The 10th Anniversary Conference of the Contemporary Women’s Writing Association in association with C21 the centre for contemporary writing at the University of Brighton.
University of Brighton Grand Parade site
Saturday 17 October 2015

Keynote Speakers
Prof Patricia Duncker, University of Manchester ( with questions from Dr Kate Aughterson  Uni B)  and Prof Lucie  Armitt,  University of Lincoln  Patricia am Lucie pm

The very existence of the term contemporary women’s writing suggests a relationship as well as a difference, a continuity, and a radical creative break between women’s writing from the 1960’s and 70’s onwards, and those works of women writers which came before. Simultaneously it suggests writing which captures the evolving spirit and concerns of the twenty first century with experimentation, innovation and speculation. Contemporary women writers have long explored their present through both the past and the future, through historical explorations of women¹s lives and worlds, and through imaginary times ahead. This conference seeks to ask what has been the big news of the last ten years in contemporary women’s writing, and what may define it in future decades. The organisers hope to explore contemporary women writers’ relationships to the past and the future, their continuities, legacies, radical breaks and innovations, including – but by no means limited to – the following topics: historical fiction; utopias / dystopias; feminist genealogies and generations; gendered temporalities; the politics of (re)writing the past and of imagining the future; women’s science fiction and fantasy; new genres/ new forms; the future of feminist literary criticism; writing in an age of crisis; defining the contemporary; women’s writing and the new technologies; women’s writing and the literary market place.

Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words for 20 minute papers by 22 September 2015 via this form.

Any questions please contact Gina Wisker on g.wisker@brighton.ac.uk

The registration fees for this event will be £45 for salaried delegates; £30 for students and unsalaried delegates.

The roundtable  has  the following  contributors :
Patricia Duncker, Lucie  Armitt, Sneja Gunew, Emily Blewitt and Poonam Gunaseelan. It will be just one hour, *2.40-3.40pm – we envisage that each panel member will take just a few minutes to ‘reflect’ on the themes and then take questions in the time left.

book launch Prof Mary Eagleton  and Dr Emma Parker are launching their new book Mary Eagleton and Emma Parker  (Eds)  Vol. 10  Palgrave’s History of British Women’s Writing: 1970 to the present. With Emma Parker, Mary Eagleton, and Ben Doyle (Palgrave Macmillan)

Talk  Jane Anger, who used to run the Silver Moon women’s bookshop in London  will  talk about  how changes in publishing and book culture over the last 10 years have impacted on women writers. This will take place   before the roundtable.

Mary Eagleton’s talk on the Friday 16th  is  entitled ”Chance and Choice: the Literature of Women’s Upward Mobility’  and  is on University of Brighton Falmer site  4-5 in Mayfield 115 Mayfield is the building second along from the bus stop  FALMER   site  – go down two floors NB  taxis like to try and take you to Sussex (which is across the motorway from us)-please  enlighten them!