Call for Papers
18th- and 19th-century British Women Writers Conference
April 11-15, 2018
The University of Texas at Austin
The twenty-sixth annual BWWC invites papers and panel proposals interpreting the theme of “New Directions.” Since the landmark “Generations” conference of 2017 invites a retrospective look back, “New Directions” will encourage turning to the future to ask crucial methodological, theoretical, and content-based questions about our fields’ key concepts and literatures. [Go to the 2018 conference website.]
What do we mean by “British”? By “women”? By “writers”? We welcome papers and panel proposals addressing change, development, destabilization, and potential in terms of both British women writers and the field of British women writers scholarship. We envision panels focused around the stability of gender-, nation-, and profession-based abstractions, as well as research on individuals living at the margins of these terms.
By December 8, 2017, send 300-word abstracts for paper proposals, along with a brief bio (in one document) to:
Panel proposals should include individual paper abstracts, short speaker bios, as well as a brief panel description (in one document). All proposals must engage the conference theme and relate to British women’s writing in the span between the eighteenth and early twentieth centuries. Graduate students are encouraged to apply for a travel grant sponsored by the BWWA.
Possible topics may include but are not limited to:
Feminist Intersections
Intersectionality
Space & Place Tension between/among feminisms
Post-structural feminism
Ecofeminism
Materialisms
Frontiers
Empire and expansion
Shifting borders
Transatlantic movement
Exploration and discovery
Postcolonial theory
Space & Place
Space and temporalities
Industrialization
Archives
The country and the city
Identity
Fraught national identity
Trans- and queer theories
Racial spectacle/ the raced body
The subaltern/ colonization
Diversity in the academy
(R)evolutions
Enlightenment philosophy
The scientific revolution
Women in/and science
Technology
Digital pedagogy
Literary Directions
(De)constructing the canon
New directions for literary criticism
Genre stability/ instability
Visual texts
Strategic presentism
Narrative Directions
Travel writing
Mapping & globalization
Adaptations & revisions
Formal invention & experimentation
Epistolary networks
British Women Writers Association 