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.

2008 Conferences

All information should be confirmed with conference organisers

2007 Conferences are listed here

This page lists conferences on Irish literature, Irish drama and theatre studies, and Irish film. 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.

“The Big House in Twentieth Century Irish Writing”
14-15 October 2008
Royal Irish Academy, Dawson Street, Dublin

Proposals are invited for 15-minute papers on the Big House in twentieth century Irish writing to mark fifty years since the death of playwright and Abbey Theatre director Lennox Robinson (1886-1958). Papers are sought in the following areas:

Please send abstracts of not more than 500 words by 28th March 2008 to: Dr Derek Hand (Committee Secretary), English Department, St Patrick’s College, Drumcondra, Dublin 9. Ireland or derek.hand@spd.dcu.ie

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Wavelengths: Irish and American Music
UCD Clinton Institute for American Studies
4-7 September 2008, University College Dublin & Temple Bar Cultural Trust

Plenary speakers will include: Eric Lott ( University of Virginia), Mick Moloney ( New York University), Paul Muldoon ( Princeton University), Mícheál Ó'Súilleabháin ( University of Limerick)

This event has been conceived by a group of scholars, musicians and producers to provide a focus for performance and study of Irish and American musical relations. These relations have a long and deep history, intertwining the cultures and identities of Irish and American peoples. The event will explore and celebrate these relations via a programme that combines conference presentations and musical performances.

Wavelengths will focus on the back-and-forwards movement of musical traditions between Ireland and the United States and identify newer currents and fusions in transatlantic music. We invite proposals for conference presentations ­ individual papers and panels. Conference themes will include, but will not be limited to:

Race and ethnicity

Nation and identity

Class and work

Innovators (performers, technicians, collectors, commentators) Emigration and diaspora Historical events New technologies Scotch-Irish influences Genres ­ traditional, folk, country, rock, jazz, soul, Celtic punk, hip hopŠ Social functions of music Representations of music in other media ­ film, photography, literature

Brief abstracts (200 words) plus a short biographical statement should be sent to Catherine Carey at Catherine.Carey@ucd.ie by 1st June 2008.

The conference will take place at the UCD Clinton Institute for American Studies. Our website will feature further details about the conference, see www.ucdclinton.ie

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IASIL 2008 - Home and Elsewhere: the Spaces of Irish Writing
Oporto, Portugal
28 July - 1 August
View the conference website here

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The Novel and its Borders
The Centre for The Novel, University of Aberdeen
8-10 July 2008
www.abdn.ac.uk/novelconference/

The novel is not only a literary form occupying a particular generic or cultural territory, but also an aesthetic, historical and social phenomenon that represents, constructs, and transgresses borders. The conference on The Novel and its Borders will engage with the novel in all its aspects, material and theoretical, from the 18th to the 21st century.

Plenary speakers: Malcolm Bowie, Jonathan Lamb, Terry Castle

Panel topics will include the following: Genealogies of the novel, Histories of the book, Memory, History and Narrative time; Transatlantic crossings; Travel narratives; Libraries, Archives, Markets; Borders of the mind; Territories of the body, novel sexualities; The novel and translation; The novel and real/imagined communities; The novel and old/new media; Materialities of the novel Transport of/in the novel; The novel and the city; The novel and the nation Technology, science and the novel; Realism and its borders (The experimental novel) ; The novel and its critical fields (Theories of the novel)

Please send 250-word abstracts for 20-minute conference papers to novel.conference@abdn.ac.uk by 31 December 2007.

Proposals for panel topics with participants are also welcome.

Organisers: Adrienne Janus, Abigail M Smith and Janet Todd

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Symposium: Visualising Ireland (Theory, Culture, Image)
University College Dublin
4-6 July, 2008

Confirmed plenary speakers include Professor Gerardine Meaney (UCD) and Dr Colin Graham (NUIM).

The last two decades has seen a growing awareness of the integral position of film and media studies within Irish culture, particularly in (though not confined to) a contemporary environment. The increased scholarly investigation of Irish visual culture has, however, exposed a division in the subject on theoretical and aesthetic grounds: between the general field of Irish Studies, which has embraced an approach which engages openly with critical and cultural theory, and the established discipline of Irish Film Studies, which has tended to resist such interrogation, preferring to

Privilege political, national and historical registers. The aim of this symposium is to bridge this gap; to explore the intersections of a peculiarly Irish visual culture and theoretical considerations of the same; to contemplate what might be the scope, and significance, of this deliberate and sustained exposure of Irish film and media to paradigms of critical and cultural theory.

The organisers of this symposium welcome abstracts and panel proposals on any conjunction of Irish visual culture and theory. Topics include, but are not limited to: Film Theory and Irish Cinema/Media; Cultural Theory and Irish Cinema/Media; Photography; Animation; Advertising; Film Genres; The Institutionalisation of Irish Film Studies

Abstracts should be approximately 200-250 words, and should reach the organisers by 9 May 2008. Abstracts and queries to: Dr. Emma Radley, Irish Studies, UCD School of English, Drama and Film, University College Dublin, emma.radley _at_ucd.ie

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Visual, material and print culture in Nineteenth-century Ireland
Annual Conference of the Society for the Study of Nineteenth-Century Ireland
26-27 June 2008
University of Limerick

Confirmed Plenary speakers include Prof. Liam Kennedy, QUB, Catherine Marshall, IMMA, Prof. Niamh O’ Sullivan, NCAD and Dr Neil Buttimer, UCC.

The University of Limerick is running a two-day international conference exploring the nature and extent of Visual, material and print culture in Nineteenth-century Ireland. Taking a broad view of the nineteenth century, panels are being constituted from, but not limited to, the following areas: history art history English literature geography architecture politics folklore urban and rural development photographic images film Litríocht na Gaeilge Gaeltacht cultural nationalism poetry the Irish novel diaries letters newspapers demography diaspora gender childhood landscape maps settlement education work religion travel writing the stage Irishman music.

The conference organisers welcome proposals for panels and individual papers. Proposals for roundtable discussions and poster sessions are equally welcome. The revised deadline for submissions is 15 February 2008. Proposals should include an abstract of the paper and a brief curriculum vitae as well as contact details, for each contributor.

Conference organising committee: Ciara Breathnach, David Butler, Angus Mitchell and Catherine Lawless Conference administrator: Lorna Moloney
Conference email address: ssnciconference08@gmail.com

The Society for the Study of Nineteenth-Century Ireland began its annual conferences in the early 1990s -- firstly in Ireland, and then rotating between Ireland, Britain and America. From these conferences more than a dozen volumes have already been published, helping to place this Society at the cutting edge of Irish studies. It is anticipated that a volume of papers from the Limerick conference will be published.

Details of registration fees to follow, see www.history.ul.ie/ssnci-conference-2008 for updates.

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Irish and Scottish Migration and Settlement: Intellectual, Political and Environmental Frontiers
AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies, University of Aberdeen
23 February 2008, 3 May 2008, and 21 June 2008
Conference website: http://www.abdn.ac.uk/riiss/diasporasconferenceseries.shtml

The AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies at the University of Aberdeen will host a series of three one-day interdisciplinary conferences looking at the global experiences of Irish and Scottish migrants and their descendants.

Overseas migration has conventionally been understood as a process that leads migrants to cross a variety of literal and metaphorical "frontiers" in order to settle into new societies. This series of three one-day conferences invites participants to reconsider this issue, looking instead at the varied ways in which the exploration of intellectual, political and environmental "frontiers" by Irish and Scottish migrants and their descendants generated new ideas, discourses and modes of life. Participants are also invited to consider the significance of this dynamic process for overseas Scottish and Irish communities, for the broader societies within which they lived, as well as for the Irish and Scottish homelands.

Keynote speakers include Patrick Griffin, John MacKenzie, Lindsay Proudfoot, and David Wilson.

Each one-day event will focus on a different theme: Intellectual Frontiers (23 February 2008); Political Frontiers (3 May 2008); and Environmental Frontiers (21 June 2008). Proposals for papers (100-200 words) should be sent by 15 December 2007 to Dr. Michael Brown (m.brown@abdn.ac.uk) or to Dr. Rosalyn Trigger (r.trigger@abdn.ac.uk).

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The Lonely Voice: 10th International Conference on the Short Story In English
June 19-22, 2008
University College Cork
Deadline for Proposals: 31 December 2007
http://www. shortstoryconference.com

The organizers of the Tenth International Conference on the Short Story in English issue a “Call For Papers” to be presented at the conference; events will be held at the University College Cork (UCC), Cork, Ireland from June 19-23, 2008. The conference is jointly hosted by the English Department, UCC, Dr. Colbert Kearney, Chair, and the Triskel Arts Centre, Ann Luttrell Education and Community Manager. The conference is

The theme is “The Lonely Voice,” echoing Frank O’Connor’s famous tribute to the short story. As in the past, the aim of this conference is to bring together writers, scholars, editors, and publishers to experience and discuss the varying aspects of this fascinating genre.

Proposals in abstract form should be 300-500 words and submitted by December 31, 2007 for first consideration. Proposals for pre-organized panels (normally limited to three papers) should be submitted by the panel’s chair, but will not be reviewed until abstracts have been received from each participant. Final consideration of abstracts will be February 29, 2008. Proposals should be written on the form downloaded from the website (www. shortstoryconference.com) and sent by email to eachof the following persons:

Dr. Maurice A. Lee, Director: MauriceL@uca.edu

Dr. Colbert Kearney, Co-Director: AFitzgerald@english.ucc.ie

Dr. Susan Lohafer, Program Coordinator: sklohafer@aol.com

Guest Writers who have already committed to attend in 2008 include: Richard Ford, Sandra Cisneros, Ana Castillo, Z.Z. Packer, Bharati Mukherjee, Clark Blaise, Francine Prose, Robert Olen Butler, Jayne Anne Phillips, Diane Glancy, Gayle Elliott, Katie Singer, Vijay Lakshmi, Claire Larrière, Minoli Salgado, William Wall, Claire Keegan, Manuel Munoz, Asali Solomon, Evelyn Conlon, Colm Toibin , Velma Pollard, Juani Guerra, Mary Morrissy, Kirpal Singh, Edna O'Brien, Rui Zink, and Cyril Dabydeen.

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Irish Theatrical Diaspora Conference: French and Irish Theatres : Influences and interactions
Lille, 13-14 June 2008
Full programme and details on http://www.irishtheatricaldiaspora.org/

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The Annual Conference of the Eighteenth-Century Ireland Society / Cumann Éire san Ochtú Céad Déag,
University College Cork,
13th – 14th June, 2008

Proposals are invited for papers (in either Irish or English) on any aspect of eighteenth-century Ireland, including its history, literature, languages and culture. 

Depending on submissions, there may be special panels on George Berkeley, Edmund Burke, and on systems of patronage in the eighteenth century. The key-note speakers at the conference will be Prof. Jacqueline Hill of NUI Maynooth and Dr Neil Buttimer of UCC.

Proposals should be submitted (preferably by email) to the conference organiser before Friday, 28 March, 2008. Please send a one-page abstract, with title, and a one-page summary CV. Reading time for the complete paper should not exceed twenty minutes. Prospective speakers will be notified of a decision by 24th April, 2008. Overseas speakers are encouraged to apply before 28 March and early decisions regarding acceptance may be made if necessary.

Queries or requests for further details should be addressed to the conference organiser. Conference organiser: Dr Clare O’Halloran Dept of History University College Cork Cork Ireland c.ohalloran@ucc.ie

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Irish Eyes – Vision and Revisions: CAIS 2008
University of Toronto
28-31 May 2008
Deadline for proposals (200-250 words): 5 January 2008 to dgreenlaw@uwaterloo.ca
Website: http://www.irishstudies.ca/

The 2008 Canadian Association for Irish Studies is holding its annual conference and AGM from May 28-31, St. Michael’s College in the University of Toronto. The conference will begin with a reception on Wednesday the 28th and conclude with the traditional CAIS banquet on Saturday the 31st.

The conference organizers are calling for 20-minute contributions on any aspect connected with or suggested by the conference theme: Irish Eyes – Visions and Revisions. Topics and themes may include but are not limited to:

- speculation and spectacle
- site lines: territories actual and virtual
- sights and signs: tourism, marketing, popular culture
- scenes private and public, literary and political
- film, theatre, and visual arts
- seeing and believing
- visual cultures
- memories and countermemories
- reflections, predictions, past and future orientations
- Ireland looking abroad (and as seen from abroad)
- surveillance, intelligence
- exposures, recoveries
- inquests, inquiries, tribunals, trials
- witnessing

Please paste the abstract into the body of e-mail submissions and be sure to include your full name, contact information, and academic affiliation (if any). Abstracts will be assessed by a conference committee. All presenters at CAIS conferences must be paid-up members of CAIS.

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“Place and Space” Nordic Irish Studies Network Conference
27-30 May 2008
Vaasa, Finland.

The 6 th Biannual Nordic Irish Studies conference is to be held in Vaasa, Finland, from Tuesday evening, 27 th May, to Friday 30 th May 2008. The conference is to be hosted by the Department of English at the modern campus of the University of Vaasa on the shores of the Gulf of Bothnia on the west coast of Finland.

While papers may deal with any aspect of Irish studies, the organisers particularly encourage presentations that address the theme of the conference, PLACE AND SPACE in the context of Irish culture, and/or treat one or more of the following themes:

The cultural politics of place
The invention of space
Cross-cultural Encounters
Annihilating space and time
Empty space
‘Every story is a travel story – a spatial practice’ (de Certeau)
Ecology and the natural world
Orality

Papers will be limited to 20 minutes, with ten minutes for discussion. Abstracts of up to 300 words, with requests for technical equipment, should be submitted to the conference website (currently under construction) at http://www.uwasa.fi/englanti/english/nisnconference/ or to Tiina Mäntymäki (tman@uwasa.fi) by Friday 29 February, 2008. Please give the following details: Name; Affiliation; Contact details (email or street address); Telephone no. ; Section (see conference themes above); Title of paper; Abstract; Special needs (dietary, mobility etc.)

The plenary speakers include the cultural critic Prof. Michael Cronin of the School of Applied Language and Intercultural Studies, Dublin City University, Jyrki Vainonen, translator of Seamus Heaney, the sports and film critic Seán Crosson (NUI Galway) and the poet and dramatist Paula Meehan, who will read and talk about her poetry.  

Location The conference will be held on the modern campus of the University of Vaasa on the shores of the Gulf of Bothnia. It is within a brisk ten minute walk of the city centre where the hotels are located, and there is a bus connection (location maps are to be found at http://www.uwasa.fi/english/about/campus/gmaps/). Vaasa (http://www.vaasa.fi) is a city of 58,000 inhabitants on the west coast of Finland. Because of its large Swedish-speaking population, both in the city and the hinterland, it is the most bilingual city (Finnish-Swedish) in the country. The Vaasa archipelago has just been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site. The end of May is the height of spring in Vaasa, and usually comfortably warm. Vaasa is statistically Finland’s sunniest city, but don’t bet on it.

Cost A conference fee of 50 € for paid-up members of NISN (60€ for others) will be payable on registration. NISN membership costs 20€ (which includes the Nordic Irish Studies Journal). There will be an excursion (extra, about 20€) to parts of the UNESCO World Heritage Site in the Vaasa archipelago.

For further information, contact one of us on the Organising Committee: Tiina Mäntymäki ( tman@uwasa.fi ); Gerald Porter (gepo@uwasa.fi); Anne Karhio (akarhio@mappi.helsinki.fi)

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Secularism and Globalization in France and Ireland
4th Conference of the National Centre for Franco-Irish Studies.
University Rennes 2, Brittany, France 23-24 May, 2008

Following the success of its three international conferences to date, the Association of Franco-Irish Studies, in association with the Centre for Irish Studies, University of Rennes 2, France, is soliciting papers for a conference, which will run from 23-24 May 2008. 

The enlargement of the European Union and globalization have accompanied a general process of secularisation of Europe. Today the separation of  Church and  State is a common feature in the Western world, though some counter examples such as the  British Monarchy still exist. Such a trend has often been described as an inevitable consequence of the spread of human rights, seen as the rights of individuals protected by  a State which has become neutral in religious matters. 

George Rupp, in his Globalization Challenged (Columbia University Press, 2006), gives a concise definition of this trend which he describes as “the call of Western secular liberalism”, according to which religious and other ideological views may be tolerated as long as they remain private convictions that do not shape public outcomes. Globalization often appears, to quote Ian Burruma (The New York Review of Books, 11 April 2002), as “another word for ‘ US imperialism.’”  In this regard, comparisons between the French and the Irish experiences may prove fruitful. In spite of the fact that the French and the American Revolutions were often seen as sisters born out of the Enlightenment, they bore fundamental differences: the French Revolution was secular, while the American one had a strong theological background. Today the French are defensive about their perceived identity in the face of Hollywood, Microsoft, MacDonalds and Sects, and the “exception culturelle” claim,  in addition to Claude Hagege's well-voiced stance on language, are evidence of  a strong suspicion as to the real motives behind globalization. Today the American-Irish connection is very strong, and a long history of migration has played a major part in this process, but one must not forget that for a long time Irish Catholicism considered American culture as yet another Anglo-Protestant threat.
 
Now, at the beginning of the third Christian millennium, the conference organisers are not only in the globalization revolution, but also in the post-modern era. What will be the responses of people in this new era to the deep insecurities produced by globalization? Is it possible in this context that they may become more theological and religious rather than ideological and secular? What alternatives exist?

The aim of the Conference will be to examine and compare the French and the Irish experiences of these phenomena, and assess what understanding and  perspectives they may offer. The headings provided do not seek to be prescriptive. Any other valid areas can also be examined.

Previous conferences have resulted in the publication of a selection of essays and the proceedings from the Rennes meeting will therefore appear in the third volume of Studies in Franco-Irish Relations series (Peter Lang).

Papers in French or English should be of 20 minutes duration and abstracts of no more than 250 words must be submitted by the 4th of February 2008 to Dr. Eamon Maher,: eamon.maher@ittdublin.ie or Dr. Yann Bévant yann.bevant@uhb.fr
 
Keynote speakers include Pr Peadar Kirby (Dublin City University) and Pr Catherine Maignant (Université Lille 3)  

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“Adaptations – Performing across Media and Genres” 17th Annual CDE Conference 2008
University of Siegen, Akademie Biggesee, Attendorn, Germany,
1-4 May 2008
Deadline for Abstracts: 200 words by 15 January 2008
Email queries and abstracts to: Prof. Dr. Eckart Voigts-Virchow - voigts-virchow@anglistik.uni-siegen.de

The German Society for Contemporary Theatre and Drama in English announces its 17 th Annual Conference.

Translation, transformation, appropriation, assimilation, adaptation – these processes of intertextual and intermedial contact have been part of theatre and drama since their very beginnings. In various guises, they have continued to play a major part in turning narratives into stage events. Linda Hutcheon argued in her recent study A Theory of Adaptation that “every live staging of a printed play could theoretically be considered an adaptation in its performance“. While this is of course true in general terms the conference organisers would like to bring into narrow focus the various processes and cultural issues at stake in converting or actualizing texts as theatre texts – and vice versa. For some time now, the academic sub-discipline of ’Adaptation Studies’ has been active in exploring adaptive processes, but we feel that this burgeoning research area has yet to make its full impact on theatre and drama studies. Resistance to analysing adaptation has probably to do with implicit reservations against adaptive work and a bias towards the problematic idea of originality. The renowned adaptor Helen Edmundson has recently called upon the Bard to defend adaptation: “Shakespeare plundered other people’s stories shamelessly. And people didn’t say, ‘That’s not a play, it’s an adaptation’”. Taking as our point of departure Kamilla Elliott’s statement that adaptation is “theoretically impossible yet culturally ubiquitous“ the conference organisers will seek to theorize a number of significant cases from within this ubiquity of adaptations across media and genres. They particularly welcome proposals in the following areas:

• Stages, screens, sounds: Media adaptations from film, TV, radio, Internet, etc. – and vice versa
• The role of translation in theatre and drama
• Text, speech, image, performance: Books, oral narratives, cartoons and games on stage
• Heritage in performance: The actualization of heritage or history narratives on stage
• Re-enactments: Iterating, re-making and re-presenting theatre history on stage
• Actualizing the classics: Myths, antiquity, Shakespeare, etc.
• Intercultural adaptation: Putting the ’Anglosphere’ on stage
• Beyond fiction: Live art, reality plays, journalism, tribunal plays and verbatim theatre

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William Trevor at 80
Second Annual Trinity Symposium on Contemporary Irish Fiction
Thomas Davis Theatre, Trinity College, Dublin
25 and 26 April 2008

An international symposium exploring the work of the award-winning novelist and short story writer, William Trevor, will be held at Trinity College, Dublin, on 25 and 26 April 2008.

The symposium will provide papers on different aspects of Trevor’s work by a panel of accomplished scholars, critics and writers. Speakers will include Hermione Lee, Thomas Kilroy, Ruth Barton, Eamonn Hughes, Gerald Dawe and Michael Parker, amongst others. The venue for the symposium is most appropriate given that Trevor is one of TCD’s most distinguished graduates; it is also timely as he is also entering his 80 th year. William Trevor is in full support of the event and hopes to attend the proceedings.

The symposium follows last year’s successful symposium, “Reading Colm Tóibín”, which was held at TCD. It will be the second annual Trinity Symposium on Contemporary Irish Fiction, and is being funded through the Long Room Hub Funding Initiative. The symposium is part of the School of English’s outreach programme with the wider community and will be free of admission and open to all.

Further details, including a final list and timetable of speakers, will be posted in April. For further details in the meantime, contact: Dr Paul Delaney, School of English, TCD (email: delanep@tcd.ie)

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James Joyce Research Colloquium
16-20 April 2008
UCD James Joyce Research Centre, University College Dublin, Ireland

This international colloquium aims to provide a forum for the discussion of current and future developments in James Joyce Studies by leading Joyce scholars and to facilitate detailed and active exchange about the challenges and problems of undertaking research on Joyce.

Speakers will analyse and debate the usefulness of particular methodologies and theoretical positions for aspects of research projects that they have concluded or their applicability for works in progress. Formal presentations of about 50 minutes by the eleven speakers will be followed by 30 minutes of discussion with the audience. The delegates at the colloquium will include doctoral and post-doctoral students currently engaged in research on Joyce at universities in Europe, the US, and elsewhere. MA students, Joyce scholars, and those with an active interest in Joyce are also welcome to attend. The fee for the colloquium is €50.00.

Close dialogue will be encouraged between all the participants to enable open and expansive discussion about the present state of Joyce Studies and the possible trajectories that it should follow. A further purpose of this colloquium will be to explore future directions in Joyce Studies and to consider how collaborative links and partnerships between the newly- founded UCD James Joyce Research Centre and Joycean specialists world-wide might be achieved. The initial lecture on Wednesday 16 April at 19.30 will be given by Professor Michael Groden to mark the occasion of the inauguration of the UCD James Joyce Research Centre. It will be open to colleagues across the university, the general public, and to Dublin Joyceans and Irish Studies specialists.

The speakers at the 2008 colloquium are as follows: Professor Brian Caraher (Queen's University, Belfast), Dr Luca Crispi (University College Dublin), Professor Daniel Ferrer (Institut des Textes et Manuscrits Modernes, Paris), Professor Anne Fogarty (University College Dublin), Professor Hans Walter Gabler (University of Munich), Professor Michael Groden (University of Western Ontario), Professor Geert Lernout (University of Antwerp), Professor Vicki Mahaffey (University of York), Dr Emer Nolan (National University of Ireland, Maynooth), Professor Paul Saint-Amour (University of Pennsylvania), and Dr Sam Slote (Trinity College Dublin).

Scholarship funding is available for doctoral and postdoctoral students and will cover accommodation, travel, and tuition fees. Applicants should forward a curriculum vitae, a letter of interest, an academic reference, and any other relevant documentation. The deadline is 5 February 2008. Late applications may be considered. For further details and initial inquiries contact Professor Anne Fogarty, UCD James Joyce Research Centre, School of English, Drama and Film, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland. Telephone: +353-17168159; email: joyceresearchcentre@ucd.ie

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The Global Irish: Conflict, Co-existence and Community - 2008 ACIS National Conference
St. Ambrose University, Davenport, Iowa
16-19 April, 2008
Deadline for Abstracts: one-page by 1 December 2007
Email Abstracts/Queries to: Dr. Ryan Dye at DyeRyanD@sau.edu
Conference website : http://www.sau.edu/acis

The conference organizers invite proposals for 20-minute papers on any Irish Studies topic, particularly those that address how the Irish—in Ireland and abroad—have endured and interpreted their experiences of conflict, coexistence, and community. Presenters must be members of the American Conference for Irish Studies ( http://www.acisweb.com).

Plenary events include the first annual Lawrence J. McCaffrey Lecture on Irish-American Studies presented by Peter Quinn, author of Looking for Jimmy and Banished Children of Eve. There will be a poetry reading by Louis de Paor, NUI Galway, and lectures by Margaret Mills Harper (Georgia State University) on Yeats; Kevin Rockett (Trinity College, Dublin) on Irish film; and Elizabeth Malcolm (University of Melbourne) on violence and gender in Ireland

Special events include concerts by Baal Tinne, bohola, and Joe McShane, a viewing of Pavee Lackeen, a visit to the Civil War cemetery at the Rock Island Arsenal, and a Mississippi River cruise on the Celebration Belle

Davenport is one of the Iowa-Illinois Quad Cities, a busy transportation and agricultural center known for the tremendous natural beauty of the Mississippi River, a vibrant city life, great restaurants, and reasonable hotel rates.  Several national and regional carriers serve the Quad City International Airport in Moline, IL, which is less than 15 minutes from the conference hotel.

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Reel borders: Transnational Cinema in the 21st Century
5 April 2008
Univrsity of Connecticut
Proposals due: 15 February 2008

UConn will host a one-day film seminar in conjunction with the Reel Ireland Film Festival on Saturday, April 5, 2008. The theme will be Transnational Cinemas. As technological developments and economic and social globalization come to the forefront of contemporary cultural studies, the concept of the transnational artist becomes increasingly more important. Themes that will be considered include but are not limited to how nationalism is strengthened or weakened in the face of such globalization, literary adaptations to film, identifying a (trans)national audience, Diasporic film, hyphenated identities and cross-cultural production.

As the seminar will be hosted amidst the Reel Ireland Film Festival, there will be special consideration to Irish cinematic and literary production fit into the global context, however papers on all (trans)national cinemas and topics are greatly encouraged, particularly those which provide a comparative and cultural studies approach.

This is an interdisciplinary conference funded by Culture Ireland and co-hosted by the Departments of Modern and Classical Languages, English, and History. Please send one-page proposals by 15 February to Nicole McClure (nmcclure@snet.net) or Mary Burke (Mary.2.Burke@uconn.edu).

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Politics and Propaganda: 29th Annual Conference of the Nineteenth Century Studies Association
Florida International University, Miami, Florida
3-5 April, 2008

The conference organisers invite papers on themes including, but not limited to political figures, movements (Chartism, socialism, communism, anarchism, trades unions, reform), parties, campaigns, immigration, imperialism, suffrage, gender politics, war, slavery, nationalism, pacifism, uprisings, and revolutions. Equally welcome are paper and panel proposals concerning propaganda, including but not limited to advertising, periodicals, promotion (including self-promotion), news, campaign materials, songs, slogans, cartoons, souvenirs, paraphernalia, monuments, posters, and public art.

Abstracts (250 words) for 20-minute papers, author’s name and paper title in heading, with one-page c.v. by Oct. 1, 2007 to: Kathleen McCormack, Program Chair, Florida International University,  mccormac@fiu.edu

Registration and accommodation information will be available on November 1, 2008:

http://www.english.uwosh.edu/roth/ncsa/index.html

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Irish Theatre: Contexts for Performance - Second Annual Conference of the Irish Society for Theatre Research
University College Dublin
4-5 April 2008
Deadline for Abstracts: 20 November 2007.
Email address for abstracts/queries: eamonn.jordan@ucd.ie

The conference organisers invite submissions of 200 words that recognise the collaborative creation that is performance, so that roles such as dramaturgy, artistic direction, design, are alongside writing and acting.

The conference will also feature a range of working groups on specific topics. The working group dynamic involves the submission of papers no more than 1,500 words in length, which are then disseminated for all members of the working group to read before the symposium. During the working group sessions on the Friday of the symposium, working group members will give a brief synopsis of their paper lasting no more than 5 minutes, after which the group as a whole will discuss the paper for 15 minutes.

The following working groups have been proposed in order to begin the process of encouraging members to develop more specialized groups in subsequent symposia in order to more fully engage with the broad spectrum of Irish theatre from page to stage:

Cultural Identities : seeks papers exploring issues of Irish theatre and performance that frame the construction and categorization of cultural identities such as: gender, sexuality, race, nation, ethnicity. Performances that are a part of institutional culture as well as alternate performance cultures are included, and projects that study popular as well as elite cultural performances will be welcomed. Contact Brian Singleton: bsnglton@tcd.ie

Theatre History and Historiography : seeks papers pertaining to any aspect of research into the history of theatre as a practice and as an institution in Ireland or the history of Irish theatre in its international contexts. This working group is also concerned with investigating the methodologies of theatre history and/or the theoretical and historical assumptions that underpin these. Contact Tom Maguire: tj.maguire@ulster.ac.uk

Textual Practices : seeks papers which engage with the relationship between textuality and performance, specifically in terms of the transformation of the play on the page into the play on stage. Of particular interest are papers that examine the performance possibilities implied by a script, score and other textual or documentary sources. Contact Eamonn Jordan: eamonn.jordan@ucd.ie

Performance Studies: seeks papers which explore ways to analyse performance in its multiplicity of elements and meanings. Participation is encouraged from practitioners, critics and academics in the disciplines of theatre and drama, digital technology, and performance art. Contact Bernadette Sweeney: B.Sweeney@ucc.ie

Please forward all working Group Submissions and any general enquires about working groups to the relevant working group coordinator. Queries about the conference itself should be directed to eamonn.jordan@ucd.ie

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Nations, Diasporas, Identities
27-30 March 2008
Victoria University, Wellington, New Zealand

Political and economic events over the last decade have begun radically to reshape the cultural identities of Ireland and Scotland.

In Ireland, the dynamism of the 'Celtic Tiger' economy has catapulted the nation from being one of Europe's poorest to one of its most advanced. In Northern Ireland, the 'peace process' has reshaped not only future relations between religious communities, but also the cultural landscape of those communities by giving equal status to Gaelic and to Ulster Scots. And in Scotland, devolution has been accompanied by what has been described as a cultural renaissance that makes the past twenty years one of the richest in the country's history.

At the same time, many people around the world have become increasingly conscious of, and assertive of, their Irish or Scottish identities - as evidenced, for instance, in the Tartan Day celebrations in the United States or St Patrick’s day in Australia and New Zealand. Do these diasporic identities, however, have any continuing relationship with the identities of the nations to which they are attached? Or are national identities themselves being transformed by feedback from their diaporas? Or are alternative 'national' identities developing which may claim to express the same national past but in fact envisage it in very different ways? Should the notion of the 'nation' be extended to encompass its diasporas or should it be narrowed down so that it does not exclude those who are themselves immigrants within its boundaries? What is a national history or a national culture in this world of mobile populations?

These are some of the general issues that it is hoped will be addressed in this conference.

Proposal for papers (of 20 minutes) should be sent to: Cairns Craig, Director of the AHRC Centre for Irish and Scottish Studies, 19 College Bounds, Aberdeen AB24 3UG; or to: Brad Patterson, Stout Research Centre, Victoria University of Wellington, PO Box 600, Wellington, New Zealand 6015

Submission deadline: 15 January 2008

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Poetry and Education
Mater Dei Institute of Education (Dublin City University)
22-23 February 2008
Deadline for Abstracts: 200 words + short bio by 30 November 2007
Email abstracts to : Dr Kit Fryatt - kit.fryatt@materdei.dcu
Email queries to : Dr Michael Hinds - michael.hinds@materdei.dcu.ie

Poetry has always played an important role in education: the didactic and mnemonic potential of verse has long been recognised; certain poems have been regarded as essential to a good education. Recently, however, the relationship between poetry and education has changed. The rise of creative writing programmes in universities, increasing numbers of poets pursuing academic careers, and a growth in writing workshop culture has altered the way we see poetry in education and education in poetry.

Papers dealing with a broad range of issues relating to poetry and education, past and present, are invited for a conference at the Mater Dei Institute of Education, Dublin, on 22nd-23rd February 2008. Topics which may be of interest include (but are not confined to): canon formation and education, poetry and religious education, Irish-language poetry in the classroom, poetry anthologies, teaching and examining poetry at all educational levels, poetry and performance, notable poet-teachers, the academy as poetic patron, didactic and mnemonic poetry, the history of poetry and education, children's poetry.

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Postcolonialism and the ‘Hit’ of the Real
6-8 March 2008
New York University
Deadline for Proposals: 15 December 2007
Contact: pococonference2008@gmail.com
http://www.nyupoco.com/html/conference_2008.html

Confirmed keynote speakers:
Pheng Cheah (University of California, Berkeley), Simon Gikandi (Princeton), Anne McClintock (University of Wisconsin), Alok Rai (University of Delhi)

How valid, in retrospect, is the founding claim of the postcolonial that it offers a different view of the real? If the world outside the west had been understood through traditions of western representation which ignored the reality of what was actually there, silencing different cultures, epistemologies, and the lives that were lived in them, how successfully has postcolonial studies intervened to enable the former subjects of Western representations to determine the representation of their own realities?

Reflecting a desire to address the materiality of questions that provided the original impetus for postcolonial thinking, scholars from a range of perspectives have attempted to reinsert the notion of the 'real' at the center of their academic praxis. Recent and historical interest in the value and valence of 'experience', the location and teleology of the 'vernacular', and a formalistic aesthetics of realism all converge around the specters of the real, together constituting a major theoretical effort to rearticulate the terms of what constitutes postcolonial reality and experience, and how, through what modes, forms, and genres, such realities might be best represented.

The conference organisers seek to confront through this conference one of the ongoing tensions in postcolonial studies: the concern for articulating aesthetic issues of realism and representation and theoretical reflections upon the ‘real’, with the complex postcolonial realities of underdevelopment, violence, political instability and gender inequality. This conference hopes to augment these addresses to the ‘real’ and pursue further engagement with the conditions of its possibility or impossibility. The conference organisers invite papers that will: * Offer definitions and discussion of ‘the real’, ‘reality’, and ‘realism’ in the postcolonial context;

* Explore the ‘real’ understood as the material, historical, or political aspects of postcolonialism‹or challenge this understanding;

* ‘Theorize’ underdevelopment and the existing empirical methods of description, analysis, and measurement;

* Inquire into the identification of the ‘real’ with such terms as ‘experience’, ‘truth’, ‘authenticity’, and ‘reality’, in the postcolonial context;

* Define the limits and possibilities of postcolonialism as critique, intervention, politics;

* Revisit the relationship between formal realism (in cinema, literature) and postcolonial reality: was there a disjuncture, as has been suggested, between European social realism and the colonial world; and is there, concomitantly, a better fit between that reality and alternative models of realism?

* Rethink the division of intellectual labor which would posit theory as the domain of the West/metropole and the ³periphery² as the raw material or ground of reality for such theoretical productions;

* Examine anew the dialectic of form and content in postcolonial texts: has providing a more adequate representation become an end in itself? What are the consequences of the privileging of content over form and value? What role do cultural forms, more broadly, and genre, more specifically, play in the determination of postcolonial canon formation? How might we explain the dominance of the novel and film among the various forms of literary and cultural expression?

While we expect proposals for papers and panels to be located within the broad problematic of postcolonialism and the real, they need not be limited to the questions listed above. The conference organisers welcome analysis of a broad range of issues and texts (literature, cinema, theatre, popular culture, visual arts, theory), theoretical interventions, disciplinary and interdisciplinary reflections, and provocations. The conference organisers also welcome contributions discussing material relevant to geographies of colonialism outside that of the British Empire (e.g. French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese colonies or former colonies).

Individual Papers: Please send abstracts of 150-200 words with the subject line, Postcolonial Conference Abstract, by December 15, 2007. E-mail Address: pococonference2008@gmail.com

Panel Proposals: Each panel should include 3 presenters and the name of the panel organizer. No presentation to exceed 20 minutes in length and no panel to exceed 1-1/2 hours. Please include a brief description of the panel as well as individual abstracts for each of the papers. Please include full name, institutional affiliation, title, phone number and email address with your proposal.

Convenors: Professors Toral Gajarawala, Rajeswari Sunder Rajan, Jini Kim Watson, Robert JC Young (NYU)

Sponsored by: Anglophone Research Project, Department of English, NYU, and Interventions: International Journal of Postcolonial Studies

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Ireland: Assent and Dissent: American Conference for Irish Studies: Southern Region 2008
Savannah, Georgia
6-8 March, 2008
Proposal Deadline: December 7, 2007
Contact information: Howard Keeley (irish@georgiasouthern.edu) at the Center for Irish Studies at Georgia Southern University
Website:http://ceps.georgiasouthern.edu/conted/ACIS.html

On 17 June 1904, Molly Bloom reminisced, "yes I said yes I will Yes." Around eighty years later Ian Paisley protested, "Ulster Says No," a partial echo of "No Surrender". Assertions of "yes" and "no"—and acts of assent and dissent—play prominently in Irish experience: past and present; at home and abroad. The conference organisers welcomes proposals on any aspect of Irish Studies, but it especially invites proposals that elaborate the theme, Ireland: Assent and Dissent.

Possible areas for consideration include, but are by no means limited to:

• dissenting religious and political traditions within Ireland and its diaspora;
• Theobald Wolfe Tone's ideal of "unit[ing] Protestant, Catholic and Dissenter under the common name of Irishmen";
• endorsement and dissension in Irish literature, film-making, art, and historiography;
• yes/no referenda on such issues as divorce, abortion, the Good Friday Agreement, and citizenship rights;
• "sea" and "n i hea" in Irish-language writing and politics;
• shifts from "no" to "yes" in Unionist and Republican rhetoric;
• the reality or myth of "No Irish Need Apply";
• Irish assent vis- a-vis economic, political, cultural, and military facets of Europeanization and globalization;
• suspension of the GAA's ban on foreign games;
• Irish utopias or "no-places."

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NarrativEncounters: New Perspectives on Narration
15-16 February 2008
University College Cork
Deadline for Abstracts: 15 December 2007
Contact: narrativeabstracts@gmail.com

Plenary Speakers: Dr. Paul Cobley ( London Metropolitan University), Dr. Ruth Page ( Birmingham City University)

The first international NarrativEncounters conference, entitled New Perspectives on Narration, will focus on new interpretations and readings, definitions and valuations, of narrative’s significance to all branches of critical thought, art and experience. The organisers invite papers from a wide range of disciplines and interests, possible topics include, but are not limited to, narrative’s centrality to fiction, film, theory; history and narrative; queering narrative; metanarratives; visual art, image, and narrative; narrating gender; spatio-temporal aspects of narrative; narrative innovation and textual event; system-collapse-transgressing narrative; staging narrative; cultural transformations of narrative; narrative and new media; verse narratives; the futures of narrative forms: e-narratives, television, comics, outsider art, fan fictions etc.; ‘ideal’ and ‘degraded’ narratives; genre and narratology; marginality and the limits of narration.

NarrativEncounters encourages the submission of abstracts encompassing all periods, and areas of research.

Abstracts (max. 250 words) should be submitted to the organisers - Danny Kennedy, Deborah Mellamphy, Catherine Smith and Dr. Éibhear Walshe at: narrativeabstracts@gmail.com Deadline: December 15 th 2007

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The 2008 JJIF James Joyce Graduate Conference
Università Roma Tre, Italy
2 February, 2008
Deadline for paper proposals : 9 November 2007
Email proposals and queries to: joyce.foundation@uniroma3.it

The James Joyce Italian Foundation is pleased to announce the 2008 James Joyce Graduate Conference in Rome. The Foundation is seeking graduate students and young scholars interested in Joyce, the man, the writer and his context to take part in the conference, which will be held at the Università Roma Tre, Italy, on February 2, 2008, Joyce’s 126 th birthday.

The graduate conference will be the occasion to present unpublished papers and work in progress on Joyce to an International audience. Emerging Joyce scholars are invited to send proposals (20-25 min) for a one-day conference on the current trends of Joyce scholarship. Suggested topics include but are not limited to:

The Writing of the Self in Twentieth-Century Literature; New approaches to Joyce’s works; Traditional approaches to Joyce’s works; Irish/International Joyce; Occult Joyce; Joyce and the Arts; Joyce and Semiotics; Language in Joyce; Genetic Joyce Studies; Joycean Literary Connections

Recent titles from a new Joyce series (Piccola Biblioteca Joyciana) and from Joyce Studies in Italy will be launched the evening before the conference. Selected papers will be recommended for publication in Joyce Studies in Italy. A Joycean birthday party will be held in the evening. There is no conference fee. Good value accomodation will be available.

JJIF Committee: Rosa Maria Bollettieri Bosinelli, Carla Marengo, John McCourt (Treasurer), Paola Pugliatti, Franca Ruggieri (President), Romana Zacchi.

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