CFP: NEMLA

42nd Annual Convention

Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)

April 7-10, 2011

New Brunswick, New Jersey

The 42nd Annual Convention will feature approximately 350 sessions, as well as dynamic speakers and cultural events. Interested participants may submit abstracts to more than one NeMLA session; however, panelists can only present one paper (panel or seminar). Convention participants may present a paper at a panel and also present at a creative session or participate in a roundtable.

More information here.
Abstract Deadline: September 30, 2010

Hours for the Writing Center--Evansdale

The Writing Center will be holding drop-in tutoring hours at the Evansdale Library, Study Room 131, on Mondays from 3:00 -- 5:00 pm and Wednesdays from 2:30 pm -- 5:00 pm.

Wednesday hours will begin on September 8 and Monday hours will begin on September 13.
 
And be sure to check out The WVU Writing Center Blog:
 

Party Report

Well it’s that season: the picnic, the meet-and-greet, the officially sanctioned mingle: three events in three days and yours truly is pretty much small talked out. And I forgot to take pictures, so a brief report will have to do.

Friday was the department’s annual picnic though, sadly, the picnic-y fixins’ didn’t last long. Graduate students, did you gobble everything up? Are you really so underpaid that you can’t afford to buy ramen noodles and thus save a few sub sandwiches for your faculty? I mean, really. Other than that, it was a swell time with children and dogs and bocce and, yes, a few crumbs to pick at and some rather pleasant chit-chat. The perfect start to the semester.

Saturday was the MFA meet-and-greet-and-read… though as soon as Director Mark Brazaitis left, the students breathed a collective sigh of relief and no one would admit to bringing anything to read. As they explained it to me, wasn’t the whole point of the proposed read-around to get people talking and weren’t they already talking and why did we have to bother with, you know, actual creative writing? Hmmm, I said, I guess I see your point.

Sunday was the very fancy dean’s reception for endowed professors and chairs. No flying WV cookies for us, no sir! Sargasso! Midget bananas and giant apricots and chicken on a stick and very tasty, very tiny BLT’s. Yum. Your English department was well represented with Professors Brady, Conner, Ernest, Hall, and Sweet, along with this-here poet, doing the mingling on behalf of us all. We heard several uplifting speeches and felt generally congratulated and ready to go on to further greatness.

Whew! Yes, what a weekend, huh? I for one am all set to put down my plate and start some serious educating. What do you think? It could be fun. And yes, there will be flying WV cookies at some point. Don't you worry.

CFP: Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture Since 1900

The 39th annual Louisville Conference on Literature and Culture since 1900 will be held at the University of Louisville, February 24-26. Critical papers may be submitted on any topic that addresses literary works published since 1900, and/or their relationship with other arts and disciplines (film, journalism, opera, music, pop culture, painting, architecture, law, etc). Work by creative writers is also welcome.

Visit our new website for complete submission guidelines: http://www.thelouisvilleconference.com/ Click on “Call for Papers” Prearranged panels are also welcome. Group Societies are welcome

Deadline for submission is September 15, 2010 (postmarked). 

The Conference Facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=131421218223

The Discourse of HIV/AIDS

A Publishing Opportunity:

Last Spring, Dr. Joyce Mathangwane of the University of Botswana visited our department and presented her work on the discourse analysis of HIV/AIDS. She is now headlining a book on the topic and is looking for contributors.

That could be you!

Check out the following for information. Look at all those potential categories!

http://linguistlist.org/issues/21/21-3427.html

MFA Meet & Greet

COW, WVU's Council of Writers, is happy to announce its annual MFA Meet & Greet.

When: Saturday, August 28, 5 p.m.

Where: 1261 Carlisle Avenue

What to bring: potluck dish; family; lawn chair; 1-2 minutes of your poetry or prose for a read around

Although, hmmm....

As Professor Hazen points out, yesterday's NYT article is a...uh...remake of an article from 2000. In the current one, though, Kirk is played by Robert Pattinson.

So, the New York Times is like "What's new, Kirk Hazen?" and Kirk is all "The quotative be like...."

For the latest update on Appalachian dialect from our very own linguist, see The New York Times.

Let's Make a Fort!

This installation piece by artist Matej Kren (read more here [update: please be advised a button for another article on this site is NSFW.]) looks like something we could totally do ourselves, don't you think? Between all the new books for fall classes, the stacks of reading accumulated by booklisting PhDs, our personal collections, and whatever is left over from this year's grad student book sale--well, this seems entirely feasible.

Note that I left library books off the list. Aside from keeping university property safe, it would be too easy. And mine are already in the shape of a bunker in preparation for the coming year. Best wishes to everyone for the new semester!

Victorian Studies conference

Victorian Epidemics
Victorian Studies Association of Western Canada
Banff, Alberta April 29-30, 2011

Keynote speaker: Pamela Gilbert, Albert Brick Professor of English, University of Florida Dr. Gilbert has published widely in the areas of Victorian literature, cultural studies and the history of medicine. Her first book, Disease, Desire and the Body in Victorian Women’s Popular Novels, was published by Cambridge University Press in 1997, followed by Mapping the Victorian Social Body (SUNY Press, 2004) and The Citizen’s Body (Ohio State University Press, 2007), and Cholera and Nation (SUNY Press, 2008).

This international conference will bring together specialists in
Victorian art history, history, gender studies, science, and
literature to contemplate the theme of disease in Victorian England
and its colonies. Papers will address medical and social histories of
disease, literary and artistic representations of disease, and disease
as metaphor in Victorian culture.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to:
-Victorian plagues: cholera, TB, venereal disease, influenza, smallpox
-histories and narratives of disease
-identity and pathology
-disease and the body
-disease as metaphor, languages of disease, contagion, illness
-disease and colonization, disease and globalization
-art as disease, mass culture as disease
-the spread of commercialism
-visual and literary representations of disease and illness
-sewers, filth, miasma
-slums, prostitution
-health and hygiene
-representations of illness
-mental illness
-imperial anxiety and disease

Please submit a 500 word abstract and short (50-75 word bio) by
September 15 to Kristen Guest, Program Chair, kguest@unbc.ca

The conference will take place in Banff, Alberta in the heart of the
Canadian Rockies. The town of Banff is surrounded by the spectacular
scenery of Banff National Park, which offers excellent opportunities
for both hiking and downhill skiing in late April. Banff is
approximately one hour from Calgary and is easily accessible by car or
air (regular and reasonably priced shuttles are available from Calgary
International Airport).

Accommodations and sessions will be held in the Banff Park Lodge.