Call for Papers: TRANS-MEDIEVALISMS (due April 1): BABEL in UC Santa Barbara, 16-18 October 2014

by Jonathan Hsy

Here’s an upcoming event of interest to medievalists and non-medievalists alike: the 3rd Biennial Meeting of BABEL Working Group at UC Santa Barbara (16-18 October 2014). BABEL members include academics as well as poets, creative writers, scientists, philosophers, and others — and BABEL conferences are well-known for featuring a wide range of presentation styles and formats.

URL: http://babel-meeting.org/2014-meeting/cfp-2014-meeting/

Candace and I are still accepting proposals for TRANS-MEDIEVALISMS!
The deadline is APRIL 1.

Trans-Medievalisms (Day 3)

Sponsor: Global Chaucers

Co-Organizers: Jonathan Hsy (George Washington University) + Candace Barrington (Central Connecticut State University)

Send brief proposals to < jhsy at gwu dot edu > or < BarringtonC at mail dot ccsu dot edu >

What happens to the Western Middle Ages when it crosses into diverse, concurrent times, languages, and cultures? How does “medievalism” take shape in multiple spaces across the planet—including cultural habitats where the Western Middle Ages are no longer the “‘zero point’ of orientation” (to reroute a phrase from Sara Ahmed’s Queer Phenomenology)? What cultural work do “the Middle Ages” perform as they infuse modern-day modes of global media and cultural production—textual, visual, musical, performative, cinematic? Our session is inspirited by our work on the “Global Chaucers” project, a utopian scholarly endeavor that seeks to gather, back-translate, and analyze all non-English translations and adaptations of Chaucer’s work. Our scheming with scholars around the world has so far revealed Chaucerian adaptations in places as far-flung and interconnected as Latin America (Bolivia), East Asia (China, Japan, Korea), Europe (Denmark, Flanders, Spain, Hungary), the Middle East (Israel, Iran), and Africa (Nigeria), as well as works in invented languages (Esperanto).

For this session we aim to gather together 5-10 presenters and/or performers. This session may include a few invited participants working on Chaucerian adaptation in non-English contexts (possibly with a focus on cultures from the Pacific Rim). We would like to invite additional proposals from people working on any aspect of medieval appropriation in “global” contemporary culture (however conceived). How might plurilingual, transoceanic, and intercultural orientations provoke new modes of engaging with the past? How can we create a dynamic, multi-site community of cross-temporal scholars and enthusiasts, a fluid collective that thrives across disciplines and borders? We welcome non-medievalists, amateurs, and enthusiasts, including creative work by poets, playwrights, musicians, and/or interpretive dancers. We highly encourage collaborative submissions.