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British Association for American Studies

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The United States of America and World War One: Exploring Political, Economic and Cultural Entanglements (British Academy)

Irish Association for American Studies Annual Conference (Ulster University, Belfast)

Irish Association for American Studies Annual Conference 28-29 April 2017 Belfast Campus, Ulster University, Belfast, Northern Ireland In 2013, Timothy Garton Ash wrote an opinion piece for The Guardian which stated that: ‘The world no longer needs to discover America; but America urgently needs to discover the world’s view of America.’ Garton Ash was writing about the US budget crisis but three years on, as the new Administration-Elect readies itself to take over the White House, the  IAAS wonders if the America the world thought it knew ever really existed. This year’s conference will challenge us to re-discover and re-engage with America – explore the changing political and cultural landscape, uncover previously unheard voices, challenge conventional wisdom, and examine the role of the academic in a post-factual world. This conference represents a unique opportunity to reorient American Studies, both in Ireland and beyond. Further details here: http://iaas.ie/the-iaas-annual-conference/  

JOB: Research Associate (University of Kent)

The School of English is seeking to appoint a Research Associate to work with Dr Sara Lyons (PI) and Dr Michael Collins (CO-I) following the award of a two-year AHRC Project Grant to investigate how British and American novelists understood and represented intellectual ability between 1880 and 1920, with a particular focus on how novelists responded to the rise of intelligence testing and the associated concepts of I.Q. and meritocracy. The post-holder will complement their work by using the periodical press to discover how debates about the measurability of intelligence affected the reception of literary texts, the discourses of literary criticism, and understandings of authorial identity in the period. In the first six months of the project, the postholder will assist the PI and Co-I by surveying the intersections between literary discourses and debates about the nature of intellectual ability in the periodical press. The successful candidate will have a […]

PHD Studentship: Black Atlantic Culture (University of Central Lancashire)

PhD (via MPhil) Studentship in the School of Humanities and Social Science at the Institute for Black Atlantic Research IBAR Reference RS1625 Applications are invited for a full PhD (via MPhil) studentship in the School of Humanities and Social Science.  The studentship is tenable for 3 years full-time and will cover the cost of tuition fees at UK/EU rates. International applicants may apply for the studentship but will be required to pay the difference in tuition fees  The successful applicant will be required to comply with the terms of funding. It is expected the successful applicant will commence 1 July 2017. Project Title Black Atlantic Culture Project Description The PhD student will be based in the Institute for Black Atlantic Research (IBAR) in the School of Humanities & Social Science, and will work on the following topic. This project will utilise the researchers at the Institute for Black Atlantic Research […]

CFP: Testimony, Memory and Reading Trauma in Representations of the Holocaust (University of East Anglia)

Testimony, Memory and Reading Trauma in Representations of the Holocaust 15 July 2017, University of East Anglia, Norwich (UK) “I am choking, I am drowning. This pencil and these scraps of paper aren't enough. I need colours, sounds – oils and orchestras. I need something more than words.” -Martin Amis, The Zone of Information (2014) “Postmemory is a powerful form of Memory precisely because its connection to its object source is not mediated through recollection but through an imaginative investment and creation. Postmemory characterizes the experiences of those who grow up dominated by narratives that preceded their birth, whose own belated stories are evacuated by stories of the previous generation, shaped by traumatic events that can be neither fully understood nor re-created.” –Marianne Hirsch, Past Lives: Postmemories in Exile (1996) This symposium proposes a critical insight into contemporary representations of the Holocaust in Fiction, Poetry, Film, Historical and artistic interpretations. An intention to showcase research […]

CFP: Bluecoat 300: Charity, Philanthropy and the Black Atlantic (Liverpool)

Bluecoat 300: Charity, Philanthropy and the Black Atlantic A weekend conference and public participation event Liverpool 24-25 November 2017 Conference 24 Nov: Dr Martin Luther King Building Public Participation 25 Nov: Bluecoat Arts Centre Keynote Speaker: Prof. Catherine Hall (UCL) The weekend is set against the backdrop of two anniversaries in Liverpool: the tercentenary of the Bluecoat building, which was built in 1717 as a charity school for the poor, and has been a centre for the arts since 1907; and it is ten years since the International Slavery Museum opened. As part of the Bluecoat’s year-long anniversary programme, one strand aims to reveal and evaluate the presence of slavery and the black Atlantic in the history of Bluecoat. Like many Liverpool institutions founded in the 18th century, Bluecoat was built to a large degree with funds derived from the expanding port. Initial findings from recent research by Sophie Jones into […]

CFP: Station Eleven and Twenty-First Century Writing

Since its publication in 2014, Canadian author Emily St John Mandel’s Station Eleven has attracted enthusiastic critical responses. This post-apocalyptic novel won an Arthur C. Clarke Award for Science Fiction in 2015 and was shortlisted for many other awards, including the National Book Award, the PEN/Faulkner Award, and the Bailey’s Women’s Prize for Fiction. In this OLH Special Collection, we seek to explore Station Eleven’s position within twenty-first-century writing. Station Eleven intersects with various debates in contemporary literary studies, opening up questions about genre, politics, national literary traditions, literary form and intermediality, popular culture and prize culture. The novel partakes in what James Berger describes as the “pervasive post-apocalyptic sensibility in recent American culture”. This sensibility is no longer the sole province of science fiction, as canonical literary authors like Cormac McCarthy and Jim Crace have written novels imagining post-catastrophic futures. Indeed Veronica Hollinger speaks of the “'disappearance’ of science […]

CFP: HELAAS International Conference (Aristotle University, Thessaloniki)

CALL FOR PAPERS – HELAAS INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE The Politics of Space and the Humanities 15-17 December 2017 Deadline: May 1st, 2017 Venue: Aristotle University, Thessaloniki The Department of American Literature of the School of English at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, in collaboration with the Hellenic Association for American Studies (HELAAS), invite scholars to submit proposals for the international conference ―The Politics of Space and the Humanities‖ to be held in Thessaloniki. The latest socio-cultural and political developments on both sides of the Atlantic have again placed space at the center of attention of current scholarship in the Humanities. The relation between places, people, and geographies as caused by immigration, migration and refugee flows, demographic changes, war tensions and conflicts, environmental disasters, urban expansion, and mapping technologies has always been dynamic. Nowadays, finding ourselves in the midst of change, we need to reconsider the politicized nature of space, its impact […]

Trump’s First 100 Days (University of Reading)

We are pleased to announce that registration is now open for the forthcoming conference ‘Trump’s First 100 Days’, 2nd May 2017. A copy of the conference programme is available below.  Registrations should be made via the University of Reading’s Conferences and Events pages.

JOB: Junior Professor for the History of North America in its Transcultural Context (Ruhr-Universitat Bochum)

The Ruhr-Universität Bochum (RUB) is one of Germany’s leading research universities. The University draws its strengths from both the diversity and the proximity of scientific and engineering disciplines on a single, coherent campus. This highly dynamic setting enables students and researchers to work across traditional boundaries of academic subjects and faculties. The Ruhr-Universität Bochum – Faculty of History – invites applications for the following position to start on 1 October 2017 Junior Professorship for the History of North America in its Transcultural Context (Salary Scale W1 with the possibility of Tenure Track W2) Applicants should be familiar with the variety of subject areas and methodology within the field of North American History in its transcultural context particularly in the area of Modern History in both research and teaching. The successful post holder should place a focus on the transcultural entanglements of the North American Continent both within its borders and without for the […]

Imperial Cultures of the United States (University of Warwick)

It has been nearly 25 years since the publication of Donald Pease and Amy Kaplan’s seminal collection of essays, Cultures of United States Imperialism (Duke, 1993), a volume which built on and expanded in new directions a field of foreign policy and imperial studies initiated largely by William Appleman Williams and the Wisconsin School in the 1950s and 60s. Since then, of course, ‘US imperialism’ has become a familiar (if still deeply contested) concept for historians, political analysts, sociologists, literary critics, and scholars of other cultural forms. Meanwhile, U.S. foreign policy itself has moved in decisive new directions: the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, interventions in Libya and Pakistan, the changing relationship with Cuba and Iran, and so on. This one-day symposium seeks to revisit and reassess the continuing currency of ‘U.S. Imperialism’ as a concept and its place in the wider projects of cultural, literary, and artistic history.  Bringing […]

Trump’s America (University College Dublin, Clinton Institute)

This conference will examine the political and cultural significance of Donald Trump’s election as President of the United States, and consider the first 100 days of his administration. Speakers include: Robert Brigham (Vassar College), Mary Fitzgerald (Irish Times), Scott Lucas (University of Birmingham), Clodagh Harrington (De Montfort University),  Diane Negra (University College Dublin), Inderjeet Parmar (City, University of London),Donald E. Pease (Dartmouth College), Stephen Shapiro (University of Warwick) Topics may include but are not confined to: “Make America Great Again” – American exceptionalism, nostalgia “America First” – foreign policy and diplomacy “Protect our borders” – immigration and terrorism “Drain the swamp” – Washington elites, lobbying and corruption “A historic movement” – white nationalism, identity politics, protest “American carnage” – dystopian visions of the US, narratives of decline “Crime and gangs and guns” – race and the cities, gun violence, civic anxiety “Fake news” – politics in the new media age, […]

JOB: Lecturer in Film, American Cinema (University of Leicester)

Leicester University is seeking an outstanding researcher and teacher in Film Studies to join our successful School of Arts. In this role you will develop the School’s research profile in International Film, and engage in research and publication in this area. You will be teaching and supporting students on the BA Film and Visual Arts and related degree streams, and offer at least one undergraduate option in American Cinema, as well as supervising undergraduate and postgraduate dissertations. With a PhD in Film Studies, you will have a proven track record of published research, which gives proof that it attains international excellence. You will have experience in designing and delivering relevant modules, and an ability to generate external funding to support your research. Click here for further information and details regarding this position Informal enquiries are welcome and should be made to Professor Martin Halliwell on mrh17@le.ac.uk or 0116 252 2645. The closing […]