the theme of invisibility within francophone narratives, shedding light on the often-overlooked voices of marginalized individuals. Unseen and unheard, the experiences of those who face discrimination based on factors such as gender, age, race, disability, immigrant or refugee status, and socioeconomic class—often find themselves relegated to the margins of societal discourse. This panel seeks contributions that explore how francophone narratives probe the experience of invisibility among these diverse subjects. Submissions are encouraged to investigate the intersections of various identity markers and how they contribute to the invisibility of individuals within francophone contexts. Additionally, we welcome analyses of resistance narratives, unveiling how writers, filmmakers, and/or activists actively confront invisibility within their storytelling. Contributors are also invited to discuss the broader social and political implications of invisibility, considering how these narratives engage with or challenge prevailing power structures. Please send 200-word proposals in English or French to Adrienne Angelo (ama0002@auburn.edu) by May 15, 2024. 

 

2. Mentoring, Mobility, and Movement (Roundtable)

As part of this year’s SAMLA inquiry into the “Seen/Unseen,” this roundtable invites papers that allow us to think about how mentoring enables greater visibility for those in a mentoring partnership. It is designed to allow us to learn more about concrete strategies, case-studies, and experiences with mentoring that foster movement into new interpersonal and professional spaces. Some of the questions this roundtable welcomes include but are not limited to: What are best practices of mentoring? How can mentoring foster more equitable access to structures of power? How can mentoring help restructure structures of power? Please send 250-word abstracts in either English or French to Lisa Connell (lconnell@westga.edu) by May 15, 2024.

 

3. Ni inexistentes, ni invisibles: Aesthetics of Visibility and Empowerment

As part of this year’s SAMLA inquiry into the “Seen/Unseen,” this panel invites presentations that examine the aesthetics of visibility used by women artists, writers, and filmmakers from the French-speaking world. Some of the questions this panel welcomes include but are not limited to: What kind of silencing and erasure do they challenge? How do they navigate strategic (in)visibility? How do their tactics of (in)visibility stage or subvert structures of power? How do they question or endorse the correlation between visibility and agency? Please send 250-word abstracts in either English or French to Lisa Connell (lconnell@westga.edu) and Delphine Gras (dgras@fgcu.edu) by May 15, 2024.

 

4. Contours of Identity: Navigating Crisis in North American Francophone Women’s Experiences

At crucial junctures in the human journey, individuals grapple with profound questions about their identity, confronting uncertainties in self-perception and the intricate process of integration into societal frameworks. These pivotal moments are characterized by societal expectations or a bewildering array of potentialities, giving rise to feelings of being overlooked or a disconcerting unfamiliarity with one's reflection. This pervasive experience, recognized as alienation, becomes an enduring identity crisis when prolonged. The paramount importance of cultivating a coherent sense of self is evident in the narratives we construct, often mirroring the archetypal journeys of characters navigating the landscape of self-discovery. Whether by achieving success, overcoming tragedy, or finding love, these outcomes symbolize a fortified sense of identity. Identity, conceived as a collective issue, is inseparable from storytelling—a requisite act of self-identification woven into the collective narrative of social interactions. This session delves into the intricate terrain of identity crises, specifically exploring notions of displacement, constriction, and freedom. Our objective is to shed light on the nuanced nature of identity crises within North American Francophone communities, focusing on women’s experiences and the diverse coping mechanisms they employ. Please send an abstract of 200 words (in English, preferred) to Annabelle M. Hicks, University of Connecticut, at annabelle.hicks@uconn.edu by May 15, 2024.

5. Framing Narratives: Pedagogical Approaches to Unveiling North American Francophone Women’s Stories (Roundtable)

This roundtable seeks to engage in a collaborative exploration of pedagogical approaches for teaching North American Francophone women’s narratives. As we consider the SAMLA 96 Conference theme, “Seen/Unseen,” we aim to illuminate the experiences of Francophone women that often remain obscured or overlooked. Participants in this roundtable will share and discuss innovative teaching strategies, resources, and approaches that bring visibility to the rich and diverse lived experiences of North American Francophone women. By focusing on pedagogies that unveil these narratives, we hope to contribute to a broader understanding of the significance of women’s identities within Francophone communities in North America. Please send an abstract of 200 words (in English, preferred) to Annabelle M. Hicks, University of Connecticut, at annabelle.hicks@uconn.edu by May 15, 2024.

 

6. Geopolitical Complexities in Sub-Saharan African Women Writing

This call for papers presupposes that nothing is more challenging than elucidating the geopolitical intricacies of the sub-Saharan region of Africa, the second largest continent in the world. It is more difficult to identify the causes of the regional conflicts that are devastating sub-Saharan Africa due to its unique geographical and historical circumstances. Mbembe believes that colonial occupation consists of seizing a geographical area, delimiting it, and exercising control over it. Complexities in sub-Saharan African countries today can be traced back to the colonial period when strong European powers invaded the continent. According to Caitlin Finlayson (2019, p. 123), 800 million people live in 48 independent countries that make up Sub-Saharan Africa today. Although colonialism altered African politics and economy, many Africans’ way of life has not changed all that much. We see this rural portrayal of sub-Saharan Africa in works of female writers like Monique Ilboudo in her Si loin de ma vie (2018) and Carrefour des veuves (2020), Justin Minsta in her Histoire d’Awu (2000), Aida Mady Diallo in her Kouty, Memoire de sang (2002), to mention but a few. The independence of African countries contributed to the geopolitical complexities of the sub-Saharan regions as rival ethnic groups found themselves in the same area thereby creating constant civil conflicts as one group fought for dominance. To seize control over territory and politics, certain factions resorted to genocide, (Finlayson, 2019: p. 123). A typical example is the Hutus and Tutsis conflict in Rwanda. In this panel, we will examine works with an emphasis on certain research axes, including but not limited to: colonialism and neocolonialism, regional conflicts, biopolitics and necropolitics, terrorism and geographical terrorization. Please send 200-word proposals in English or French to Carole Mafotsing Kougang (cmkougang@crimson.ua.edu) and Diweng Mercy Dafong (mdafong@crimson.ua.edu) by May 15, 2024. 

7. Increasing Enrollment: Teaching Diversity through French and Francophone Women Authors (Roundtable)

As French and foreign language departments face increasing problems with enrollment while simultaneously being called upon to take greater action in addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion, educators and administrators are being forced to find solutions. Teaching French and Francophone women writers, authors, and filmmakers can be a powerful tool in reaching diverse student populations while bringing in students who might normally not consider taking French. In a world dominated by men, French and Francophone women creators have had to find strategic, innovative, and compelling ways to make themselves visible and heard. This panel explores how the teaching of French and Francophone women authors can increase student interest. Questions for consideration may include: What are the visible and invisible obstacles women creators face? How can women authors draw power and inspiration from those experiences to arrive at artistic creation? Additionally, how can universities better recognize the behind-the-scenes labor of faculty teaching courses promoting minority voices while creating better work conditions for contingent faculty? Finally, how might both the teaching of French and Francophone women creators and valuing the work of contingent faculty contribute back to our attempts to create a world more diverse, inclusive, and secure? Please send a 250-word abstract in English or French by May 31, 2024 to organizer Cathy Leung, cleung11@fordham.edu  along with presenter’s academic affiliation, contact information, and A/V requirements.

 

8. “Other” Francophonies: French and Francophone Women Creators Reshaping the Field

French and francophone literature is a vast and continually evolving landscape. The face of French and francophone literature has been transformed by an increasingly globalized world, as well as through awareness of the effects of colonialism and post-colonialism. Continuing this evolution in the present, there is the increasingly visible presence of migrant/ immigrant authors and the voices of what one could consider “other francophonies.” This panel will examine how French and francophone women authors, filmmakers, and artists belonging to ethnic minorities and populations previously less prominent in the field, are contributing to this evolution. Possible questions for consideration may include: how is the work of ethnic minority women creators in French and francophone literature visibly or invisibly changing the literary landscape? How are such women creators pushing back against presumptions about their identities or their work? How can scholars and critics better capture the diversity of this growing literary landscape of francophone literature incorporating, among others, francophone African, Caribbean, Oceanic, Québecois, and East-Asian authors writing in French? What role does gender play in the subjects chosen by these women creators, and in the narrative and aesthetic strategies they employ in their works? How can teaching these “other francophonies” be a powerful pedagogical tool for promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion? Please send a 250-word abstract in English or French by May 31, 2024 to organizer Cathy Leung, cleung11@fordham.edu along with presenter’s academic affiliation, contact information, and A/V requirements. 

 

9. Seen/Unseen Desires in Contemporary French and Francophone Women’s Narratives 

The complexities of desire manifest themselves through visible tensions, such as conflicts in relationships or ambitions, as well as in invisible tensions like those in internal struggles, unconscious influences, and intangible societal pressures. This session seeks to explore the Seen/Unseen desires that shape contemporary French and Francophone narratives. Possible topics may include but are not limited to: 

• Un/seen psychological underpinnings of desire, including cognitive and affective aspects. 
• Un/seen role of desire in shaping individual and collective identities, and how it relates to aspects such as gender, sexuality, race, and class. 
• Un/seen ethical considerations of desire that address questions of consent and societal norms. 
• Desire and its entanglements with changing technology and social media 
• Subversion of tropes associated with desire and the presentation of alternative narratives. 

Please submit proposals of 250 words or less, in English or French, along with the presenter's name, university affiliation, a brief bio (150 words), and any A/V requests to Noran Mohamed (noran.mohamed@hunter.cuny.edu) by May 15th, 2024. 

 

10. Intergenerational Trauma and Transmission in French/Francophone Women’s Writing

As part of this year’s SAMLA conference, Seen/Unseen, this panel will explore the portrayal of intergenerational trauma in French and Francophone women’s writing from any literary historical period. As Roger Luckhurst has written, “Trauma […] issues a challenge to the capacities of narrative knowledge. In its shock impact trauma is anti-narrative, but it also generates the manic production of retrospective narratives that seek to explicate the trauma.” These narratives seek to expose and work through the residual effects on the individual (the writer or a fictional character) who inherits suffering, not through what they have seen firsthand, but from what family members have passed on through the prisms of behavior, speech, action, fear, and other manifestations. This could be trauma from the collective and historical experiences of war, natural disasters, immigration or migration, revolution, exile or from unique and personal experiences, for example, of physical or sexual abuse. Paper proposals in French or English (abstracts 200-250 words) should be sent to Anne Quinney (aquinney@olemiss.edu) by May 15, 2024.

Octave Mirbeau. Life and Fiction, Drama, Art Criticism, and Friendships

Octave Mirbeau : vie et fiction, théâtre, critique d'art et amitiés

 

ROCKY MOUNTAIN MODERN LANGUAGE ASSOCIATION CONVENTION

CALL FOR PAPERS 2024 / APPEL À COMMUNICATION 2024

Conference Dates / Dates de la conférence : October 10-12, 2024 / du 10 au 12 octobre 2024

Conference Location / Lieu de la conférence : Las Vegas, Nevada

Deadline for Abstracts / Date limite pour les résumés : April 1, 2024 / 1er avril 2024

 

Please send a 250-word abstract on Octave Mirbeau's life, fiction, drama, art criticism or friendships, in French or English, along with a short academic biography to Frederic Leveziel (University of South Florida) at fleveziel@usf.edu by April 1, 2023. Please include your name, affiliation, telephone number and e-mail address.

 

Veuillez adresser une proposition d’intervention de 250 mots sur la vie, la fiction, le théâtre, la critique d'art ou les amitiés d’Octave Mirbeau, en français ou en anglais, ainsi qu’une courte biographie académique à Frédéric Leveziel (University of South Florida) à fleveziel@usf.edu avant le 1er avril 2023. Merci indiquer votre nom, affiliation, numéro de téléphone et adresse électronique.

Women in French Australia – Work in Progress Seminar Series 

Le (néo)libéralisme au prisme du genre dans l’œuvre de Nelly Arcan 

Organisée par Ons Othmani (Université de Carthage)

En ligne – 4 avril 2024

 

Cette demi-journée d’étude propose d’analyser les imbrications entre le capitalisme et l’oppression des femmes dans l’œuvre de Nelly Arcan. En effet, les dynamiques de pouvoir entre les sexes constituent une problématique majeure dans les écrits de l’autrice. Par ailleurs, une étude plus approfondie des textes arcaniens permettrait de révéler aussi le rôle de l’organisation sociétale néolibérale dans la construction d’un certain ethos féminin. Dès son premier texte, Putain (2001), Nelly Arcan, par le biais de « la figure de la prostituée […] une sorte de carrefour signifiant où convergent le sexuel et l’économique » (Saint-Martin, 1997, p.191-192), met en lumière la corrélation entre les privilèges détenus par des personnages masculins et leur puissance économique, notamment en dépeignant la marchandisation du corps féminin. Dans cette première autofiction, ainsi que dans la suivante, Folle (2004), les narratrices sont aliénées par les normes du genre et tentent de correspondre à une féminité considérée comme idéale telle que véhiculée par la société de consommation, les médias de masse et l’industrie pornographique. De même, la figure de la Schtroumpfette, qui court « les boutiques et les chirurgies » (Arcan, 2001, p.101), incarne parfaitement l’assujettissement des femmes au marché de la séduction. Dans le roman À ciel ouvert, paru en 2007, Rose et Julie luttent pour attiser le désir d’un homme à coups de bistouri, faisant de leur propre corps un produit qu’on peut sans cesse remodeler et perfectionner.

Que révèle alors, au sujet du paradoxe de la situation des femmes « émancipées » au sein d’un univers ultralibéral, cette mise en scène de protagonistes féminines soumises aux diktats sociaux tout en étant révoltées contre ces derniers ? En quoi le discours ambivalent des personnages arcaniens constitue-t-il la critique d’une société foncièrement consumériste dans laquelle les femmes occidentales seraient prisonnières d’une « burqa de chair », parfait emblème de la machine capitaliste-patriarcale ? De quelle manière cette lecture permet-elle, in fine, de mettre à nu les rouages d’un néolibéralisme prétendument libérateur ? Toutes ces questions, et bien d’autres, seront au cœur de cette rencontre et en tisseront les lignes directrices.

Nous accueillons les propositions en études littéraires et interdisciplinaires pour cette demi-journée d’étude qui se veut un espace de réflexion théorique et critique. Les interventions dureront environ 20 minutes et seront suivies de 10 minutes de discussion. Toutefois, comme il s’agit de présenter des travaux en cours, les intervenant·e·s auront plus de flexibilité par rapport à une présentation classique.

—

Les propositions de communication, en français ou en anglais, d’environ 300 mots, agrémentées d’une notice biobibliographique d’une centaine de mots, doivent être adressées, d’ici le 31 janvier 2024, à Ons Othmani (onsothmani12@gmail.com) ainsi que Dominique Carlini Versini (dominique.carlini-versini@durham.ac.uk) et wifaustralia@gmail.com en copie.

 

Bibliographie indicative

Authier, Christian, Le Nouvel Ordre sexuel, Paris, Bartillat, 2002. 

Baudry, Patrick, La pornographie et ses images, Paris, Armand Colin, 1997. 

Butler, Judith, Ces corps qui comptent. De la matérialité et des limites discursives du « sexe » (trad. par Charlotte Nordmann), Paris, Éditions Amsterdam, 2009.

 ____ Trouble dans le genre. Pour un féminisme de la subversion (trad. par Cynthia Kraus), Paris, La Découverte, 2005.

Chollet, Mona, Beauté Fatale : Les nouveaux visages d’une aliénation féminine, Paris, La Découverte, 2012.

Delphy, Christine, L'ennemi principal. I, Économie politique du patriarcat, Paris, Syllepse, coll. « Nouvelles questions féministes », 1999. 

Détrez, Christine, A leur corps défendant. Les femmes à l'épreuve du nouvel ordre moral, Paris, Seuil, 2006.

Dufour, Dany-Robert, La Cité perverse, libéralisme et pornographie, Paris, Denoël, 2009. 

Heinich, Nathalie, Les ambivalences de l'émancipation féminine, France, Albin Michel, 2003.

Marzano, Michela, Malaise dans la sexualité, Paris, Jean-Claude Lattès, 2006. 

Marzano, Parisoli, La pornographie ou l'épuisement du désir, Paris, Buchet-Chastel, 2003. 

Paul B. Preciado, Pornotopie : "Playboy" et l'invention de la sexualité multimédia (trad. par Serge Mestre et Beatriz Preciado), Paris, Climats, 2011. 

Poulin, Richard, Vassort, Patrick, Sexe, capitalisme et critique de la valeur, pulsions, dominations, sadisme social, Québec, Ville Mont-Royal, M éditeur, 2012. 

Saint-Martin, Lori, Contre-voix. Essais de critique au féminin, Québec, Nuit blanche, 1997.

Vörös, Florian, Désirer comme un homme. Enquête sur les fantasmes et les masculinités, Paris, La   Découverte, coll. « Sciences humaines », 2020.

ACQL Panel Proposal

Mobility in Literatures Written in Canada

In Ducks Kate Beaton recounts the two years she worked in the Alberta oil sands following her degree in fine arts. Beaton’s trip to Alberta from Cape Breton, a have-not part of a have-not province, is a journey of both sacrifice and ambition. She hopes that working in the oil sands will help her transcend the predictable jobs for educated women at home. So, Beaton’s participation in the oil economy that fuels the cars of the country is also her chance at a more metaphoric mobility. In highlighting the interconnections between three kinds of mobility––the movement of people across borders (provincial or otherwise), the movement of vehicles that are fueled by the oil processed in the sands, and the romanticized notion of upward mobility––the memoir also illuminates the ways in which class, gender, race, colonialism, and ability complicate the freedom imagined in tropes of mobility.

Beaton’s memoir is only one recent example of a literary text that grapples with “Canada’s history […] of movement,” which Heather Macfarlane claims “is arguably at the core of the nation’s identity” (Road Narratives and Nationhood in Canada 14). Macfarlane sees this history expressed in the conflicts and contradictions of road narratives that, like Beaton’s memoir, trouble masculinist and colonial fantasies of movement as an expression of freedom and agency. This bilingual panel invites papers that examine literal and metaphoric mobility in literatures written in Canada. We are especially interested in papers that grapple with the conflicts and contradictions that arise when mobility is examined through lenses that centre decolonial, queer, feminist, and disability studies.

Submissions:

Kait Pinder (kait.pinder@acadiau.ca)

Ania Wroblewski (awroblew@uoguelph.ca)

La mobilité dans les littératures écrites au Canada

Dans Ducks, Kate Beaton fait le récit des deux années pendant lesquelles elle a travaillé dans les sables bitumineux de l’Alberta après avoir obtenu son diplôme en beaux-arts. Son voyage vers l’Alberta depuis le Cap-Breton, une région démunie située dans une province pauvre, est marqué par le sacrifice et par l’ambition. Beaton espère que les expériences acquises en travaillant dans les sables bitumineux lui permettront d’éviter à exercer l’un des emplois typiquement réservés aux femmes instruites de sa région d’origine. Ainsi, le rôle qu’elle joue dans l’économie pétrolière à produire les carburants qui alimentent les véhicules circulant sur les routes du pays lui permet d’accéder à une sorte de mobilité métaphorique. En mettant en évidence les liens qui existent entre trois formes de mobilité – le mouvement des personnes à travers les frontières (provinciales et autres), le mouvement littéral des véhicules, et la notion romantique de la mobilité ascendante – les mémoires de Beaton éclaircissent la manière dont la classe, le sexe, la race, le colonialisme et l’habileté laissent leurs empreintes sur la notion de la liberté telle qu’elle se trouve imaginée dans les tropes de la mobilité.

Les mémoires de Beaton constituent un exemple récent d’un texte littéraire qui aborde « Canada’s history […] of movement, » une histoire qui, selon Heather Macfarlane, « is arguably at the core of the nation’s identity » (Road Narratives and Nationhood in Canada 14). Les conflits et les contradictions qui se trouvent au cœur des récits de la route tels que l’œuvre de Beaton troublent, d’après Macfarlane, les fantasmes masculinistes et coloniaux de la mobilité. Ce panel bilingue invite les auteur.e.s à présenter des textes qui étudient la mobilité littérale et métaphorique dans les littératures écrites au Canada. Nous nous intéressons particulièrement à des études qui abordent le sujet de la mobilité à l’aide d’une perspective ancrée dans la pensée décoloniale, queer, et/ou féministe et/ou dans les disability studies.

Soumissions :

Kait Pinder (kait.pinder@acadiau.ca)

Ania Wroblewski (awroblew@uoguelph.ca)

Call for Papers 

UN THÉÂTRE MONDAIN : PERFORMING CLASS AND GENDER IN PARIS

Arizona State University

April 24-25, 2024

 

 

Like no other, Marcel Proust was able to depict Paris, from the Belle Epoque to the interwar period, as the stage of a vast mundane theatre on which the last scions of aristocracy who were also successful writers like Robert de Montesquiou, Élisabeth de Clermont-Tonnerre, Anna de Noailles, Marthe Bibesco, Carmen Sylva, Elena Vacaresco, Aurélie Ghika, and Ludmila Savitsky enacted their glamorous lives by turning them into striking performances.

In the society of writers like Rachilde, Natalie Clifford Barney, and Adrienne Monnier, young authors like Marcel Proust, André Gide, Colette, Jean Cocteau, Renée Vivien, René Crevel, and Mireille Havet, among many others, emerged as the new avantgarde that produced a literature in which questions of class and gender intertwine and call into question the values of traditional Parisian society by contesting gender and relationships among social classes. As Laure Murat argues in her recently published Proust, roman familial/Proust, a family novel (Paris, 2023), sexual inversion “blurs class and power relationships, undermines social conservatism, all the while maintaining appearances, because gay and lesbians are even more subject to the silence which binds them in shame and secrecy than to the vice they share in pleasure. Subterfuges, strategies, the unspoken, lies, dissimulation, involuntary betrayals: it is all about theatre, about playing games, about techniques of recognition and subliminal dances of seduction.”

It is this Parisian theatre of “subterfuges,” of “strategies”, of “the unspoken”, of “lies”, of “dissimulation” and that of “involuntary betrayals”, as it appears in some of the works published in the interval from the Belle Epoque to the Interwar period, that we propose to address over two days (April 24-25, 2024) during an international conference organized in Tempe on the campus of Arizona State University. "Théâtre mondain: Performing Class and Gender in Paris" encourages contribution proposals from scholars belonging to various disciplines, from literature, history, art, and history to gender and sexuality studies. The 20-minute papers could respond to issues raised by, but not limited to, the following topics: 

·      How do interbellum writers approach issues of gender and sexuality?

·      What do these authors reveal with respect to the power structures and changes in society?

·      What ethical issues are debated, or, by contrast, what ethical issues are avoided in their works?

·      How does technological progress transform the literature of this period?

·      How is the non-human represented?

·      How do these authors utilize chronotopes to evoke their experiences?

·      How do relatively recent theoretical frameworks, such as affect theory, intersectionality, posthumanism, ecocriticism, or disability studies, reveal new facets of literary and visual works produced in this period?

The proposals (in English or French) should not exceed 2500 characters, should be accompanied by a brief bio-bibliography that connects structure, research, subject, and recent work, and should be sent to all three of the organizing committee members.

Calendar

Deadline for sending proposals : January 31, 2024

Deadline for receiving a response from the committee : mid-February, 2024

Conference dates: April 24 - 25, 2024

Organizing Committee:

Frédéric Canovas - fcanovas@asu.edu

Ileana Orlich - orlich@asu.edu

Madalina Meirosu - mmeirosu@asu.edu