NEW

(call for papers)

EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF ENGLISH STUDIES Vol. 17 

Please note that the deadline for proposals for all issues for this volume is 31 October 2011, with delivery of completed essays by 31 March 2012. Volume 17 will appear in 2013.

MYTHS OF EUROPE: EAST OF VENICE

Guest Editors: Ljiljana Ina Gjurgjan & Aidan O’Malley

Gazing east from Venice, the narrator in Henry James’s Travelling Companions is asked what lies beyond the horizon; he replies: ‘Greece, among other things.’ Eastern Europe has long been a site of otherness for Western Europe – the place, amongst other things, from which Islam has threatened and, where communism held sway. As such, it has played a crucial role in the Western construction of a cultural vision of itself. Founded in the context of the Cold War, the EU has produced a number of myths (in Barthes’s sense of the term), the idea that Europe shares common cultural and historic roots being not the least of them.

The editors of this issue welcome contributions, then, that consider how (in literature, the media and the arts generally, as well as in cultural theory) the construction of a unified European cultural heartland has been consolidated and/or challenged in the post-Cold War period, when, inter alia, we have seen EU enlargement into Eastern Europe.

Have writers and artists from the other Europe subverted the hegemonic imaginary of the other or succumbed to it (Kundera, Brodsky, Pamuk, Ugrešić, Drakulić)? Is contemporary European cultural cartography a competing site of ‘small narratives’ or a grand one with an exotic fringe? Have these political and cultural changes been manifested in the ways in which writers in the West have read and produced translations of Eastern European writers? Throughout the Cold War, artists from the East were construed as guardians of the consciences not only of their countries, but of the West; as artists seem to have lost this importance in the contemporary world, do we now witness expressions of nostalgia for these times? Are artists and thinkers such as Žižek still being translated (literally and culturally) into the West as icons and iconclasts?

On a theoretical level, does postcolonial thinking play an enabling role in questioning the relationships between the two Europes? To what extent do orientalist perspectives mould Western representations of Eastern Europe? Are there other theoretical frameworks that have more salience to the historical experiences of Eastern Europe?

The post-Cold War period has been the period of globalisation, which, amongst other things, has manifested itself in the cultural hegemony of English: how has this transformed the cultural and political economy of translation between East and West Europe?

Proposals for contributions are welcomed on topics that might include, but are not restricted to, themes such as:

•       Eastern Europe as the other in Western culture

•       Eastern European perspectives on Western constructions of the East

•       the relationship between the changing political landscape of Europe and artistic expressions of European cultural identity

•       the exoticisation of Eastern Europe by the West and the East

•       translation (cultural and literal) of Eastern European literature and authors

•       Cold War nostalgia

•       postcolonial/cultural theory and the relationship between Western and Eastern Europe

•       globalisation, the cultural hegemony of English and cultural boundaries in Europe

Detailed proposals (500-1,000 words) for articles of c. 5-6,000 words, as well as all inquiries regarding this issue, should be sent to both the guest editors: Ljiljana Ina Gjurgjan ljgjurgj@ffzg.hr; Aidan O’Malley Aidan.OMalley@EUI.eu.

The Rhetorics of Space
International Conference
Ljubljana, 24-25 November 2011

Call for papers

Organizers: Slovene Comparative Literature Association, Department of Comparative Literature and Literary Theory (Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana), Institute of Slovene Literature and Literary Studies SRC SASA (Ljubljana).
Participants: 18-20
Financial support: Slovene Public Book Agency
Working language of the conference: English
The organizers will cover the costs of accommodation (23-26 November) in Hotel Emonec (located in the centre of Ljubljana).
The articles resulting from the papers presented at the conference will be published in a (reviewed) scientific monography in 2012/2013.

International Conference “The Rhetorics of Space”

The international conference “The Rhetorics of Space” addresses the question of  the relationship between the capital and culture. This relationship was argued by Stephen Mullaney in 1997 (“Toward a Rhetoric of Space in Elizabethan London”): it refers to the urbanistic arrangement and characteristic rituals of a city which, acting the role of the capital of a single community, has attained the status of a privileged place, i.e. the centre of  the cultural space of a single community during its cultural history. In this aspect, its spatial arrangement can be read as the representation of power.  Referring to this new-historicist point of view, the thematics of the conference place stress  especially on the role of literature and literary histories in creating the relationship between the capital and culture, as well as enabling modifications (or transformations) of this perspective by also taking into account U. Eco’s, or J.M. Lotman’s etc. cultural semiotics. The argument for both these modifications derives from moving the field of such research to the single Central-, East- , Nord- and South-European territories formed by their communities as their own cultural spaces. Namely, it seems that forming, arranging, or representing the capitals as centres of the cultural space of a single community inhabiting these territories are highly motivated by continuous re-employment of literature and literary histories.      

According to specific historical-political circumstances, cultural spaces drawn in the above-mentioned territories represent the identities of the single communities in characteristic (cultural) encoding of the literary-spatial signs arranged in the urban area of a single capital. These specifics or characteristic encodings have been created from about the middle of the 19^th century (the process of urbanistic modernizations in the capitals of these territories also started at this time), when the single cultural communities in these territories started intensively to ascribe to themselves the identity of the national community, aiming at the official confirmation of this kind of identity in the “final” form of political emancipation, i.e. the (national) state, which was mostly gained in about the last decade of the 20^th century.        

The spatial arrangements, or representations of single capitals as the centres of cultural spaces can also be read as maps of  cultural-spatial signs among which the most privileged status, as it seems, was ascribed to the literary-spatial signs, due to the privileged cultural-political function of literature and literary histories of a single community in these territories. Therefore, the similarities or at least the comparable cultural-historical circumstances in which the central cultural spaces of capitals were urbanistically arranged can be recognized especially in the light of the national and comparative literary and cultural histories of these territories. According to the thesis of Slovene comparative literature historian D. Pirjevec, the literature of a single community that understands itself  as a national community, while it has not yet gained its political emancipation in the desired form of a (national) state, should be identified with the culture (of such a community) and, according to the level of deficiency of the (national) state’s infrastructure should also attend to the duties or functions of the state institutions.

    The central part of the conference also addresses the question of the representational and representative “character” of the capital as the cultural and political spatial centre of a single (national, multinational, etc.) community in the aspect of literary-spatial signs, or representations of literature as a privileged domain of one community’s identity created in special and similar historical-political and cultural-political circumstances. This creation characterized the modernizing arrangements and supporting activities of the culturally central urban space of a single capital which has retroactively and additionally supported the cultural(-political) functions of literature and literary histories for confirming one community’s identity until the present day, i.e. in the political frames of the European Union, which in principle gains its identity on the grounds of the cultural diversity of its members.    Mapping the cultural space of the capitals from this aspect also stresses the inevitable role of the national and comparative literary histories in creating the significant literary-spatial signs for representing the spatial consolidation of the community’s identity. Therefore, the research can be based on the literary- and cultural-historical perspectives.   

Thematics:

1. theoretical aspects for researching the modes by which the cultural space (of the capital) gains meanings, represents itself as such, or creates its (literary) cultural-spatial signs (perspectives of new historicism, semiotics of culture, comparative literary history).
2. Concrete arrangements, i.e. (literary-)cultural mappings of single capitals by taking into account the spatial positions, names, images, etc. of the monuments, buildings, streets, squares, etc. which refer to the literature, literary history and literary and cultural historiography of a single cultural community; the spatial relations between them and the role of literary history in creating these relations.  
3. Rituals (especially those which refer to the literary spatial signs) as representations of a single cultural space’s identity, i.e. the rituals which are performed in the territory of the capital, confirming the cultural identity of the community by cyclical or on special political-historical occasions performed events, which literary-culturally “present” the past, or represent the “invention of tradition” of a single community.

4. Special relations between spatial signs in different historical periods of a single (even just “local”, i.e., politically subordinated) capital as a cultural centre: this aspect refers to those historical periods in which one cultural community was not emancipated in the political form of “its” (independent) state, i.e., it created itself in the frames of this or that more extensive (for example, multi-national) state-political form. These topics can be further divided into the following aspects:

a) in the perspective of ideological hegemony, the cultural-political spatial signs of “the state” in one “local”, i.e., subordinated capital (like Ljubljana in comparison to Vienna as the factual political capital of the multi-national Austro-Hungarian state) can differ from the signs created by its single politically non-emancipated cultural community;

b) especially from the middle or the end of the 19^th centuy on, urbanistic aims (and plans) for modernizing the (local, subordinated) capitals can clearly stress these ideological differences;

c) literary spatial signs in the space or cultural map of a single capital can also be read from the aspect of the deficiency of such spatial-material “proofs”, which should confirm the spatial presence of one cultural minority in the centre, i.e., the capital of the cultural space. Such possible deficiency as a result of the selection of literary cultural spatial signs can be reviewed from the aspect of comparative and national literary histories, especially of their historically different canonizations of literature.

5. Representations of a single capital as the (political) cultural centre of one community, referring  especially to the literary tradition: a) in literature (including travel literature, etc.); b) in visual (and other) arts; c) referring to the theatre or performing arts, etc.

Author of the concept: dr.Vanesa Matajc (University of Ljubljana); the idea appeared in discussions with dr. Jüri Talvet (University of Tartu).

Please e-mail the title of your 20-minute paper, a 250-300 word abstract, your short curriculum vitae (5 lines) and your full contact address to
Vanesa Matajc ( vanesa.matajc@guest.arnes.si ) and Varja Balžalorsky ( bvarja@gmail.com ) not later than 30 July 2011.

All participants whose abstract has been accepted will receive an official invitation to the conference issued by Slovene Comparative Literature Assocciation (Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana; Aškerčeva 2, 1000 Ljubljana, Slovenia).  

Živo branje: literatura, znanost in humanistika / Reading Live: Literature, Science and Humanities
9. mednarodni komparativistični kolokvij  / 9^th International Comparative Literature Colloquium VILENICA 2010
September 8 – 9, 2011, Lipica, Slovenia

(program and abstracts)

(call for papers)

Together with Slovenian Writers’ Association, the Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Arts and Sciences and the Department for Comparative Literature and Literary Theory (Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana), Slovenian Comparative Literature Association will host the 9^th annual International Comparative Literature Colloquium, entitled Reading Live: Literature, Science and Humanities.

The international colloquium traditionally promotes up-to date research results of Slovenian comparative literary studies and its interdisciplinary affiliations with the humanities. Taking place in Slovenia, the event serves a systematic integration of comparative literary studies in the international exchange of research results.

The international colloquium entitled Reading Live: Literature, Science and Humanities will offer three thematically divided albeit interconnected and overlapping problematics. The first one will examine the contemporary relevance of humanities and transgressive literary thought for the historiographic and nomothetic epistemological positions of scientific knowledge. Following up from the first, the second focus will be on the field of literature as a living, inconclusive or non-finalised totality, and particularly on the autopoiesis of living systems as they are conceptualised by both science and the humanities. Finally, the third problematic will include conceptual questions of performativity in relation to performativity as an aesthetic and social effect of literary practice on the one hand and as an imposed imperative of science policy on the other.

Possible themes include but are not limited to: life, reflexivity, dialogism and narrativisation in science, the humanities and literature; the nomothetic vs. idiographic knowledge; the linguistic turn in semiotics, physics and biology; the performativity of literary discourse; historicity of knowledge; realism and the real.

As such, the topic of interfacing literature, science and humanities revisits and develops the social and cultural contextualisation of literature, which was addressed already by the previous three colloquia: The Author: Who or What Writes Literature? (2008), Who Chooses? Literature and Literary Mediation (2009) and Who Reads? Perspectives on Reading Research (2010).

The proceedings of the conference will be published in a special bilingual (Slovenian and English) edition of the Slovenian Comparative Literature Association journal Primerjalna književnost (Comparative Literature, www.zrc-sazu.si/sdpk, indexed by A&HCI).

The colloquium will form part of the 26^th annual Vilenica International Literary Festival. It will take place in the village Lipica, located in the beautiful Karst region close to Slovenian-Italian border. The colloquium will be held on September 8 – 9, 2011 at the Lipica Wedding Hall.

Invitation. We would like to encourage everyone who might be interested in the topic to send us a paper proposal. The proposals of no more than 250 words should include the title of the presentation and the full address and affiliation of the applicant.

Please email proposals in English, by July 1, 2011, to jsk@zrc-sazu.si and jhabjan@zrc-sazu.si. As the number of speakers is limited to twelve, we will be forced to make a selection of proposals arriving on time that will best suit the aims and purposes of the conference. You will be notified about our decision by July 28.

Further guidelines. If your proposal is accepted, you will be asked to send a short curriculum (5 lines), a photograph and an abstract of 500-1000 words (in English) to be translated to Slovenian. The working language of the conference will be English. In order to leave enough time for discussion, presentations should not exceed 20 minutes.

Conference facilities. Conference room facilities include an LCD-projector. Normally, the projector will be – when necessary – used for simultaneous translations from Slovenian to English, but you can also use them as a tool for your presentations.

Travel and accommodation. The organisers will offer free transport to Lipica from the Jožef Pučnik airport in Ljubljana. The invited speakers will be accommodated in the Maestoso hotel in Lipica (all meals included). Participants of the colloquium are welcome to attend other festival events during their stay in Lipica; local transfers to various festival venues will be provided free of charge.

Irma Ratiani: Georgian “Version” of the World Literature: A Brief Survey of 19^th-20^th Century Georgian Literary Processes
Ljubljana, March 17, 2011, 11.00, ZRC SAZU, Novi trg 5, Mala dvorana (Little hall, 2^nd floor)

Irma Ratiani is a Professor of Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, Chair of the department of General and Comparative Literary Studies; Director of Shota Rustaveli Institute of Georgian Literature; and President of Georgian Comparative Literature Association. Her field of interest is Literary Theory and Comparative Literature in the wide cultural context. The aim of her lecture is to introduce to Slovenian colleagues a specific interpretation of the main trends and directions regarding the adoption of the notion of “world literature” in 19^th-20^th century Georgia – over viewing the colonial and post-colonial experiences of Georgian literature. 
 

Knjiga – ekonomija kulturnih prostorov / The Book: An Economy of Cultural Spaces
Mednarodna konferenca / International Conference

Ljubljana, ZRC SAZU, 25.–26. 11. 2010

(program and abstracts PDF brochure)

Četrtek, 25. novembra 2010 / Thursday, November 25, 2010

9.30 Pozdravni nagovor / Opening address: Marko Juvan

Uvod / Introduction: Jola Škulj: A Challenging Game of Books and Free Interplay of Cultural Transfer

10.00 – 11.00 Plenarno predavanje / Plenary lecture

   Bala Venkat Mani: Bibliomigrancy and the Bourgeois Private Library: The Making of World Literature in Reclam’s Universalbibliothek (1910-1945)

11.00 – 11.15 Odmor / Coffee break

11.15 – 13.15 Prvo zasedanje / First session (chair: Jüri Talvet)

   César Domínguez: Premodern World Literature and Circulation before European Hegemony: Cultural Routes between Europe and Outremer, 1250-1350

   David Šporer: Renaissance Poetry, Print and the Role of Marin Držić

   Nele Bemong: The Distribution and Parading of Cultural and Social Capital in Flemish Nineteenth-Century Literature

   Dragos Jipa: Canon littéraire et dispositifs éditoriaux : La collection des  ‘Grands Ecrivains Français’ (1887-1913)

13.15 – 15.00 Kosilo / Lunch

15.00 – 16.45 Drugo zasedanje / Second session (chair: César Domínguez)

   Jüri Talvet: The Lingering Journey of Poetry from ‘Peripheries’ to ‘Centres’: The Estonian Case of F. R. Kreutzwald’s Epic Kalevipoeg (1861) and Juhan Liiv’s (1864-1913) Lyrical Work

   Marijan Dović: Mediatory Role in the Literary System: Three Periods in Slovenian Literature

   Jiřina Šmejkalová: Researching Cold War Books in the 'Other Europe': Methods, Concepts, and Resources

16.45 – 17.00 Odmor / Coffee break

17.00 – 18.00 Plenarno predavanje / Plenary lecture

   Miha Kovač: Materials, Gatekeepers and Artists: Impact of Publishing Business Models on the Content of Books

20.00 Večerja v stari Ljubljani / Dinner in the Old Town

Petek, 26. novembra / Friday, November  26

9.30 – 10.30 Plenarno predavanje / Plenary lecture

   Alexis Weedon: Changing Attitudes to the Value and Status of the Book: Looking Back over Two Centuries

10.30 – 10.45 Odmor / Coffee break

10.45 – 12.15 Tretje zasedanje / Third session (chair: Nele Bemong)

   Svend Erik Larsen: The Book as a True Copy?

   Marijana Hameršak: How did Fairy Tales Become a Genre of Croatian Children’s Literature? Book History without Books

   Slavica Srbinovska: The book: A Space of an Imaginary Identification and Cultural Dialogues

12.30 – 13.15 Predavanje v Semeniški knjižnici / Lecture in the Seminary Library

   Luka Vidmar: Ljubljana as the New Rome: The Establishment of the Public Library in the Collegium Carolinum

13.30 – 15.00 Kosilo / Lunch

15.00 – 16.45 Četrto zasedanje / Fourth session (chair: Jiřina Šmejkalová)

   Maja Breznik: Culture as Productive Reproduction

   Tiina Aunin: The Book: An Object of Our Shared Understanding of Media Change

   Aleš Vaupotič: The Book and the World Wide Web

16.45 – 17.00 Odmor / Coffee break

17.00 – 18.00 Plenarno predavanje / Plenary lecture

   Anna Notaro: Towards Book 2.0

Jón Karl Helgason (Reykjavik, Island): Visual translation of Njáls Saga
Monday, 24. 5. 2010, 9.00, Filozofska fakulteta (room 526)

As a part of an extensive research on the rewriting of Njáls saga, Helgason has produced an interactive CD-Rom with some 360 illustrations from editions and translation of this Icelandic medieval family saga. In his lecture, Helgason will deal with this corpus and its political and stylistic implications.

Jón Karl Helgason is Assistant Professor at Icelandic and Comparative Cultural Studies at the University of Iceland. His scholarly fields of interest include the post-medieval reception of the Icelandic sagas and 20th-century Icelandic cultural history. His books include Hetjan og höfundurinn (1998), The Rewriting of Njáls saga (1999), Höfundar Njálu (2001) and Fer?alok (2003). His latest book, Mynd af Ragnari í Smára, a biography of cultural patron Ragnar Jónsson (1904-1984), was nominated for the Icelandic Literary Prize in 2009.

Bralec: Kdo ali kaj bere literaturo? / The Reader: Who or What Reads Literature?

8. Mednarodni komparativistični kolokvij  / 8^th International Comparative Literature Colloquium VILENICA 2010

2^nd – 3^rd September 2010, Lipica, Slovenia

(call for papers)

Together with Slovenian Writers’ Association, the Scientific Research Centre of the Slovenian Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the Department for Comparative Literature and Literary Theory (Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana), Slovenian Comparative Literature Association will host the 8^th International Comparative Literature Colloquium, entitled Who or What Reads Literature?

The international colloquium traditionally promotes up-to date research results of Slovenian literary science and its interdisciplinary affiliations with the humanities, as well as the studies of Slovenian fiction, originating in literary studies abroad. Taking place in Slovenia, the event serves a systematic traditional integration of Slovenian literary studies in the international exchange of research results.

International colloquium entitled The Reader: Who or What Reads Literature? will offer three thematically divided albeit interconnected and overlapping sections. The first one will focus on the historical reader and reading practices, providing the cultural and historical contextualisation of reading practices, including the contemporary ones. Following up from the first, the second section will address various reading motives (the motif of the reader, of reading, of the library etc.). Finally, the third section will (re)consider the theories of reading and reflect on the future of the practice.

As such, the topic of the reader will complement the previous two festival symposiums, which centred on the role of the author (The Author: Who or What Writes Literature? (2008)) and on the importance of literary intermediaries (the publishers, editors and critics, among others) in contemporary literature and culture (Who Chooses?, 2009).

The proceedings of the conference will be published in a special multilingual (Slovenian, English and French) edition of the Slovenian Comparative Literature Association journal Primerjalna književnost (Comparative Literature, www.zrc-sazu.si/sdpk, indexed by A&HCI). A special book publication may also be considered.

As usual, the colloquium will form part of the 25^th International Writers’ Festival Vilenica. It will take place in a village named Lipica near Sežana, located in the beautiful Karst region close to Slovenian-Italian border. The colloquium will be held on the 2^nd and the 3^rd of September at the Lipica Wedding Hall.

Invitation. We would like to encourage everyone that might be interested in the topic to send us a paper proposal. The proposals of no more than 250 words should include the title of the presentation and the full address of the applicant.

Please email proposals in English to ana.vogrincic@guest.arnes.si ; and proposals in French to tone.smolej@guest.arnes.si. The d-day for submission is May 10, 2010. The number of speakers being limited, we will be forced to make a selection of proposals arriving on time that will best suite the aims and purposes of the conference. You will be notified about our decision by May 24.

Further guidelines. If your proposal is accepted, you will be asked to send a short curriculum (5 lines), a photography and an abstract of 500-1000 words (in English) to be translated to Slovenian.

The working language of the conference will be Slovenian, English and French. In case the paper is presented in Slovenian, English translation will be provided. In order to leave enough time for discussion, presentations should not exceed 20 minutes.

Conference facilities. Conference room facilities include an LCD-projector. Normally, the projector will be – when necessary – used for simultaneous translations from Slovenian to English. However, if you will be using the projector for your presentation, the translations of the abstracts will be provided in print.

Travel and accommodation. The organizers will offer free transport to Lipica from Jožef Pučnik airport in Ljubljana. The invited speakers will be accommodated in the Maestoso hotel in Lipica (all meals included). Participants of the colloquium are welcome to attend other festival events during their stay in Lipica; local transfers to various festival venues will be provided free of charge.

Esej in singularnost // The Essay and Singularity
Mednarodna konferenca / International Conference
Ljubljana, Mala dvorana ZRC SAZU, Novi trg 4/II, 22.–23. 10. 2009

7. International Comparative Literature Colloquium VILENICA 2009
"Kdo izbere?" Literatura in literarno posredništvo / "Who Chooses?" Literature and Literary Mediation
Lipica, Slovenia, 3–4 September 2009
program and abstracts

International Scientific Conference (Tbilisi, Georgia, October 7-9)
“Totalitarianism and Literary Discourse (20th century experience)”
The conference is about to be organized by the Shota Rustaveli Institute of Georgian Literature in partnership with Georgian Comparative Literature Association (GCLA). The conference will be held in October 7-8-9, 2009 with the support of the Foundation for Georgian Studies, Humanities and Social Sciences (Rustaveli Foundation). The conference is dedicated to the analysis, evaluation, revision and reinterpretation of ongoing literary processes against the background of 20th century. In addition, the revision and classification of the tendencies of literary studies are emphasized.Panel topics will include the following:
- Myths and Stereotypes of Totalitarian Epoch;
- Totalitarianism and Models of Alternative Thinking
- Literary Genres of the Epoch of Totalitarianism;
- Totalitarian Text and the Concept of Leader;
- Peculiarity of Interpretation of Creative Text under the Conditions of Totalitarian Regime;
          Dissident Literature;
- Banned and Harmed Texts under the Conditions of Dictate Censorship;
- Public and Intellectual Criticism;
- Totalitarianism from Far-away Perspective (centre and emigration);
- Formation and collapse of Totalitarian Text.
Working languages of the Conference are Georgian, English and Russian. We are pleased to inform You that Shota Rustaveli Institute of Georgian Literature and GCLA with the support of Rustaveli foundation will cover Your expenses (registration fee, accommodation and meals).

Call for Abstracts:
Paper titles, abstracts of no more than 250 words (in English) and filled registration forms (registration forms can be downloaded from the following website: http://www.litinstituti.ge/english/total-reg-form.htm) should be sent electronically by July 20, 2009 to the Organizing Committee on the following email: maillit@litinstituti.ge. For further information feel free to contact the Organizing Committee on the above mentioned email or visit our official web-site: www.litinstituti.ge.
 

Invitation to cooperate with Georgian comparatists and Sjani review
We are writing in order to inform You about the call for papers for the oncoming issue of the Journal "Sjani". "Sjani" ("The Thoughts") is an Annual Peer-Reviewed International Journal of Literary Theory and Comparative Literature published by Shota Rustaveli Institute of Georgian Literature and Georgian Comparative Literature Association. It welcomes articles covering philology, literature, literary theory, criticism, comparative studies, culture and aesthetics. Articles can be written in Georgian, English, German, Russian or French languages. It would be honour for us to receive contributions from You and publish articles of Your colleagues. The deadline for submitting papers is 20 December, 2009. For the guidance on how to format your paper, please see the citing style for scientific publications of Shota Rustaveli Institute of Georgian Literature by visiting out official website: www.litinstituti.ge or http://www.litinstituti.ge/english/cit-ingl-stile.htm. For further information please feel free to contact us on the following e-mail: maillit@litinstituti.ge.


The Essay and Singularity
An International Conference of the Slovenian Comparative Literature Association, Ljubljana, 22-23 October 2009
(call for papers)

The essay evades genre classifications and falls outside the typologies of the three literary genres that were inherited from Romanticism, but was nonetheless recognized as an independent genre in twentieth-century literary studies. One characteristic of this genre is that it transcends the boundaries of literature and hybridizes its discourse with that of another art, philosophy, science, religion, or politics. The essay is the genre that, alongside the novel, perhaps best responds to modernity: from Montaigne and Bacon through Benjamin and Adorno to today, it is distinguished by experiential and exploratory creation of knowledge, questioning of established systems of learning and disciplinary divisions, as well as showing doubt about traditional authorities and general laws or rules. The essay intervenes in given cultural sources with poetic writing, primarily authorized by the singularity of an individual’s existence, its enunciatory position, personalized experience, and perspective that continually enable the essayist writing to open up new, sometimes barely anticipated associations between words, things, concepts, disciplines, and experiences. The examining creativity of the essay, its significance in the dynamics of thought and cognition, and also its hybridity or borderline quality (characterized at a loss as “semi-literary quality”) should also be considered and defined outside the comfortable formulas of the essay as a subjective, at first glance literary practice and representation of knowledge. The conceptual framework that could prove to be productive in this endeavour implies singularity, an issue that has recently been much discussed in philosophy (Jean-Luc Nancy) and literary studies (Samuel Weber, Timothy Clark, and Derek Attridge). Singularity – to which art itself unavoidably adheres in its essence – opens new perspectives on the known structural nature of the essay, such as subjectivity, mixing of genres, reflexivity and self-reflexivity, first-person narrative, autobiography, rhetoric and poetics, narrativity and intertextuality, open form, etc. The conference will raise the following questions: What is the connection between singularity and pluralism of ethics, policies, and truths in the essay, which is the presumed emblem of postmodernity? How much and how does essayistic writing overstep the genre boundaries of the essay and shapes novels, poetry, plays, and the performing arts? How does it transform itself in the language of modern print and electronic media? Does an essayistic pop culture also exist? How is the essay used and misused in education? Furthermore, in a society in which the criteria of knowledge are shaken, is the essay not often also a pretense or alibi? Does the rhetoric of essayism not in many cases conceal argumentative deficiencies, logical errors, scholarly lack of expertise, hidden political agendas, and ideologies? Or perhaps transgressive thinking, such as is recorded in essay writing, is only an unavoidable and inherent segment of the cognitive understanding of new realities?

Organizing Committee: Dr Marko Juvan (Scientific Research Centre and University of Ljubljana), Dr Darja Pavlič (University of Maribor), Dr Ivo Pospíšil (University of Brno), Jola Škulj (Scientific Research Centre, Ljubljana).

Please send the title of a 20-minute paper and a short synopsis (300 characters) in English before 1 June 2009 to Dr Darja Pavlič, e-mail: darja.pavlic@uni-mb.si The participants whose abstracts have been accepted will be sent an official invitation by the Slovenian Comparative Literature Association in June 2009. They will be asked to send a longer abstract (2000 characters) before 20 September 2009 in order to publish it in a booklet before the conference. A selection of papers will be considered for publication in Primerjalna književnost journal in June 2010. There is no conference fee. It is expected that the participants will cover their travel and accommodation costs by themselves. The organizers will provide the information on accommodation in Ljubljana.

VILENICA 2008, program and abstracts
Avtor: kdo ali kaj piše literaturo? / The Author: Who or What Is Writing Literature?
Lipica, Slovenija September 4-5, 2008

Responding to cosmopolitanism: the new identities of literary theory
ICLA Committee on Literary Theory International Colloquium, Ljubljana   5-7 June 2008
program and abstracts

VILENICA 2007
5^th International Comparative Literature Colloquium
Literatura in cenzura / Literature and Censorship
Lipica, Slovenija, September 6-7, 2007

Milan Dekleva: Zgodba kot svet in predstava (Lecture from the cycle "Autopoetics", 6. 2. 2007)

Tomaž Toporišič: Kriza dramskega avtorja v gledališču osemdesetih in devetdesetih let dvajsetega stoletja. (Lecture, 10. 1. 2007)

Marijan Dović: Modeli slovenskega pisatelja / The Models of a Slovene Writer. (Lecture, Ljubljana, ZRC SAZU, 28. 9. 2006)

VILENICA 2006
Zgodovina in njeni literarni žanri / History and its literary genres (programme and paper abstracts)
Lipica, September 7-8, 2006

The Anniversary of Primerjalna književnost Journal
INVITATION (call for papers)
The anniversary of Primerjalna književnost journal which will take place the next year, is reason for invitation to reflect on what was happening with literature (as object of study) and comparative literature (as scientific discipline) in the last thirty years. To encourage a wide range of replies, some issues are presented, but essays with other topics which will discuss literature or comparative literature after 1978, are also welcomed.

1. Comparative literature, other sciences, knowledge and society
Comparative literature is traditionally open to concepts of different disciplines (philosophy, linguistics, psychoanalysis, sociology, history and so on). Interdisciplinary approaches have considerably enriched our knowledge about literature, whereas transdisciplinarity means a rather new challenge. Transdisciplinarity is grounded on assumption that knowledge is transgressive in its essence, and therefore transcends the borders between disciplines as well as the borders between science and society. Transdisciplinarity doesn’t abolish singular disciplines; on the contrary it aims for dialogue between specialists and different kinds of knowledge, therefore also between literary science and literature. It emphasizes the notion of accountability to different users and the importance of teaching among other things.

2. Changes in comparative literature
After years of mutual exclusion, two main approaches to literary studies in 20^th century, textualism and historism, have reached the point where they can work together. However, the social turn has marked the recent past of literary science more than the linguistic turn. Socio-political aspects of text (power, class, history, race, gender and so on) have gained the attention. When we speak about the development of comparative literature, we can not ignore recurrences of past models, for example Geistesgeschichte as one of them.

3. Changes in literature
Intertwining of historism and textualism takes place in a special kind of postmodern novel, historiographic metafiction. Postmodern achievement is affirmation of genres and popular culture, whereas the question if postmodernism is the latest literary movement or just an episode in literary history, remains open. In the recent past -- marked with economic and cultural globalisation and corresponding localisation, in the post-socialist states particularly with transition to democratic society – problems of identity, individual as well as group, are central in literature. One of the characteristics of current literature is also new relations with media (hypertext and interactive literature, post-dramatic theatre).

Guidelines for participation: an abstract (500-600 characters) written in English or Slovene should be sent until 15^th of October to the editor’s address (darja.pavlic@uni-mb.si). Until 15^th of November you’ll be informed whether you are invited to send your paper (20.000 characters with spaces, i.e. 10 pages) until 1^st of March 2007. The selected papers will be published in Primerjalna književnost journal in jubilee year 2007.

Darja Pavlič, editor

A new book of Slovene comparatist Metka Zupančič, “Death, Language, Thought” was recently published in USA. 

Minutes of the General Assembly of the REELC/ENCLS (Florence, september 2005)

A letter to the Rectorate of the University of Innsbruck (supporting the Innsbruck CL department)

Winfried Menninghaus: Beauty and Death in Darwin and Freud / Lepota in smrt pri Darwinu in Freudu. Lepota in smrt pri Darwinu in Freudu. (Lecture, 20. 10. 2005)

Winfried Menninghaus: Hölderlin's Sapphic Mode: Revising the Myth of the Male Pindaric Seer / Hölderlinov sapfični modus: Revidiranje mita o moškem pindarskem vidcu. (Lecture, 20. 10. 2005)

VILENICA 2005
3^rd International Comparative Literature Colloquium
Teoretsko-literarni hibridi: o dialogu literature in teorije / Hybridizing Theory and Literature: On the Dialogue between Theory and Literature
(Lipica, 8. in 9. september 2005, abstracts)

Dr. Jan Johann A. Mooij, Groningenu (Hol): Literature and the Arts
(19. 5. 2005, 11.15)

Dr. Galin Tihanov, Lancaster (VB): Post-Romantic Syndrome
(14. 4. 2005, 10.30)

Special edition of CL: Literature and space: Spaces of transgressiveness
edited by Jola Škulj and Darja Pavlič - articles by Jean Bessiere (University of Paris III – Nouvelle Sorbonne), Bart Keunen (University of Liege, Belgium), Bertrand Westphal (University of Limoges, France), Jelka Kernev, Darja Pavlič  (University of Maribor, Slovenia), Igor Škamperle, Marko Juvan, Jola Škulj, Marijan Dović (Literary institute ZRC SAZU, Ljubljana, Slovenia), Katia Pizzi and Igor Zabel (Modern galery, Ljubljana, Slovenia). 

Jola Škulj was invited and elected a member of the ICLA/AILC Executive council.
 
VILENICA 2004: Comparative Literature Congress (abstracts)
"Kosovel: Between Ethics and Poetics
(Vilenica, Slovenia, 9.- 10. September)

VILENICA 2003: Comparative Literature Congress (abstracts)
"Spaces of Transgression: Literature at the Edge"
(Vilenica, Slovenia, 3. in 4. september)
Jean Bessiere (University of Paris III – Nouvelle Sorbonne), Bart Keunen (University of Liege, Belgium), Bertrand Westphal (University of Limoges, France), Jelka Kernev, Darja Pavlič  (University of Maribor, Slovenia), Igor Škamperle, Marko Juvan, Jola Škulj, Marijan Dović (Literary institute ZRC SAZU, Ljubljana, Slovenia), Zoltan Jan (University of Trieste) and Igor Zabel (Modern galery, Ljubljana, Slovenia). 

A new issue of Primerjalna književnost / CL review 
PKn 2002/2 brings articles by Janko Kos, Brane Senegačnik, Alenka Jovanovski and

International Conference:
How to Write Literary History Today?
Ljubljana, Mala dvorana ZRC SAZU , Novi trg 4, 2. floor

Organized by dr. Darko Dolinar and dr. Marko Juvan

A new issue of Primerjalna književnost / CL review PKn 2002/1 brings articles by Aleksander Skaza, Marko Juvan, Matija Ogrin and Franca Buttolo.

The last, 46th volume of Literary Lexicon brings a monograph on old verse forms of India by Vlasta Pacheiner-Klander.

New at ICLA/AILC (conferences, calls for papers …)
http://www.byu.edu/%7Eicla/cgi-bin/announce.cgi