announcements, calls for papers, conference, job opportunities, monthly mailing, new titles, news, SFPS monthly mailing

Monthly Mailing: November 2018

30th November 2018

SFPS Monthly Mailing: November 2018

  1. Calls for Papers

1.1 The Society for the Study of French History, Annual Conference 2019: ‘Legacies’

1.2 Chimères 2019 Conference: “Individuals and Ideologies”

1.3 ASMCF – SSFH Postgraduate Study Day 2019: Visibility/Invisibility

1.4 SFS Postgraduate Conference 2019: The Return of the Author

1.5 Special Issue: The Care (Re)Turn in Contemporary French & Francophone Cultural Productions

1.6 Mobilities and Moorings: Renegotiating Spaces and Identities in Modern and Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures

1.7 Narratives of Forced Migration in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries

  1. Job Opportunities

2.1 Lord Kelvin / Adam Smith Readership (Associate Professor) Scheme

2.2 SFHS Institut Français d’Amérique Research Fellowships

  1. Announcements

3.1 Empire and Afterlives in Modern France (Series of Events)

3.2 Mediating Thought: A Conference in Honour of Christopher Johnson

  1. New Titles

4.1 Unbecoming Language Anti-Identitarian French Feminist Fictions (The Ohio State University Press, 2018)

4.2 The Representation of the Relationship between Center and Periphery in the Contemporary Novel (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2018)

4.3 Antijudaïsme et antisémitisme en Algérie coloniale 1830-1862 (Presses Universitaires de Provence, 2018)

 

  1. Calls for Papers/Contributions

1.1 The Society for the Study of French History, Annual Conference 2019: ‘Legacies’

8-9 July 2019, University of Leeds

Keynote speakers:

Professor Barbara Diefendorf (Boston University, emeritus), ‘Uncivil Wars: Legacies of the Religious Conflicts in Early Modern France’

Professor Olivette Otele (Bath Spa University), ‘Race Matters: Education, Identity, Citizenship and Post Colonial Memories in 21st Century France’

Roundtable on ‘Legacies of the Women’s Movement’ featuring Professor Michelle Zancarini-Fournel (Université Lyon-1, emeritus) and Dr. Bibia Pavard (Université Paris II)

Recent years have been replete with significant anniversaries of landmark events within French history: from the Reformation to the Centenary, Sétif and 1968. This conference invites reflections on the legacies of these and other important historical moments. What happened next to the men and women who lived through these events? How did they understand and deal with the after effects of the changes wrought within their families and communities? How were the structures as well as the material fabric of societies reconceptualised and rebuilt? What new configurations – political, economic, social – emerged? Were these changes ephemeral or enduring? How were such events represented and remembered? How have these historical moments echoed down the years and to what extent do they continue to shape life in France and in France’s former colonies?

We encourage people to interpret ‘legacies’ in the broadest possible terms, taking into account social, cultural, imperial, political, economic, military, gendered and other dimensions. Interventions tackling commemorative afterlives and contemporary resonances are also welcome.

In addition to the conference theme, we also invite papers or panels on any aspect of French history from the early medieval to the contemporary period and we welcome contributions that reflect the broad diversity of the history of France and its former colonial empire.

We particularly welcome contributions from postgraduates and ECRs, overseas scholars, and scholars from under-represented groups. Please note that the SSFH does not accept all-male panels. All the conference venues, including the accommodation, are accessible and we are very happy to discuss particular needs that participants might have and how we can best accommodate these.

Proposals should be for 20-minute papers in English or in French. Complete panel submissions consisting of three thematically linked papers are especially welcome. Each proposal should comprise a paper title, abstract of 300 words and a one-page CV in a single PDF or MS Word file. Proposals for complete panels will contain the same information for each participant, as well as an overall title for the panel.

Submissions should be emailed to ssfh2019@leeds.ac.uk

Queries should also be directed to this email address.

The deadline for abstracts is Monday 7 January 2019.

Organising Committee:

Claire Eldridge, Nina Wardleworth, Sara Barker, Jim House, Alison Fell, Rachel Utley, Jocelyn Evans

Contact email: ssfh2019@leeds.ac.uk

***

The Society for the Study of French History, Colloque annuel 2019

Thème du colloque: ‘Séquelles’

8-9 Juillet 2019, University of Leeds

Conférences plénières:

Professor Barbara Diefendorf (Boston University, émerité), ‘Uncivil Wars: Legacies of the Religious Conflicts in Early Modern France’

Professor Olivette Otele (Bath Spa University), ‘Race Matters: Education, Identity, Citizenship and Post-Colonial Memories in 21st Century France’

Table ronde Professor Michelle Zancarini-Fournel (Université Lyon-1, émérite) et Dr. Bibia Pavard (Université Paris II) au sujet ‘Des héritages du mouvement des femmes’

Les dernières années ont été marquées par d’importants anniversaires d’événements marquants de l’histoire française: de la Réforme au Centenaire, en passant par Sétif et 1968. Ce colloque invite des contributions qui réflechissent sur les héritages de ces moments historiques importants. Que s’est-il passé ensuite aux hommes et aux femmes qui ont vécu ces événements? Comment est-ce qu’ils ont compris et traité les répercussions des changements survenus au sein de leurs familles et de leurs communautés? Comment les structures et le tissu matériel des sociétés ont-ils été reconceptualisés et reconstruits? Quelles nouvelles configurations – politique, économique, sociale – ont émergé? Ces changements étaient-ils éphémères ou durables? Comment ces événements ont-ils été représentés et commémorés? Comment ces moments historiques ont-ils résonné au fil des ans et dans quelle mesure continuent-ils à façonner la vie en France et dans ses anciennes colonies?

Nous encourageons les participants à interpréter l’idée d’ «héritages» de la manière la plus large possible, en tenant compte des dimensions sociale, culturelle, impériale, politique, économique, militaire et autre. Les interventions sur les vies commémoratives ultérieures et les résonances contemporaines sont également les bienvenues.

Outre le thème du colloque, nous invitons également des communications ou des panels sur tous les aspects de l’histoire française, du début du Moyen Âge à l’époque contemporaine, et nous souhaitons recevoir des contributions qui reflètent la grande diversité de l’histoire de la France et de son ancien empire colonial.

Nous nous encourageons tout particulièrement des contributions des étudiants de troisième cycle et desuniversitaires en début de carrière, des universitaires étrangers et des universitaires issus de groupes sous-représentés. Veuillez noter que le SSFH n’accepte pas les panels composés exclusivement d’hommes. Tous les lieux de la conférence, y compris l’hébergement, sont accessibles aux personnes à mobilité réduite et nous sommes très heureux de discuter des besoins particuliers des participants et de la manière dont nous pourrons le mieux y répondre.

Les propositions de communication, pour une intervention de 20 minutes, composées d’un résumé de 300 mots sont à adresser au comité d’organisation, par mail. Pour les ‘panels’, le titre, résumé de 300 mots pour chaque intervenant et d’une courte notice bio-bibliographique sont également à adresser au comité d’organisation.

Les soumissions doivent être envoyées à ssfh2019@leeds.ac.uk

Les questions doivent également être adressées à cette adresse électronique.

La date limite des propositions est le lundi 7 janvier 2019.

Comité d’organisation: Claire Eldridge, Nina Wardleworth, Sara Barker, Jim House, Alison Fell, Rachel Utley, Jocelyn Evans

Adresse e-mail de contact: ssfh2019@leeds.ac.uk

 

1.2 Chimères 2019 Conference: “Individuals and Ideologies”

April 13th, 2019

The Department of French, Francophone, and Italian Studies of the University of Kansas invites researchers to submit proposals for its spring conference to be held April 13, 2019 in conjunction with Chimères, a peer-reviewed Journal of French & Francophone Literatures and Cultures. Chimères is a graduate-run journal that is MLA-listed and has been in publication since 1967. Our entire archive is digitized; the 2017 issue (which can be viewed online here: https://journals.ku.edu/chimeres) has had over 40,000 individual downloads for the year to date. Selected papers will be considered for publication in the winter 2019 edition of the journal.

Our spring conference will explore notions of individuals and ideologies in terms of literary, cultural, cinematic, and historical identities and expressions as found in French and Francophone works.

Our keynote speaker will be science-fiction specialist Professor Nicholas Serruys of McMaster University.

Possible topics could include, but are not limited to:
•       Spirituality
•       Self & Society
•       Moral & Political Ideals
•       Totalitarianism
•       Fascism
•       Neo-Liberalism
•       Humanism & Post-Humanism
•       Censure & Censorship
•       Utopias & Dystopias
•       Colonialism & Post-Colonialism
•       Identity & Alterity
•       Traumas & Traumatisms
•       Self-Expression & Emotions
•       Sexual & Social Constructs
•       Images & Media Culture

Papers are invited from any area of French and Francophone studies and may be in English or French.  Prospective presenters may submit an abstract of no more than 250 words by January 8, 2019.

All submissions should be sent to mchimeres@ku.edu. Please attach a Word document to your message that includes your abstract, name, institution, email address, and a brief bio of 100 words or less.

 

1.3 ASMCF – SSFH Postgraduate Study Day 2019: Visibility/Invisibility

2 March 2019 – All Souls College, University of Oxford

Keynote: Dr. Antonia Wimbush

Entre les couleurs et les visibles prétendus, on retrouverait le tissu qui les double, les soutient, les nourrit, et qui, lui, n’est pas chose, mais possibilité, latence et chair des choses. ~ Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Le Visible et l’invisible (1964)

What we do not see is as important as what lies on the surface. Cultures and societies are moulded by tensions between dominant powers and marginalities, centres and peripheries – between those who are visible, and those individuals, bodies, or groups who are hidden or driven from view. Twenty-first-century scholars are increasingly seeking to probe norms of cultural visibility and bring to light the invisible, in order to explore their coexistence and codependence.

This Study Day aims to bring together the next generation of postgraduate scholars to share reflections, tensions, and hesitations, and to consider methodological approaches to navigating ‘the invisible’.

We invite proposals for 20 minute papers in English or French that reflect on visibility and/or invisibility from across French studies, focusing on the period 1789 to the present. This includes but is not limited to French and francophone history and society, literature, politics, linguistics, film and visual cultures, philosophy, critical theory, and other disciplines.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

  • Hide and seek
  • Disability, neurodivergence, bodily otherness
  • Queerness and LGBTQ identities
  • Gender
  • (Post)colonialism, (de)colonialism
  • ‘Footnotes to history’
  • Museums and archives
  • Power and revolution
  • Collectives, communities and renegades
  • Inside/outside
  • Acts of memory
  • Under the skin
  • Surface tension
  • Performance and performativity
  • Frames, framing, the hors-champ
  • Norms and normativity
  • The nonhuman
  • Prisons, schools, and hospitals
  • Exile(s)
  • Sound and vision
  • Architecture, design, urban planning
  • Eyes wide shut
  • Hidden messages, hidden tongues
  • Subliminal

Abstracts of no more than 250 words, either in English or in French, should be sent to frenchpg2019@gmail.com. Submissions should be received by 9AM UK time on 12 January 2019.

Call for Flash Presentations

We welcome proposals from MA and early PhD students for flash presentations of their research lasting no longer than 5 minutes and limited to one PowerPoint slide. The research in question can cover any topic relating to the study of France.

Please email frenchpg2019@gmail.com to indicate your interest.

The Study Day will include professional development panels and an opportunity to engage with senior academics from other institutions. It is generously funded by the Association for the Study of Modern and Contemporary France (ASMCF) and the Society for the Study of French History (SSFH), and is supported logistically this year by our hosts at All Souls College. Attendance is free but we ask that all attendees become members of one of the two societies before or on the day. Travel reimbursement will be made available for speakers.

Organising Committee: Emily Hooke (Southampton, SSFH), Anaïs Pedron (QMUL, SSFH), Alison Marmont (Southampton, ASMCF) and Madeleine Chalmers (Oxford, ASMCF).

 

1.4 SFS Postgraduate Conference 2019: The Return of the Author

Date and place: Saturday 27 April 2019, Durham University

Deadline for Submission: Sunday 27 January 2019

Deadline for Registration: Friday 12 April 2019

In his 1967 seminal article ‘La Mort de l’auteur’, Roland Barthes declared that ‘la naissance du lecteur doit se payer de la mort de l’auteur’ (Barthes, 1967). Following Mallarmé’s ‘disparition élocutoire du poète’, French theory proclaimed that the author was nothing more than an anonymous voice, a ‘function’ (Foucault, 1969).

However the figure of the author and the importance of biography have since re-emerged (Burke, 1992) to the point where the postmodern author can be defined as a multidimensional cultural figure – even as their own brand (Wrona, 2017). There is therefore an epistemological importance in re-evaluating authorship in the digital age, when the cultural dominance of mass media and new technologies never cease to create new authorial strategies like ethos, postures, transfictionality and transmediality (Harris, 2018). From the medieval auctor and the author as œuvre (Montaigne) to the author as subject (Modernité) or cultural brand (Houellebecq), but also the anonymous and/or collective enterprise of authors like Comité Invisible, this conference will seek to question the status, role, representation and reception of the author in French and Francophone culture of all periods.

The Society for French Studies Postgraduate Conference 2019 invites proposals for twenty-minute papers in either English or French that address the theme of ‘The Return of the Author’ as it relates to the interdisciplinary field of French and Francophone Studies. Contributions from all periods and disciplines are welcome, including, for example, literature, theatre, film, queer, postcolonial, sociology, performance, translation and cultural studies.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

  • presence and absence of the author
  • identity
  • fiction and reality
  • the imaginary author
  • l’écrivain-journaliste
  • ethos and posture
  • voice and subject
  • visual representations of the author
  • collective of (anti-establishment) writers
  • autobiography and autofiction
  • mystification
  • l’écrivain médiatique
  • authority and interpretation
  • soi-même comme un autre
  • pseudonyms and pennames
  • plagiarism

Registration and catering are free of charge, but speakers are asked to seek financial help from their own institutions to cover travel costs.

Students who are members of the Society are eligible to apply for funding to help with transport costs.

Please send abstracts (250-300 words) for twenty-minute papers (in French or English) along with the name of your institution, the title of your PhD and your year of study to thereturnoftheauthor@gmail.com no later than 27 January 2019.

Organisers: Sarah Budasz and Alexandre Burin

***

Le Retour de l’auteur

SFS Postgraduate Conference 2019

Date et lieu: Samedi 27 avril 2019, Durham University

Date limite de soumission: Dimanche 27 janvier 2019

Date limite d’inscription: Vendredi 12 avril 2019

Dans son article fondateur « La Mort de l’auteur », Roland Barthes déclare que « la naissance du lecteur doit se payer de la mort de l’auteur » (Barthes, 1967). À la suite de la « disparition élocutoire du poète » de Mallarmé, la French theory proclame ainsi que l’auteur n’est rien de plus qu’une voix anonyme, une simple « fonction » (Foucault, 1969).

Pourtant, la figure de l’auteur et l’importance de la biographie ont depuis ressurgi (Burke, 1992), au point que l’auteur postmoderne peut désormais être défini comme une figure culturelle multidimensionnelle – voire comme sa propre marque (Wrona, 2017). Il existe donc une importance épistémologique à réévaluer la notion d’auctorialité à l’ère numérique, alors que la domination culturelle des médias de masse et des nouvelles technologies ne cessent de donner lieu à de nouvelles stratégies auctoriales : ethos, postures, transfictionnalité et transmédialité (Harris 2018). De l’auctor médiéval et l’auteur comme œuvre (Montaigne) à l’auteur comme sujet (modernité) ou comme marque culturelle (Houellebecq), en passant par les entreprises d’auteurs anonymes et/ou collectifs comme le Comité Invisible, cette conférence entend questionner le statut, le role, les représentations et la réception de la figure de l’auteur dans la culture française et francophone à travers les époques.

La Society for French Studies Postgraduate Conference 2019 est ravie de recevoir des propositions pour une présentation d’une vingtaine de minutes, en français ou en anglais, sur le thème « Le Retour de l’auteur », en lien avec le champ interdisciplinaire des études françaises et francophones. Nous encourageons l’envoi de contributions couvrant toutes les périodes et disciplines aussi variées que, par exemple, la littérature, le théâtre, le cinéma, les études queer, les études postcoloniales, la sociologie, la performance, la traduction ou les cultural studies.

Les thèmes envisagés incluent, sans s’y limiter :

  • La présence et l’absence de l’auteur
  • Identité(s)
  • Fiction et réalité
  • L’auteur imaginaire
  • L’écrivain-journaliste
  • Ethos et posture
  • Voix et sujet
  • Les représentations visuelles de l’auteur
  • Les collectifs d’auteurs (antisystème)
  • Autobiographie et autofiction
  • Mystification(s)
  • L’écrivain médiatique
  • Autorité et interprétation
  • « Soi-même comme un autre »
  • Pseudonymes et noms de plume
  • Le plagiat

La participation à la conférence et la collation sont gratuites, mais il est demandé au participant de recourir à l’aide de leur institution de rattachement pour couvrir les frais de déplacement.

Les étudiants membres de la Society of French Studies peuvent postuler à une « Research Support Grant » pour les aider à couvrir leurs frais de déplacement.

Les propositions de communication de 20 minutes (250-300 mots), en français ou en anglais, accompagnées du nom de votre institution, du titre de votre thèse et de votre année de doctorat, sont à envoyer à thereturnoftheauthor@gmail.com avant le 27 janvier 2019.

Organisateurs : Sarah Budasz et Alexandre Burin

 

1.5 Special Issue: The Care (Re)Turn in Contemporary French & Francophone Cultural Productions

Editors: Dr. Loic Bourdeau, Dr. Natalie Edwards, and Dr. Steven Wilson

In his recent contribution, Réparer le monde. La littérature française au XXIe siècle, Alexandre Gefen argues that we have reached a “tournant esthético-éthique” according to which « [l]a littérature se proclame utile parce qu’elle nous met en contact avec des expériences de pensées à valeur morale, et […]parce qu’elle nous permet de ressaisir l’altérité dans une société éclatée en individus » (13). Drawing on “care ethics” (Carol Gilligan), as does Gefen, this special issue seeks to investigate contemporary French and Francophone artistic productions (literature, cinema, BD, etc.) in an attempt to highlight strategies of writing care, empathy, and social engagement. Considering, as Camille Laurens posits in her novel Philippe, that “[l]e médecin et l’écrivain font le même métier: ils lisent des signes. Que ces signes soient émis par le corps ou par le monde, il s’agit toujours de les déchiffrer et de les interpréter,” what signs do contemporary productions bring forth? How do artists engage with social turmoil and struggles? How do cultural productions on care engage with medical discourses and to what end?

Possible topics include:

– representations of maternity, paternity, adoption and child care

– self care

– end-of-life care

– caring for the elderly

– disability and care

– marginality and diversity

– care ethics then and now

– care ethics, feminism, and literature

– queer ethics are care ethics?

– caring for the “outsider”, the “marginalized” in society

– emotions: lack or predominance

– society of the spectacle

– the poetics of care

– literature as care / bibliotherapy

Abstracts of 350 words, including a short biography, should be sent to loic.bourdeau@icloud.com by February 15, 2019. All abstracts will be peer-reviewed by the three editors of the issue. Full articles will be due in Fall 2019 and will be peer-reviewed by experts in the relevant fields. Further information about the selected journal will be shared later on in the process. Inquiries welcome.

 

1.6 Mobilities and Moorings: Renegotiating Spaces and Identities in Modern and Contemporary French and Francophone Cultures

The Graduate School

Queen’s University Belfast

30th – 31st May, 2019

Keynote speaker: Dr. Gillian Jein (Newcastle University) – “Globalism is Ordinary”

This two-day postgraduate conference aims to reconstitute and reconfigure ways of approaching the status quo and challenges to it. Edward Saïd has stated that the ‘borders and barriers, which enclose us within the safety of familiar territory, can also become prisons, and are often defended beyond reason or necessity’. Culture is becoming increasingly globalised, and the once static concepts of space and identity are in flux more than ever. The increasing importance of social media and online (pseudo) identities have forged global connections and yet have also had the inverse effect of mentally and emotionally isolating us.In the dust of the quincagenary of the mai 68 demonstrations and other iconoclastic events, the efficacy and resilience of the nation-state is being interrogated and challenged by populist politics and demagogues across the globe. Emmanuel Macron has said that ‘il n’y a pas une culture française, il y a une culture en France et elle est diverse’, which Marine Le Pen contests, claiming that ‘maintenant, le clivage c’est pas non plus gauche et droite, mais mondialiste et patriote’. Similarly, the fixity of gender identity is also beingcontested, with La Manif pour tous claiming that ‘l’idéologie du genre est destructice, obscuratrice, anti-sociale, anti-populaire comme elle est anti-naturelle’. In this cultural climate of flux and instability, we invite potential speakers to become exiles – ‘citizens of nowhere’ (Theresa May) – who ‘cross borders [and] break barriers of thought and experience’ (Saïd), in order to explore identity and spatial conflict in the literary, political, multimodal, and historical spheres. Proposals may focus on (but are not limited to):

  • Gender and sexuality
  • Urbanism
  • Postcolonialism
  • Travel writing and narratives
  • Queer identities and LGBTQ+ engagement
  • Cosmopolitanism and the Cosmopolitan
  • The Avant-garde
  • Flânerie  
  • Migration and exile
  • Political instability
  • National vs. international identity
  • Populism
  • Digital Humanities

Topics should be interpreted broadly, and papers on related themes are encouraged. Inter and multidisciplinary approaches are particularly welcome. Please provide a short abstract (250-300 words) outlining the argument of the proposed paper, as well as the speaker’s full name and contact details. Proposals for complete panels are also welcome. Please provide abstracts and contact details for each speaker as well as a short rationale for the panel. One speaker will be responsible for the panel.

Proposals will be considered by the committee, who will contact you by Friday 29th March to inform you whether it has been possible or not to include your paper. Please email your proposals and a short biography to mobmoor19@gmail.com by Monday 19th February 2019.

 

1.7 Narratives of Forced Migration in the Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries

University of Stirling, 16-18 September 2019.

Confirmed Keynote Speakers:

Professor Marianne Hirsch (Columbia University)

Professor Lyndsey Stonebridge (University of Birmingham)

The last century has seen millions of people displaced around the world as the result of war, persecution, or the end of empire. The ‘migrant’ or ‘border crisis’ in the Mediterranean triggered by the war in Syria, uneven development in the Global South, and climate change is the most recent example of a succession of instances of forced mass migration. Within this long history of forced migration across continents and within Europe, we can also include the German Vertriebene, the French pieds-noirs, the Portuguese retornados, and forced migrants from the former Yugoslavia. These population movements posed acute political and social challenges to the receiving states, since they often embodied liminal positions being both citizens of receiving nation states and yet members of culturally distinct groups. These challenges often result in trauma for the individuals and families who experience them. In the longer term, migrants and receiving societies face the challenges of cultural integration, in which ethnicity, colonial ties and the associated legal status may, paradoxically, both facilitate acceptance and create barriers to it. The large number of forced migrants involved has implications for nationhood and identity on a supranational scale, leading to the production of new forms of cultural memory and political formulations in the present.

This conference seeks to bring together and create a dialogue among scholars working on diverse geographical and historical instances of forced migration from a range of disciplinary perspectives in order to illuminate the processes of movement, integration and commemoration which characterise them. The primary focus of the conference will be forced migrations that have highlighted and/or called into question the internal and external borders of Europe, although comparative case studies from beyond Europe are welcome. Above all, it seeks to assess the ‘connectedness’ of disparate cases of forced migrations and to consider the influence and impact of specific events on subsequent migrations and those groups involved in them. It builds on the historical and ethnographical work of scholars such as Andrea L. Smith (Europe’s Invisible Migrants, 2003) and Manuel Borutta and Jan Jansen (Vertriebene and Pieds-Noirs in Postwar Germany and France, 2016), and seeks to broaden their comparative analyses to consider other forced migrant groups, and to extend the scholarship into new disciplinary areas. The conference is interested in how narratives by and about forced migrants use imaginative means to make sense of and represent their experiences, and to construct post-migration identities through genres such as literature, film, music, photography, and documentary.

The conference committee welcome proposals across disciplines of migration studies, cultural studies, history, politics, literature, visual culture, memory studies, and other relevant scholarly fields. The scope of the conference includes but is not limited to:

  • Attitudes towards and reception of migrant groups
  • The legalities of forced migration
  • Impacts on nationhood and European identity
  • Borderscapes and biopolitics
  • State management of perceived ‘migrant crises’
  • Forced migrants as political constituents and lobbying groups
  • Gendered experiences of forced migration
  • Queering migration
  • Exile and trauma
  • Nostalgia and constructions of ‘home’
  • Cultural memory: inter-generational transmission, multidirectionality, and ‘connective’ narratives
  • Public approaches to fostering integration
  • (Re-)constructing community and diaspora
  • Attempts at return

Please send proposals of 300 words and short bios for papers lasting 20 minutes to Dr Beatrice Ivey at beatrice.ivey@stir.ac.uk by 28 February 2019. Proposals for three or four paper panels are also welcomed, as are proposals from postgraduate researchers. The language of the conference is English.

The conference is funded by the AHRC, as part of the Leadership Fellows project, ‘Narratives and representations of the French settlers of Algeria’.

 

  1. Job Opportunities

2.1 Lord Kelvin / Adam Smith Readership (Associate Professor) Scheme

Recruiter: University of Glasgow

End of advertisement period: 26 Dec 2018

Academic Discipline: Arts & Humanities, Business & Economics, Clinical, Pre-clinical & Health, Engineering & Technology, Life sciences, Physical Sciences, Social Sciences

The University of Glasgow is continuing to grow its global reputation for world-changing research. As part of our investment in research excellence, we now have exciting opportunities for outstanding researchers who are starting their first academic position.

Through our flagship Lord Kelvin / Adam Smith (LKAS) Readership (Associate Professor) Scheme, we are inviting applications from researchers with the drive and ambition to become our future research leaders. Qualifying candidates should have completed one or more competitively awarded external fellowships, and must meet a range of essential minimum criteria.

Successful applicants will be appointed to a Research & Teaching contract at Reader Grade 9, and external candidates will be offered a generous start-up package. For further details, please see the candidate flipbook at http://online.fliphtml5.com/hjth/bsee/ or the LKAS Readership (Associate Professor) webpage at http://www.gla.ac.uk/readers. LKAS Fellowships and Professorial Appointments The University also has opportunities for talented researchers, from any discipline, who are either establishing their independent research career (LKAS Fellowships) or who are global leaders in their field (LKAS Professorial Appointments). LKAS Fellowships The University offers attractive terms to researchers who are applying for externally funded fellowships or who would like to transfer their fellowship to the University. For more information, see www.gla.ac.uk/fellows. LKAS Professorial Appointments We also welcome senior researchers with world-leading reputations in their respective fields who wish to bring their activities to the University. Further information can be found at www.gla.ac.uk/professors. The University is in the middle of a £1 billion campus redevelopment project that will transform our environment by embedding new technologies and changing the way we work, to enhance both our staff and student experience. Join us at the University of Glasgow to inspire world-changing research. The closing date for applications to the Readership Scheme is 14 January 2019. To apply, please visit www.glasgow.ac.uk/jobs and search ref. 023685. The Fellowship and Professorial appointments have no fixed closing dates for notes of interest.

Laurence Grove, Professor of French and Text/Image Studies and Director of Stirling Maxwell Centre encourages applicants in French Studies.

For more information, see https://www.timeshighereducation.com/unijobs/listing/119748/lord-kelvin-adam-smith-readership-associate-professor-scheme-/.

 

2.2 SFHS Institut Français d’Amérique Research Fellowships

Supported by “The Institut Français d’Amérique Fund,” the Society for French Historical Studies offers the Gilbert Chinard Fellowship and the Edouard Morot-Sir Fellowship (up to $1,500 per award) for maintenance during research in France for a period of at least one month.  Whereas the Chinard will support research in all areas of French historical and cultural studies, the Morot-Sir will give preference to young scholars working in a broadly defined field of cultural history, art history, or literary studies.

Candidates should be working on PhD dissertations, or they should have received the PhD no longer than three years before the application deadline(since January 2016for the 2019 award). These awards are not for travel to or from France.

To apply: please submit the following as email attachments (word or PDF) to Professor Jeffrey Burson(jburson@georgiasouthern.edu), chair of the committee, by 15 February 2019:

1. Project Proposal: In no more than two pages (single-spaced), the applicant should outline the nature and scope of the project and the archives and libraries to be consulted;
2. Current Curriculum Vitae;
3. Two confidential letters of recommendation supporting the proposal. Reference letters may be sent to the chair of the committee electronically; make sure that the scanned copy is signed. Original letters via snail mail are also accepted.

Mailing address:

Professor Jeffrey Burson, Department of History
Georgia Southern University
PO Box 8054
Statesboro, GA 30460-8054 (USA)

 

  1. Announcements

3.1  Empire and Afterlives in Modern France (Series of Events)

Leïla Slimani will speak at the University of Sheffield on Wednesday 12 December at 18.00. At the event, Leïla will discuss what it means to be a writer and an activist. She will also talk about her defence of women’s and LGBT rights and equality in Morocco. The Lord Mayor of Sheffield, Magid Magid, will be in attendance and will say some words to close the event. Please see the eventbrite for more information and registration – https://leilaslimani.eventbrite.co.uk. For additional details, please write to – d.l.lee@sheffield.ac.uk

This event has been made possible thanks to the generous support of the Association for the Study of Modern and ContemporaryFrance’s Visiting Scholars’ Seminar Series. It is one of three events in 2018-2019 at the Universities of Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield that will explore Empire and Afterlives in Modern France. The other two speakers are:

Malika Rahal(IHTP / CNRS), who will speak at the University of Leeds on Wednesday 13thFebruary 2019.

And

Dominique Rogers(Université des Antilles), who will speak at the University of Manchester on Monday 6thMay 2019.

All Welcome!

Organising Committee: Claire Eldridge (Leeds), Daniel Lee (Sheffield), Alexia Yates (Manchester)

 

3.2 Mediating Thought: A Conference in Honour of Christopher Johnson

Saturday 26 January 2019, King’s College London

Christopher Johnson was widely admired for his work on French thought, especially the philosophy of Jacques Derrida and the anthropology of Claude Lévi-Strauss, and for his work on the philosophy of technology. He wrote brilliantly on many topics, including translation, the figure of the French intellectual, and space travel. This conference, which will open with a paper drawn from Chris’s unfinished book on the ethnologist and prehistorian André Leroi-Gourhan, will celebrate Chris’s work, and especially his long association with the journal Paragraph. The speakers are Terence Cave, Leslie Hill, Marian Hobson, Mike Holland, Peggy Kamuf, Judith Still, Michael Syrotinski and Boris Wiseman. The event is generously supported by King’s College London, Edinburgh University Press, and the Society for French Studies.

Full details of the programme and how to register can be found here.

https://www.kcl.ac.uk/events/event-story.aspx?id=33c52299-d508-4e66-8835-91cffd106f3d

 

  1. New Titles

4.1 Unbecoming Language Anti-Identitarian French Feminist Fictions (The Ohio State University Press, 2018)

By Annabel L. Kim

“What would ‘French theory’ or ‘French feminism’ look like if it is based on the trio Sarraute, Wittig, and Garréta? Kim raises this paradigm-shifting question through a nuanced engagement with the authors’ ‘unbecoming’ literary experiments, challenging us to overhaul the more familiar categories of feminist and queer identity politics.” —Rey Chow, author of Not Like a Native Speaker: On Languaging as a Postcolonial Experience

“Kim has an excellent command of these three writers’ oeuvres and of the linguistic, feminist, postmodern, and queer theories she uses to analyze them. The conclusions of the book go far beyond the excellent close readings she does of these writers’ works, with the objective of making a significant contribution to queer theory and discussions of identity politics.” —Jennifer Willging, author of Telling Anxiety

Unbecoming Language is beautifully written, original, and compelling. The book effectively recuperates a powerful lineage of what Kim calls ‘anti-difference’ French feminist writing and argues for the value of literature generally as a mode of writing that does political work. That act of creation, Kim argues, has genuinely revolutionary possibilities.” —Lynne Huffer, author of Are the Lips a Grave?

In Unbecoming Language, Annabel L. Kim examines a corpus of French writing against difference. Inaugurated by Nathalie Sarraute and sustained in the work of Monique Wittig and Anne Garréta, this corpus highlights three generations of the twentieth and recent twenty-first centuries and the direct chain of influence between them. Kim considers these writers, and the story of literature’s political potential, as a way of rereading and reinterpreting each writer’s individual corpus—rearticulating the strain of anti-difference feminist thought that has been largely forgotten in our (Anglo-American) histories of French feminisms.

Kim’s close readings ultimately enliven the current conversation in French studies by serving as a provocation to return to reading literary texts deeply and closely, without subordinating literature to a pre-existing ideological framework—to let literature speak, to let it theorize. Tracking the influence of these writers on each other, Kim provides a new, original French feminist poetics and demonstrates that Sarraute, Wittig, and Garréta’s work allows for a hollowing out of difference from within, allowing writers and readers to unbecome—to break free of identity and exist as subjectivities without subjecthood. In looking at these writers together, Kim provides a defense of literature as liberatory— capable of effecting personal and political change—and gives readers an experience of literature’s revolutionary possibilities.

For more information, see https://ohiostatepress.org/books/titles/9780814213841.html.

 

4.2 The Representation of the Relationship between Center and Periphery in the Contemporary Novel (Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2018)

Ed. by Ruth Amar and Françoise Saquer-Sabin

This collection of essays offers a comparative perspective on different forms of representation of social hybridity in contemporary novels through various cultural and linguistic lenses. It explores the various subcategories of their interdependent relationships, including power and domination between hegemony and marginality. The book revolves around five axes: namely, writing strategies and reterritorialization; marginality and intermediary spaces; revisited urban spaces; when periphery becomes center; and the modality of confrontation and construction of identity. It focuses on the identification and classification of spaces in order to understand their function in relation to the thematic strategy of the novel. Its main objective is identifying the textual representation of the challenge of center and periphery, as well as these concepts’ role and significance in diegesis. Thus, new light is shed on the subject and on the contemporary novel as a whole.

For more information, see https://www.cambridgescholars.com/the-representation-of-the-relationship-between-center-and-periphery-in-the-contemporary-novel.

 

4.3 Antijudaïsme et antisémitisme en Algérie coloniale 1830-1862 (Presses Universitaires de Provence, 2018)

De Geneviève Dermenjian (Préface de Benjamin Stora)

Pendant la période française (1830-1962), les Juifs d’Algérie ont tout d’abord été soumis à un antijudaïsme qui prit la forme d’une forte hostilité de la part de nombreux Européens envers la personne des Juifs, puis à un antisémitisme fondé sur la haine de ces Juifs en tant que groupe ethnique ou racial. Antijudaïsme et antisémitisme ont donné naissance à des comportements, des mises à l’écart, des campagnes d’opinion agressives. Cette animosité éclata en crises violentes, à la fin du xixe siècle et dans l’entre-deux-guerres, avec des manifestations, des émeutes, des « mesures antijuives », prises par les « conseils municipaux antijuifs », soutenus par des « députés anijuifs ». En dehors des moments de crise ouverte où la population descendait dans la rue, les relations interpersonnelles indiquaient la persistance de l’antisémitisme dans la population.

Après avoir décrit les grandes périodes de cette « idéologie de masse » selon l’auteur, cet ouvrage détaille l’implication de la population européenne et musulmane dans cet antisémitisme et les conséquences qui en résultèrent pour les Juifs. Enfin, l’accent est mis sur ce qui explique la prégnance de l ’antisémitisme en Algérie : ses fondements idéologiques et son appareil, son expression dans l’espace public – occupation de la rue et manifestations, fêtes, langue spécifique, journaux et caricatures – lui ayant permis de s’imposer dans l’espace public tant auprès de ses fidèles que de ses détracteurs.

En savoir plus: https://presses-universitaires.univ-amu.fr/antijudaisme-antisemitisme-algerie-coloniale-1830-1862.

 

You Might Also Like

No Comments

Leave a Reply