Welcome to the 2006-2007 IASIL Newsletter

Welcome to the IASIL Conferences and Summer Schools Page.

This page lists conferences/summer schools that deal with Irish Literature, Theatre, and Film. Conferences with broader themes that pay substantial attention to Irish writing will also be listed from time to time. If you wish to include a listing, email webmaster@iasil.org

These pages are provided for information only - you should confirm dates, deadlines, and so on with conference organisers.

Last Updated 9 August, 2007

"Into the West Redux: Old and New Stories of the Celtic Diaspora" - Celtic Languages and Literature Panel at MLA 2006
27-30 December 2006
Philadelphia, USA
Contact: Jacqueline Fulmer (fulmerjk@berkeley.edu).
Deadline for Proposals: 300 words by 15 March 2006.

The following panel will take place at this year's MLA conference, which will be held in Philadelphia on 27-30 December. IASIL members are invited to submit proposals, and are asked to forward this CFP to any interested parties.

Invitation to submit papers comparing earlier (the Classical, Late Antique, or the medieval period) and/or later (i.e., late 20th-early 21st century) periods of the Celtic Diaspora as depicted in historical writing, fiction, films, or memoirs. 300 word abstracts due via e-mail by 15 March to Jacqueline Fulmer.

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Bernard Shaw at 150: Theater, Criticism, Contemporaneity
A special session on Shaw at the Modern Language Association Meeting, Philadelphia, USA
27-30 December.
Deadline for abstracts (300 words): 15 March, 2006.
Website: http://www.shawsociety.org/ISS-at-MLA-06.htm.

Please send with bio or c.v. via attachment to an email to Professor Richard Dietrich at dietrich@cas.usf.edu or by snail mail to R. F. Dietrich, ISS President, P.O. Box 728, Odessa, FL 33556-0728. For details about the MLA conference itself, consult the MLA website at http://www.mla.org/

You need not be a member of the ISS to attend or propose a paper for one of these events, but an application form is linked off of www.shawsociety.org. Membership brings discounts.

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Beckett’s Traces
Université Charles-de-Gaulle Lille 3,
8-9 December 2006
Deadline for Abstracts (200-words, in English or French) : 15 March 2006
Contact : Helen Astbury (helen.astbury@univ-lille3.fr)

The resonance that echoes would have in all of Beckett’s work was discernible as early as his first collection of poems: Echo’s Bones. When he abandoned (temporarily) both his mother tongue and poetry in the 1940s to write mainly theatre and prose in French, Beckett’s interest did not wane. The survival of a sound that is an echo continued to evolve as Beckett’s work did, to become a visual remnant in his later plays, in which the characters no longer participate in the representation of an action, but become the image of that which is narrated by a voice without body – a visual trace of that which is no longer or has not yet been. This conference will study all forms of echoes, relics, traces in Beckett’s work, including (but not limited to):

• audible traces: Beckett, who made sure no recording was ever made of his voice, made of his stage characters “receivers” of recorded voices (Krapp’s Last Tape, That Time, Rockaby) ; the radio plays, recorded for posterity, unlike the stage plays
• visual traces: the plays for television, a genre to which Beckett turned after having written stage plays, which leave no trace, other than, in the case of Beckett, his minutely detailed Theatrical Notebooks; Film; the Beckett on Film project; the photographs in A Piece of Monologue and Film; the fading away of the characters in the late plays, themselves no more than traces of characters who no longer exist (or exist only as ghosts, or turned to stone) and who listen to the traces of a previous life which may have been theirs
• bilingualism: the trace left by English in French, by French in English, by Hiberno-English in both
• genetic criticism: the traces of the different stages of writing to be found in the finished work
• the traces left by those authors who counted for Beckett in his own work
• the traces left by Beckett’s work in that of his successors
• the trace as a sign of evanescence, of what is no longer. In the radical miniaturisation of the Beckett text, there is nothing which is not the trace of something absent – absence of the character who is no more, who no longer seeks to be, absence of contact with the world, disappearance of the body, extinction of language

Conference organising committee : Helen Astbury (Lille 3), Bernard Escarbelt (Lille 3), Fabienne Garcier (Lille 3), Carle Bonafous-Murat (Paris 3), André Topia (Paris 3)

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Birth was the death of him: Samuel Beckett, Death, Dying and All That Other Unfinished Business' - An International Conference in honour of Samuel Beckett’s Centenary
Avenue Campus, University of Northampton,
1 - 3 December 2006
Deadline for Abstracts: 8 September
Contact: Matthew Feldman: matthew.feldman@northampton.ac.uk, Philip Tew: tewp@ukf.net, Steve Barfield: barfies@westminster.a.uk

The centenary of Samuel Beckett’s birth is with us and, in the period since his death in 1989, his texts have continued to thrive and spark massive critical engagement. For Beckett, death marks us all, and haunts our existences. Christopher Ricks, in Beckett’s Dying Words, insists that Beckett is concerned not with any instinct of self-preservation, but The desire of oblivion (Clarendon Press, 1993; p. 3) Beckett’s oeuvre is ineluctably associated with states of death, dying, limbo, purgatory, and various conditions of (non-)being pervading the Beckettian text and subject. Such contexts and themes will be the foci for this international gathering of scholars.

Northampton seems an appropriate place for such a consideration since, as a young man, Beckett twice played cricket for Trinity College against Northamptonshire (appearing in Wisden) and much later frequently visited Lucia Joyce in St Andrew's private psychiatric hospital in Northampton, where she was institutionalized from 1951 to 1982, suffering what her biographer, Carol Loeb Shloss, called a ‘mysterious illness’ (Bloomsbury,2004; p. 6). In addition to being where Lucia died and is buried, this asylum is where John Clare, the Northamptonshire peasant-poet, died in 1864 after living 23 years in the hospital. Hence, in your travels to the conference you will literally be following in both Beckett’s and Clare’s footsteps. This final centenary gathering will consequently analyze and consider the tropes referred to above in terms of their relationship to Beckett Studies, and will hopefully take these ideas and concepts even further, investigating themes of Beckettian deathliness that act as a finally anxious influence surviving in other writers.

On one of the evenings of the conference, there will be a private reading of a late Beckettian text by renowned Beckett actress and scholar, Dr. Rosemary Pountney. Other activities, including keynote addresses and a conference dinner, to mark Beckett’s centenary will follow throughout the weekend; academic papers will be delivered over the course of Friday 1st December to Sunday 3rd December 2006. Accommodation can be provided at the Sunley Management Centre, but both this and the conference dinner will be charged in addition to the basic registration fee specified below. Details of other local hotels can be sent by e-mail on request.

Papers and panels are invited on all relevant topics and themes, considering all of Beckett’s work in its various genres and phases. Especially welcome are papers and panels capable to working within the following proposed themes, although these are not to be considered as inclusive:

• Beckett's Deathly Humour
• Gothic Beckett and Beckett's Gothic
• Holy Living and Holy Dying: Beckett’s Formative Readings
• Textual Death: Genetic Criticism since 1989
• Beckett’s Demise and an Afterlife of Archival Revelations
• Philosophy, Time and Finitude
• Eschatology, Teleology, Religion and The End
• Deathly Lives and Deathly Living: Beckett’s Drama
• Lunacy as Limbo: Limbo as Lunacy
• Beckett’s Legacy: Deathly States
• Repetition as Deathliness
• Disembodied Voices: Beckettian Narratives
• Psychoanalysis, Death and Other Unfinished Business
• Other themes will be considered!

Send abstracts for proposed panels and/or papers of 250 words per paper. Proposal deadline: Friday 8th September, 2006; however notification of acceptance for international delegates requiring confirmation for travel funding is guaranteed by Monday 17th July 2006 if such proposals are received by Friday 30th June 2006. Individual requests for earlier confirmation may be possible.

Using Word, abstracts of no more than 200 words should be sent as an attachment to all of the above three e-addresses with the subject line as “Death, Dying and Samuel Beckett: Centenary Conference’ (this is essential as your messages will be searched for and sorted automatically andunless you use this subject line your message will not be retrieved; this phrase can be cut and pasted easily enough):

Please note that there will be a special discounted rate for participants who pay before Monday, 2nd October 2006. Academics and the public: £55.00; participant members of the UK Network for Modern Fiction Studies, and the London Beckett Seminar, and University of Northampton staff £30:00; unwaged and students: £25 Accommodation and meals will be charged in addition to this fee. Prices to be sent to delegates on acceptance.

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Postcolonial Politics - A Symposium
The Postcolonial Studies Research Network
University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand.
27 - 29 November, 2006
Deadline for Abstracts (250-300 words) 8 September
Contact: (vijay.devadas@stonebow.otago.ac.nz)  
Keynote Speakers Dr Suvendrini Perera( Faculty of Media, Society and Culture, Curtin University of Technology); Dr Anthony Burke School of Politics and International Relations, University of New South Wales); Dr Mark Devenney (Historical & CriticalStudies, Brighton University, U.K.  

What is a postcolonial politics? How might such politics be constituted? What concerns animate contemporary postcolonial politics? Where are the spaces of politics? Where are the stakes? What are the terms of political contestation and transformation? How are the forms and concerns of postcolonial politics shifting?  

Such questions are critical in the face of arguments that postcolonial criticism has become absorbed into institutions of power, as well as suggestions that the abstraction of the postcolonial as a methodology, and its appropriation for First World concerns, mean that the postcolonial has no political currency. Against this are arguments affirming the productive possibilities of articulating politics of liberation through postcolonial critique.

Questions about a postcolonial politics also emerge as crucial at a time when the rights of a variety of peoples (asylum-seekers, refuges, boat-people, exiles, diasporas, indigenous communities, migrants) animate the genealogy of our present.  

The conference organizers invite a wide range of scholars working out of different contexts, disciplines and interests to either reinterpret/revisit any of the major debates in these fields, or ask new questions that seem important. Postgraduate scholars and early career researchers are particularly encouraged to contribute. They intend to publish selection of papers from the symposium.  

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Plural Beckett Pluriel - A Centenary Celebration
23-24 November 2006
Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto, Portugal
Deadline for submission of titles and abstracts (+250 words): 15 July 2006
E-mail: beckett06@letras.up.pt

This conference will mark the centenary of Samuel Beckett by addressing the plurality of his writing and of the artistic and critical consequence of his work – in drama as in fiction, and in a variety of contexts and cultural practices.

Confirmed keynote speakers: Ronan McDonald (Director, Beckett International Foundation, University of Reading), Maria Helena Serôdio (Centre for Theatre Studies, University of Lisbon), Steve Wilmer (The Samuel Beckett Centre, Trinity College Dublin)

The organisers will welcome contributions in the form of proposals for 20-minute papers, either in English or in French, on a variety of topics, such as:
- Beckett and Performance
- Beckett and Ireland
- Beckett and Philosophy
- Beckett and 20th Century Drama and Fiction
- Beckett, Music and the Visual Arts
- Beckett and Religion
- Beckett, Bilingualism and Translation

Notification of acceptance: 8 September 2006. Deadline for registration: 6 October 2006. Fee: 75 Euros

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Bath Spa University Second Annual Postgraduate Irish Studies Conference
18 November 2006
Deadline for Abstracts: 29 September 2006
Contact: Dr Brian Griffin Email: b.griffin@bathspa.ac.uk

This year the Irish Studies Centre at Bath Spa University is hosting its second annual conference, open to Irish Studies students and recent graduates from British Colleges and Universities. This year’s conference will have an open theme, as the aim is to showcase the broad range of topics that are studied by Irish Studies postgraduate students and recent graduates(those who have graduated within the last three years) in Britain. A selection of the proceedings will be published.

Abstracts of c.200 words for papers of 25 minutes in length should be submitted by Friday 29 September 2006.

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Acts of Aggression: the performance of violence in contemporary Irish theatre practice
17-18 November 2006
University of Ulster at Magee
Deadline for Proposals (200 words) 31 July 2006,
Contact: Lisa Fitzpatrick - l.fitzpatrick@ulster.ac.uk

In the past decade a theatrical moment described as 'in-yer-face theatre' [Sierz], or framed using Artaud's theatre of cruelty [Ken Urban], has emerged on the British stage. Internationally, the post-dramatic theatre of verbatim performance, tribunal plays, or Robin Soans' 'Talking with Terrorists', open a range of theoretical and performance questions about the staging of power and violence. In Ireland, examples such as Gary Mitchell's representation of loyalist paramilitarism, contemporary tragedy based on both classical Greek and Irish legends, and the popularity of a violent, urban sub-genre of monodrama similarly raise questions of the representation of violence and its bodily effects. This conference aims to identify and debate the intersection of these issues with contemporary theatre practice in Ireland, and the relationship of Irish theatre to these challenging international dramaturgical and performance strategies.

Papers and presentations are invited on the following topics:
The body on stage: issues of presence and charisma
Staging violence: issues of decorum, abjection, and audience reception .
Technical considerations in the representation of violence .
Political violence and the body .
The performance of power

Papers and presentations should be no more than 20 minutes in duration.

In line with the symposium's focus on performance strategies and staging, contributions from practitioners as well as researchers are welcome. Practice as Research projects are of particular interest.

Performance Studies Working Group

The Performance Studies working group will hold its first meeting at the symposium, Acts of Aggression: the performance of violence in contemporary Irish theatre practice, at the University of Ulster, November 17-18 2006.

The working group seeks to create a network of researchers on the island of Ireland whose research explores ways to analyse performance in its multiplicity of elements and meanings. This includes, but is not limited to,

- the specificity of performance and its frames,
- the ways these impact of the actions of and reactions to the soma,
- the study of performance as an artform that uses any and all media,
- performance as a consciousness of doubleness, according to which the actual execution of an action is placed in mental comparison with a potential, an ideal, or a remembered original model of that action,
- the body in performance,
- the individual body as testament,
- the virtual body
- the disciplined (rehearsed) body.

Following the initial meetings in Derry in November 2006, the working group will meet in Belfast in April 2007, at the launch of the Irish Society for Theatre Research at Queen’s University, Belfast. Thereafter, it aims to meet annually, to present research, and to engage with the development of performance studies as a discipline, in Ireland.

Participation is encouraged from practitioners, archivists, critics and academics in the disciplines of theatre and drama, digital technology, and performance art.

For more information, please contact one of the following: Pat Burke, St. Patrick’s College Pat.Burke@spd.dcu.ie; Lisa Fitzpatrick, University of Ulsterl.fitzpatrick@ulster.ac.uk; Berni Sweeney, University College CorkB.Sweeney@ucc.ie

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Irish Texts Society Eighth Annual Seminar: The Poems of Carolan
11 November, 2006
University College, Cork
Contact: p.riggs@ucc.ie.
Web: http://www.ucc.ie/locus/ITS.html

The eight annual Irish Texts Society Seminar takes place this November, with the focus this year on the poems of Carolan. Speakers include Nicholas Carolan, Ruairí Ó hUiginn (NUIM), Emily Cullen (NUIG) Lesa Ní Mhunghaile (MIC Limerick) and Joep Leerssen ( University of Amsterdam).

Last year’s conference was held on the subject of Translations from Classical Literature in the ITS Series: Imtheachta Aeniasa / The Irish Aeneid (ITS vol.6) and Stair Ercuil ocus a Bás / The Life and Death of Hercules (ITS vol. 38). The event was held at UCC on 6 November 2005. Papers were given at the seminar by Dr Máire Ní Mhaonaigh, Professor Erich Poppe, Dr Diana Luft, Dr Fiona Cox and Professor Gearóid Mac Eoin. The proceedings will be launched at this year’s seminar.

The proceedings of the first seminar on Fled Bricrenn (1999), the second on Dáibhí Ó Bruadair (2000), the third on Beatha Aodha Ruaidh Uí Dhomhnaill (2001), the fourth on Duanaire Finn (2002), the fifth on Cinnlae Amhlaoibh Uí Shúilleabháin (2003) and the sixth on Foclóir an Duinnínigh / Dinneen’s Dictionary (2004) have since been published in the ITS Subsidiary Series. They, along with select ITS volumes from the Main Series, will be available for purchase on the day of the seminar.

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Ireland - Renaissance, Revolution, Regeneration.
The University of Sunderland, in Association with the North East Irish Culture Network
10-12 November 2005
Deadline for Proposals: 20 June 2006

Following the success of its last three international conferences: Representing-Ireland: Past, Present and Future, [2003] and The Word, The Icon and The Ritual, [2004], and Lands of Saints of Scholars, [2005] the University of Sunderland, in association with NEICN, is soliciting papers for an interdisciplinary conference, which will run from 10-12 November 2006.

The conference organisers hope to represent a wide range of approaches to Irish culture from academics and non--academics alike. Performances, roundtables, collaborative projects, and other non--traditional presentations are encouraged in addition to conference papers. The organisers particularly welcome proposals for panels. As with previous years’ conferences, they welcome submissions for panels and papers under the thematic headings of: Ireland - Renaissance, Revoution, Regeneration in the following areas: Literature, Performing Arts, History, Politics, Folklore and Mythology, Ireland in Theory, Gender and Ireland Anthropology, Sociology, Art and Art History, Music, Dance, Media and Film Studies, Cultural Studies, and Studies of the Diaspora.

North American and other international scholars, practitioners in the arts, and postgraduate students are all encouraged to submit proposals to the conference organisers. They also welcome proposals for papers in absentia for delegates who wish to participate but may find it difficult to attend the event.

The last three conferences have resulted in the publication of a selection of essays, and the organisers hope to continue this with essays from this year's conference. This year they will have over 100 speakers in an international event that will include a book launch, traditional music and dance, drama and a ceilidh. Plenary Speakers include Ailbhe Smyth (University College, Dublin), Mervyn Busteed (University of Manchester) Proposals of not more than 500 words should be sent by 20th June 2006 at the latest to either of the editors: Dr Alison O'Malley-Younger - alison.younger@sunderland.ac.uk Professor Stephen Regan - stephen.regan@durham.ac.uk And copied to the conference adminstrator, Ms Susan Cottam - susan.cottam@sunderland.ac.uk

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18:Beckett
9-10 November 2006
Toronto, Canada
Deadline for Abstracts: 300-500 words and a CV by 30 June 2006.
Contact: beckett@utm.utoronto.ca

The prevalence of Beckettian references and formal strategies in contemporary art, new media and theatre attests to the urgency felt by cultural producers to negotiate his challenging legacy. This symposium will explore recent reinventions of Beckettian themes or strategies, such as repetition, fragmentation, abstraction, absurdity, negativity and humour, in relation to contemporary issues.

Speakers may address different projects by contemporary artists, writers, art collectives and/or theatre groups, and will examine the conceptual and philosophical frameworks that have compelled engagement with the work of Samuel Beckett as a means of reactivating avant-garde production.

The symposium will accompany an exhibition of the work of thirteen international contemporary artists who explore the legacy of Beckett through new media and video. The artists represented in the exhibition include Martin Arnold, Stan Douglas, Bruce Nauman, and Hans Op de Beeck. The exhibition is scheduled to run from November through December 2006 at the Blackwood Gallery, UTM, and the JM Barnicke Art Gallery at Hart House on the St. George campus, University of Toronto.

20-minute papers are invited on any aspect of the relation between Beckett’s work and new media and/or contemporary art production. Possible topics include:

Hybrid, avant-garde reinventions of Beckettian themes in the visual arts and theatre Contextualizing Beckett’s formal strategies for the contemporary arts, especially in the intersection of new medias with fine art, literature and theatre The aftermath of avant-garde theatre and absurdist, atheistic cultural criticism Postmodern theories of contemporary art and cultural criticism The procedural realities of working with Beckett=92s texts today (in film and theatre productions) in relation to the copyright control of the Beckett Estate

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Robert J. Flaherty
2006 Film and History League Conference: "The Documentary Tradition"
Dolce Conference Center, Dallas, TX
8-12 November, 2006
Deadline for Proposals: 15 September, 2006
Contact: jgreen@stonehill.edu
Web: http://www.filmandhistory.org    

Traditionally considered to be documentary cinema's defining text, Robert J. Flaherty's Nanook of the North (1922) has both an iconic and problematic status in contemporary studies of non-fiction film. Flaherty himself has been a figure similarly revered and reviled in equal measure for his genre-defying mixture of observational documentation and romantic reconstruction. As a flashpoint for debates about documentary film ethics and ethnographic representation, as well as a key figure in any consideration of the polymorphous category of non-fiction film, Flaherty remains as significant a figure to documentary studies as he was to the historical development of the form. We are inviting submissions on all aspects of the work of Robert Flaherty. Possible topics include, but are not limited to:  
—Flaherty and Anthropological/Ethnographic Display.
—The Ipsographic Imagination: Flaherty's Films of British, Irish and American Industry,
—Territorializing the Real: Geography and Authenticity
—Global Receptions and Revisions of Nanook
—Hybrid Visions: Intersections of Fiction and Non-Fiction in the work of Flaherty and His Collaborators
—Between Commerce and Art: Flaherty and Material Culture
—Resistant Vision: Flaherty in the Era of Synchronized Sound
—Watching Flaherty through the Third Eye: Nanook, Moana and Elephant Boy in the Postcolonial Frame.
—Flaherty and Grierson: Developing the Documentary Form.
—Constructing Paradise: Moana, Tabu and White Shadows of the South Seas
—Observing from the Margins: Frances Flaherty as (Nearly) Silent Partner
—Gender and Sexuality in Moana and Nanook
—Romance and Destitution in America: The Land and Louisiana Story
—Flaherty and Propaganda: Prelude to War
—Considerations of Flaherty's non-directorial achievements (Flaherty as cinematographer, screenwriter, editor and producer).  

The Film and History League conference details, including a list of other areas to be represented at the conference, can be found at: http://www.filmandhistory.org  

The conference will run from 8-12 November, 2006 in the Dolce Conference Center near the DFW airport. This year's featured artists are D.A. Pennebaker and Chris Hegedus and the conference speakers will be Betsy A. McLane and Raymond Fielding.

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The Construction And Deconstruction Of Irish Memory
3 – 4 November 2006
University of Aarhus, Denmark
Nordic Irish Studies Network Symposium and Conference
Deadline for proposals and abstracts (200 words for 20-minute papers): 1 July 2006.
Contact: Michael Böss - engmb@hum.au.dk

The conference will be held in conjunction with a Beckett symposium. The conference will be open to all members of NISN and EFACIS.

November 3: World Theatre: Samuel Beckett and the Theatre
The purpose of the symposium is to discuss the contribution of Beckett's drama not only to European theatre, but also to the notion of a "world theatre". Speakers: Prof. Ronan McDonald (University of Reading), Prof. Werner Huber (University of Vienna), Prof. Claudion Viventi (University of Napoli Orientale), Dr. Tatiana Chemi Strøm, Dr. Jorunn Kjølner and Dr. Janek Szatkowski (University of Aarhus), M. Phil. Brynhildur Boyce (University of Iceland)

The symposium is organised by The Centre for Irish Studies and the Department of Drama.

November 4: The Construction and Deconstruction of Irish Memory
Guest Writer: Chris Arthur
Fee: DKK 850 (120 Euro)

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Beckett after Ibsen
Ankara, Turkey
3-5 November 2006
Contact: Dr.Beliz Güçbilmez - baltan@humanity.ankara.edu.tr
Deadline for Abstracts: 1 May 2006

2006 is the centenary of Ibsen’s death and Beckett’s birth. Both playwrights represent two main ways of writing identified with their own names. The conference aims to create an opportunity for theatre scholars to reevaluate the accumulation of 9 August, 2007 rights. The conference organisers are calling for 20 minutes contributions on all aspects connected with or suggested by the title of the conference. Topics may include but not limited to
-the historical/ideological/social/structural aspects of Ibsenite drama and their ‘adventures’ after Ibsen
-Ibsenite playwrights/plays between Ibsen and Beckett; the link between 19th and 20th centuries of theatre
- Continuity and discontinuity of modes of writing in theatre
- Beckettian strategies
-Texts for the stage
New perspectives for reading Ibsen plays after Beckett.

Keynote speakers:
Professor Mary Bryden, President of the Samuel Beckett Society: from School of European Studies. Cardiff University. Title of the conference lecture 'Ibsen to Beckett via Shaw'.

Professor Jon Nygaard/ Title of the conference lecture: "Decline of Dialogue" from Ibsen to Beckett, Professor of drama, from the Centre for Ibsen-Studies at the University of Oslo.

Conference language: Turkish and English.

The conference is organized by the Theatre Department of Faculty of Letters, Ankara University.

Please send a 200-250 words proposal, and a brief CV no later then 1/05/2006 to tdergi@humanity.ankara.edu.tr DO NOT SEND ATTACHMENTS. Instead, please paste the abstract into the body of the e-mail and please be sure to include your full name, contact information, and academic affiliation (if any).

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“Conflict and Peace in Ireland”
27-29 October, 2006
American Conference for Irish Studies – Western Regional Conference
George Fox University, Newberg, Oregon
Deadline for Abstracts: 1 June 2006
Contact: Dr. Kathy Heininge - kheininge@georgefox.edu

Irish history is filled with stories of political, religious, cultural or ideological conflict. Conflict takes place between regions, groups, or family members. Irish history is also filled with efforts to achieve peace in these conflicts, efforts that have met with varying levels of success. This conference will explore both the conflicts and the efforts at peace to illustrate the great diversity in approaches to achieving peace. Papers will be welcomed on any facet of the topic, including but not limited to the following possibilities:

Historical narratives
Representations of conflict and peace in art, film, music or literature
Discussions of current efforts

Papers will also be welcome on any other topic of interest to Irish studies.

Abstracts of no more than one page must be submitted, either via email or hard copy, by June 1, 2006 for consideration for the conference. Final papers should not exceed 15 minutes.

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“Which Direction Ireland?”
American Conference for Irish Studies Mid-Atlantic Regional Meeting,
27-28 October, 2006
Kutztown University, Kutztown, PA.
Deadline for Proposals: 28 July 2006
Contact: mcnamara@kutztown.edu

Papers are sought touching on any aspect of the idea of direction and Ireland... Especially welcome are presentations addressing questions of modernization and technology, Ireland in the international sphere, immigration and emigration past and present, even projections for the future. These areas can be considered in light of literature, history, language, social science, geography, or any other heading appropriate to the topic of Ireland and direction. In addition, any paper proposal relevant to Irish studies will be considered.

Proposals/abstracts of no more than 200 words may be submitted to Dr. Donald McNamara, Department of English, Lytle Hall, Kutztown University, Kutztown, PA 19530, or mcnamara@kutztown.edu no later than July 28, 2006.

Located on the edge of the famed Pennsylvania Dutch country, Kutztown, PA, offers an ideal location, within reasonable distance of metropolitan centers and yet in a tranquil, scenic location perfect for a conference. There may even be a horse-drawn carriage or two moving through the middle of campus. Fall is an especially pleasant time to visit the area, both for weather and for vibrant colors. Kutztown University, part of the state university system of Pennsylvania, is experiencing tremendous growth, poised to accommodate more than 10,000 students while remembering its origins as a normal school.

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Global Beckett
Odense, Denmark
25-27 October 2006.
Abstracts: 20 minute presentations, 250 words, due June 1, 2006.
Conference website: http://www.globalbeckett.sdu.dk

Papers are invited for the upcoming Global Beckett conference at the University of Southern Denmark, Odense, October 25-27, 2006, organized by the Universities of Southern Denmark, Oslo and Aarhus. Along with the conference there will be an audiovisual Beckett exhibition at Kunsthallen/Brandts Klaedefabrik in Odense. Adopting "Global Beckett" as its overall theme, the conference will limit itself to four subsections that in differing ways function as venues for exploring the specifically global potential of Samuel Beckett's oeuvre:

Global culture: Literature-functions-society.
Keynote speaker: Steven Connor, Birkbeck College, London.
Firstly, in a pragmatic-sociological sense Beckett is global in that he is, quite simply, being played, staged, read and debated all around the globe. From Asia to South America, from Australia to Europe, any number of people continue to engage in the work of Beckett. This raises the issue of a "global literature": What are its specific features and functions, if any, and how can the work of Beckett be said to constitute a part of global culture?

Territorial Subtraction: Earth-cylinder-space.
Keynote to be announced.
Secondly, a striking number of Beckettian fictional people are tied to the earth, wander and roam fields and tracks, restlessly perambulate the countryside. In most cases specifically national signs are carefully subtracted or withheld. The geological and ecological stratum emerges as earth, rather than a delimited set of national territories. Another large group of Beckett-texts deal with the construction of possible worlds. We are thinking of the so-called "cylinder-texts" from the sixties. An odd cleansing of commonplace references to specific ethnic, national, religious or other borderlines are carried out within the cylinders. The worlds created are presented as highly singular and bounded, yet "here" could be anywhere. What perspectives does this harbour in terms of our thinking of the global versus the national, of space versus place? How may the singular and earthbound, yet dislocated nature of Beckett's terrestrial and possible worlds illuminate the notion of the "global"?

Withdrawal as resistance: Politics-subjectivity-globalization.
Keynote to be announced.
Thirdly, a Beckettian aesthetic politics could be said to be "global" in that he consistently cuts across or goes beneath ethnic, religious and ideological thresholds. This non-specific or de-differentiated material, in combination with the credos of the nothing to express and Fallor, ergo sum, i.e. the Beckettian aesthetics and ethics of failure and abstainment or de-subjectification, cannot, however, avoid pointing towards a certain subjectivity. How does the Beckettian self-effacing subject concern the various subject-politics of globalization and its theories? Perhaps by not representing or referring to anything universal, any stable identity or human essence or voluntary will-to-create from whatever local or non-specific material one may come across. What is the potential of a Beckettian global subjectivity? Does it hint towards reflections on a humanity bereft of dividing differences? What kind of insight concerning the issue of a global ethics might focusing on Beckettian subjectivity yield? How might it relate to biopolitics and geoaesthetics? Does it offer a valid (global) form of resistance? Having witnessed the fading of deconstructionist and hermeneutical readings of Beckett, are there any lessons to be culled from Beckett concerning the status of the ticklish subject?

Worldly Laughter: Humour-affect-the unofficially global.
Keynote speaker: Simon Critchley, New School University, New York.
Fourthly, Beckett combines a subtle and nuanced humour, produced by a highly specified usage of language, with what appears to be a global sense of release and deliverance, albeit not necessarily redemption. While the understanding of Beckett's humour seems dependent upon a comprehension of subtle nuances within the literary contexts of the English or French languages, the inherently comic release of his otherwise serious characters and monologues, appear, on a certain level, to be accessible to audiences who do not possess this competence. Thus, does Beckett's humour encompass an entanglement between the universal and the singular? If so, how is this possible? What is the nature of the relationship between laughter and the global in Beckett? How might reading Beckett illuminate the relationship between humour and literature? And how may such a type of reading contribute to our understanding of the bonds between affectivity, community and globalization?

Please send abstracts to: Mikkel Astrup (Oslo): mikkel.astrup@ilos.uio.no Mikkel Bruun Zangenberg (Odense): zangenberg@litcul.sdu.dk Jacob Lund Pedersen (Aarhus): jacoblund@hum.au.dk Inquires are welcome at any time. Please direct all questions concerning practical issues (hotel, conference fee, etc.) to Anders Knudsen, a.knudsen@litcul.sdu.dk

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New England American Conference for Irish Studies (NEACIS) 2006
University of Connecticut at Storrs
21 – 22 October 2006
Proposals due by 20 June 2006

Confirmed speakers include COLM TÓIBÍN, EMMA DONOGHUE and KEN SIMPSON

Proposals are requested for the 2006 NEACIS conference on the theme of “Changing Ireland”. Presentation topics may include but should not be limited to the following topics: Irish identity, Celtic Tiger Ireland, colonialism/post-colonialism, immigration/emigration, Northern Irish Peace Process; social, historical, artistic, religious, sexual or political (r)evolution

2-day conference•campus hotel•screenings•céilí•free accommodation for grad speakers with UConn grads (FCFS)•2 receptions & 2 meals included in registration cost

This is an interdisciplinary conference. While proposals addressing the conference theme will be especially welcome, the organisers will consider offerings on any Irish Studies topic and any historical period. Please send your one-page proposals to Mary Burke (Mary.2.Burke@uconn.edu) or Rachael Lynch (Rachael.Lynch@uconn.edu), or to NEACIS 2006, Department of English, University of Connecticut, 215 Glenbrook Road Unit 4025, Storrs, CT 06269-4025.

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Women in Irish Culture and History
20-22 October 2006
University College Dublin
Deadline for Proposals (300 words for papers, 500 for panels): 7 July 2006
Contact: gerardine.meaney@ucd.ie and anne.mulhall@ucd.ie

Recent years have seen a rapid proliferation in research on the role of women in Irish culture, society and history parallel to the changing role of women in Ireland. What was the nature of women’s cultural production and participation? What kind of impact did they have on public life and public policy? What has been the impact of emigration and immigration? What have our research agendas been and why? How has this impacted on perceptions of women’s lives and experiences, north and south? How has our perception changed? This interdisciplinary conference brings together work on culture and history and welcomes input from a broad range of disciplines and periods.

Proposals for papers and panels are invited in the following areas, though not limited to them:

• Culture and Politics
• Feminism and Social and Cultural Change
• Women in Publishing
• Globalisation
• Women and the Songwriting Tradition
• Women and Social Policy
• Bilingualism in Women’s Writing
• Women in the Visual Arts
• Modernism and Postmodernism
• New Media
• Film, Television and Radio
• From Emigration to Immigration
• Class and Gender
• Race, Ethnicity and Gender
• Sexuality
• Interrogating the Postcolonial
• Women and Religion/Spirituality

Proposals should be submitted by email in rtf format with ‘Conference Proposal’ in the subject line to the conference organisers before 7 July 2006.

This a joint conference of the Women in Modern Irish Culture Project (School of History, University of Warwick and School of English and Drama, UCD) funded by the AHRC and the Women in Twentieth Century Irish Public Life and Culture project (School of History, Queen’s University Belfast; Dept. of History, University of Limerick; School of English and Drama, UCD) funded by the HEA North-South Research Collaboration Fund, Strand 2.

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Beckett and the Thirties
20-21 October, 2006
Paris, France
Deadline for Abstracts: 30 April 2006

In celebration of the centenary of Samuel Beckett, the universities of Paris III-Sorbonne nouvelle, Strasbourg II-Marc Bloch, and Paris VII-Denis Diderot, are co-organizing the conference, Beckett and the Thirties, to be held at the Ecole Normale Superieure in Paris, where Beckett held the post of lecteur from 1928-1930.

As the title indicates, this conference will focus on the period of 1929-1939, and in particular on Beckett’s relationship with both the city of Paris and French literary, philosophical, and intellectual traditions and texts. At the same time, The conference organisers wish to emphasize the specificities of Beckett’s work as an English-language writer during this time, which preceded his much more intensive use of French as language of composition from the nineteen-forties onward. The conference organisers would also welcome considerations of Beckett’s deeply formative encounters with German and Italian literature, philosophy, and art during this period.

Please send a short proposal (250 words maximum) and a short cv to either Daniel Katz (dkatz@wanadoo.fr), Carle Bonafous-Murat (cbmurat@aol.com), or Ciaran Ross (ciaranross@tele2.fr) by April 30, 2006. Please mention Beckett and the Thirties in your subject line, and paste your text into the message rather than sending attachments.

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Beckett & Company: A Centenary Conference on Samuel Beckett and the Arts
5-7 October 2006
Birbeck, Tate Modern, the London Consortium, Goldsmiths - London, UK
Deadline for Abstracts: 1 June 2006

Tate Modern, The London Consortium, Birkbeck College, and Goldsmiths College are hosting an interdisciplinary conference to celebrate the importance of Samuel Beckett’s work for the arts in the twenty-first century. Artists such as Jasper Johns, Bruce Nauman, Steve McQueen, and Doris Salcedo, composers such as Philip Glass, Morton Feldman, and Mark-Anthony Turnage, filmmakers like Atom Egoyan and dancers like Maguy Marin, have all engaged with Beckett in their work. Bringing together visual artists, composers, musicians, dancers, choreographers, architects, and philosophers, this three-day conference will provide an opportunity to question and debate Beckett’s contemporaneity, and to celebrate his relevance for the arts. Beckett & Company will begin with an academic conference at Birkbeck, followed by a day of public events, talks, and screenings at Tate Modern, headlined by key contemporary artists. Goldsmiths will close the conference with a series of workshops, roundtables, and performances that will bring scholars and practitioners into dialogue.

Contributions to the conference are invited in two forms:
1. Academic papers of 20 mins
2. Presentations for workshop, roundtable, or performance of 20-40 mins.

Please send two copies of abstracts (250-500 words) with affiliation and contact details via email (as Word, PDF, or RTF attachments) to Dr Derval Tubridy (d.tubridy@gold.ac.uk) and Dr Laura Salisbury (l.salisbury@bbk.ac.uk) by 1 June 2006.

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John Huston Centenary Conference
23-24 November 2006
National University of Ireland, Galway
Deadline for Proposals: 7 May 2006
Contact: tony.tracy@nuigalway.ie

In November 2006, The Huston School of Film and Digital media, National University of Ireland, Galway will host a two day conference in recognition of the centenary of the birth of John Huston. Submissions are invited for papers (25mins in duration) dealing with the life and work of this most versatile and charismatic of American directors.

John Huston, the director of over films in a career lasting was much celebrated by his peers and associates but has been strangely neglected in the critical literature. This conference wishes to redress such neglect and provide a forum for as wide a consideration of his contribution to film as possible.

Topics for consideration might include: Huston as actor; as writer; as auteur; as personality; approaches to genre; considerations of the many adaptations in his oeuvre; Huston¹s life and film activities in Ireland; representations of gender in his work; Huston¹s relationship with Hollywood; thematic studies; Clint Eastwood¹s White Hunter, Black Heart; etc.

Please submit a 300 word proposal stating the topic, aims and scope of the paper along with a brief CV via email to Tony Tracy,. Email: tony.tracy@nuigalway.ie 

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The First Symposium of Irish Studies in South America
28 – 30 September 2006
University Sau Paulo
Web: http://www.freewebs.com/irishstudies

Our colleagues in Brazil are preparing the First Symposium of Irish Studies in South America, from Sep. 28 to Sep. 30, at USP (venue of the 2002 IASIL conference), sponsored by USP, ABEI and the Irish Embassy in Brazil.

Chris Morash, Hedwig Schwall, Inês Terente and Maureen Murphy are scheduled as guest speakers. Additionally, Brazilian scholars will take part in panels of discussion and a sessions of papers. It is hoped that this will be the beginning of an annual event.

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"Borderless Beckett" - International Samuel Beckett Symposium
Waseda University International Convention Centre, Tokyo
29 September – 1 October
http://beckettjapan.org/borderless.htm

Under the auspices of the 21st Century COE (Center of Excellence) Institute for Theatre Research, Waseda University and The Samuel Beckett Research Circle of Japan

The year 2006 marks not only the one-hundredth anniversary of Samuel Beckett’s birth but also the fiftieth anniversary of the Japanese public’s very first encounter with his work. In 1953, a Japanese student named Ando Shin’ya watched the world premiere of En attendant Godot at the Théâtre de Babylone in Paris and was enchanted by this “unprecedented” play. The Hakusuisha Publishing Company published Ando’s Japanese translation of the play in 1956. Ando himself directed Godot’s Japanese premiere for the major Shingeki (“modern theatre”) company Bungakuza in 1960, making a decisive impact on such playwrights as Betsuyaku Minoru, Suzuki Tadashi, Sato Makoto, and Kara Juro. The production triggered the avant-garde movement called the “Underground Theatre”, which developed into “Shogekijo-Undou” (the “Little-Theatre Movement”), the new wave of Japanese theatre. Godot has been performed repeatedly in Japan since the 60s, leaving a deep impression upon spectator and practitioner alike. Such theatre artists as Ninagawa Yukio, Kushida Kazuyoshi, Tsuka Kohei and Miyazawa Akio demonstrate the influence that Beckett’s play continues to have in contemporary Japanese theatre.

Japan’s first international Beckett Symposium will be held at the International Convention Centre at Waseda University for three days, from 29 September to 1 October, 2006. The Symposium will be co-hosted by Waseda University’s 21st Century COE Institute for Theatre Research and the Samuel Beckett Research Circle of Japan. The symposium theme will be “Borderless Beckett”. The late Takahashi Yasunari, who initiated Beckett studies in Japan, described affinities between Beckett’s drama and classical Noh theatre. Noh crosses borders between reality and dream, between life and death. Beckett’s art too undermines dualistic thinking and transgresses various borders: traditional distinctions in genre, linguistic differences between English and French, geographical and political differences, and conventional frameworks of philosophy and aesthetics. Beckett’s writing, which seems on the one hand to be art reduced to bare essentials, is in fact paradoxically excessive, eluding conventional views of literature, media and culture. The symposium will aim to create a free critical and creative space, where diverse critical approaches and methodologies may reach toward and celebrate Beckett’s transgressive, borderless art.

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS: Stanley Gontarski (Florida State University), Mary Bryden (Cardiff University), Steven Connor (University of London), Evelyne Grossman (Université Paris VII)

PLENARY PANELS "Beckett and the Art of His Century" - Enoch Brater (University of Michigan), Angela Moorjani (Emerita, University of Maryland, Baltimore County), Linda Ben-Zvi (University of Tel Aviv)

All submissions must be made at the Website of JTB (the official site for the Symposium application).

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Irresponsibility
28-30 September 2006
NTU Singapore
Deadline for Proposals: 10 April (Irish Lit panel and conference)
Contact: Neil Murphy at camurphy@ntu.edu.sg (Irish Lit panel) and irresponsibility@ntu.edu.sg
Website: www.hss.ntu.edu.sg/english/eng_conference.asp

Jorge Luis Borges once claimed that “the Irish have always been the iconoclasts of the British Isles.” Bearing Borges’ suggestion in mind, it is hoped that this panel will address the perception of Irish literature as a category of writing that has frequently been provocative to formal and social norms. As Irish writers have been pivotal in the dominant, frame-breaking, literary categories of this century, like Modernism (Yeats, Joyce, Beckett) and Postmodernism (Joyce, Beckett, Flann O’Brien, Banville), a discussion on irresponsibility has particular resonance, particularly in the sense that Irish literature has frequently refused to accept social, aesthetic, formal and political modes of established order.

Proposals (250 words) are invited on any conjunction of Irish literature and irresponsibility, or resistance to fixed standards, and should be forwarded to Neil Murphy at camurphy@ntu.edu.sg. This panel has been agreed by the conference committee.

Other suggestions for panels or papers related to any aspect of Irish literature in the context of (ir)responsibility are very welcome.

This Irish Literature panel is part of a broader conference on the them of Irresponsiblity in literature. The opening address is by Professor Shirley Chew, plenary address by Professor J. Hillis Miller, and the keynote address by Professor Eugene O’Brien.

Literature tells us—before psychoanalysis, before deconstruction—that our crimes are overdetermined, our ethical concepts unstable. Yet the facile deployment of the rhetoric of responsibility and irresponsibility, in all manner of debate, indicates the widespread abuse of the concept of responsibility, if not its bankruptcy. With our title “Irresponsibility,” The conference organisers hope to provoke a conversation aimed at assessing both the contribution of literature to our understanding of the concept of responsibility and its vicissitudes, and the possible resistance within literature and literary studies to cheap distinctions between responsibility and irresponsibility. The conference organisers hope also to provide a forum for those interested in determining the responsibility of literary studies today, both within its own domain, and in its relation to other disciplines. They welcome a wide variety of approaches to our theme, and encourage a broad understanding of its scope. The conference organisers invite papers and proposals for panels (of 3-4 papers). Suggested topics include, but are not restricted to, the following:

o Representations of irresponsibility in the literature of any period or nationality
o Irresponsible characters, narrators, authors, or literary critics
o Responsibility after Freud (or Kierkegaard, or Sade, or Marx, or Nietzsche, or Derrida)
o Interdisciplinary irresponsibility: Literature and Philosophy, Literature and Science, Literature and Law, Literature and Film Studies, Literature and Cultural studies
o The pleasure of irresponsibility: Libertinism; Sadism; Pornography; Trash Cinema
o Irresponsibility and Postmodernism, Postcolonialism, Poststructuralism
o Irish Literature and Irresponsibility, or Subversion in the Anti-Realist tradition
o Moral didacticism, moral dilemmas, moral anxieties in Literature or Film
o Primal guilt: Adam, Eve, Oedipus, Antigone
o Victorianism and the rhetoric of responsibility
o Irresponsibility and Insanity, Dilettantism, Hypocrisy, Scepticism, Faith, the Sacred, Violence, Polemics, Politics, War
o Irresponsibility in responsible Singapore: Singapore literature, the arts, and culture
o Responsibility in the age of terror
o Culpatory and exculpatory rhetoric
o Irresponsibility as resistance
o The ethics of reading

Please send abstracts of 300 words either by email to <irresponsibility@ntu.edu.sg> or by mail to Conference Committee, English Division, School of Humanities and Social Sciences, NTU, Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 639798.

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The Line of Contemporary Poetry - The British and Irish Contemporary Poetry Conference
22-24 September 2006
St Anne's College, Oxford, England
Deadline for submission of abstracts: 1 March 2006
For further information, contact John Stammers - editor@poetryconference.org.uk
www.poetryconference.org.uk

In association with the University of St Andrews, Seamus Heaney Centre Queens University, Belfast, and Lancaster University

Speakers include Professor Jonathan Bate, Professor John Kerrigan, Professor Robert Crawford, Dr Mark Ford and Dr Deryn Rees-Jones

Abstracts are invited on the conference theme of: The Line of Contemporary Poetry.
Abstracts to be 300 words in length on the conference theme and should propose papers which will read to 20 minutes. Ideas for panels and conference events in non-traditional formats are welcomed.

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Iris Murdoch International Conference
Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Kingston University, LONDON
15-16 September 2006
Deadline for Proposals: 30 May 2006

Kingston University is pleased to announce the third Iris Murdoch Conference, to be held at Kingston University in 2006. The Conference will focus on Murdoch's relevance to contemporary debates on morality and literature, and will investigate the ways her moral philosophy manifests itself in her novels. The conference organisers also welcome philosophical and theological papers on any aspect of Murdoch's moral philosophy. In addition, they shall consider papers for panels on specific topics or aspects of individual novels.

Organizer: Dr Anne Rowe, Kingston University, Tel: +44 (0)208 547 2000 E-mail: a.rowe@kingston.ac.uk

Abstracts of up to 300 words to be sent by 30th May 2006 to: Penny Tribe, Iris Murdoch Conference Administrator, Kingston University, Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, Penrhyn Road, Kingston, Surrey, KT1 2 EE Tel =44(0) 208 547 2000 E-Mail: p.tribe@kingston.ac.uk

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Why Irish?
September 14 & 15, 2006
Department of Irish Language & Literature
University of Notre Dame

The Department of Irish Language & Literature will host the annual colloquium WHY IRISH? on 14 & 15 September, 2006. Each year WHY IRISH? brings international speakers to Notre Dame to examine the role of the Irish language in various disciplines. This year's event focuses on communication and song.

Thursday, 14th September 2006
Cathal Goan, Director General, Raidió Telefís Éireann (RTÉ)
“TG4 – 10 Years A’Growing”
4:00pm, 422 Flanner Hall

TG4, the Irish language national television channel, commenced broadcasting in 1996. The most high-profile public Irish language initiative in the past fifty years, attracting over 800,000 viewers a day, TG4’s programs have earned numerous prestigious international awards. Cathal Goan, TG4’s first CEO, will reflect on founding a minority language television station and the future of state broadcasting in Europe.

Friday, 15th September 2006
Maighréad Ní Dhomhnaill, Traditional Artist
“Neilí Ní Dhomhnaill and the West Donegal Song Tradition”
3:00pm, Hesburgh Center Auditorium

No opportunity to hear this unforgettable voice should be missed. Maighréad Ní Dhomhnaill-- one of Ireland's foremost singers -- offers a rare opportunity to hear her unique vocal style and repertoire of folk songs. The recepient of the highest honor in Irish music, TG4's Traditional Singer of the Year in 2005, Maighréad will perform Irish songs celebrating the history, culture and people of Donegal and Ireland. The sound of her voice will linger long in your memory.

Admission is free and all are welcome.

WHY IRISH? celebrates the Thomas J. and Kathleen O’Donnell Chair of Irish Language and Literature of which Professor Breandán Ó Buachalla is the inaugural Professor. Further details available at http://www.nd.edu/~irishstu and

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The fourth Annual British and Irish Spenser Seminar
9 September 2006
Bowett Room, Queens' College, Cambridge
Deadline for Proposals: June 2006
Contact: Andrew Zurcher, Tutor and Director of Studies in English, Queens' College, Cambridge CB3 9ET, United Kingdom

The theme of this year's meeting will be 'Life and Texts', which will also be the focus of the plenary paper from Andrew Hadfield. The organisers are keen to receive contributions from students and scholars from the UK, Ireland, and abroad, and would be happy to hear from anyone who might be interested in participating, or who could recommend someone else (particularly graduate students, whom they are keen to involve) who might like to contribute a paper. They will be accepting proposals for papers until early June; anyone interested should write to the organiser by email. Advance registration for the seminar is encouraged, and there will be an enforced contribution of five pounds (or the equivalent).

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21st Century Celts - The Inaugural Conference of the Celtic Education and Research Network
8-10 September 2006
Truro, Cornwall
Abstracts (300 words) to 21stcenturycelts@exeter.ac.uk by 1 June 2006

What constitutes Celtic identity in the 21st century? How does the definition of Celtic identity differ across the world, particularly around the Atlantic seaboard? How are Celtic identities transformed at cultural and geographical borders? How do modern Celtic identities continue to use (and abuse?) the past? What is the role and significance of cultural memory, oral traditions and the ancient landscape in the construction of Celtic identities?

These are some of the questions to be explored by 21st Century Celts: a three-day public conference to be held at New County Hall, Truro, Cornwall. This event is an initiative of CERN (Celtic Education & Research Network) and is held in association with the Cornish Audio Visual Archive (CAVA). 21st Century Celts will combine a programme of conference papers with discussion forums, question and answer panels, and art and drama performances. Its objective is to encourage a lively and informed academic debate surrounding the construction, manifestation and significance of 'Celtic' identities in the 21st century.

Key note speakers include Celeste Ray (University of the South, Tennessee), Ken MacKinnon (University of Edinburgh) and Marion Bowman (Open University).

Papers are requested, addressing the themes raised by the questions above. Papers comparing and contrasting global 'Celtic' identities, and papers that discuss the means via which these identities are constructed, reproduced and/or transformed (e.g. landscape remnants, oral traditions, cultural memory, film, art, literature) are particularly desired. It is envisaged that conference proceedings will eventually be published. A number of places for postgraduate papers have been reserved (abstracts from postgraduates must be received by 1st July 2006).

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Women and poetry in the 21st Century: Kicking Daffodils III
6-7 September 2006,
University of the West of England, Bristol
Deadline for Proposals: 31 March (250 words)
Contact: womenandpoetry@uwe.ac.uk
http://www.uwe.ac.uk/hlss/faculty/news/womenandpoetry/

Keynote Speakers: Medbh McGuckian and Marion Wynne-Davies

Including contributions from: Elaine Feinstein, Deryn Rees-Jones, Diane Middlebrook, Robyn Bolam, Kate Clanchy, Michelene Wandor, Tracy Brain, Fiona Sampson, Georgia Scott, Zina Rohan, Cheryl Malcolm.

The first 'Kicking Daffodils' conference and festival devoted to 'women and poetry' was held at Oxford Brookes University in April 1994. More than a decade later Daffodils III represents a fresh opportunity to explore the burgeoning field of 'women's poetry'. How have issues like gender, history and ideology affected the reading, writing and/or the performance of poetry by women down the ages? Is there critical merit in establishing a female canon, or does it invite unhelpful value judgements? Has the recovery of forgotten poets from earlier centuries had any lasting impact on definitions such as Romanticism, the Renaissance, or the Enlightenment?

This two-day conference brings poets, critics and readers together with poetry publishers and editors in an event comprising workshops, readings, academic papers, lectures, roundtables, discussion and debate. The organisers invite further proposals (250 words by 31st March 2006); papers on pre-twentieth century poets and poetics will be particularly welcome.

Organisers: Dr. Alice Entwistle, School of English & Drama, University of the West of England, Bristol; Dr. Jo Gill, School of English & Creative Studies, Bath Spa University

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