Name Change

Effective yesterday, the Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Legend Area has been merged with the Horror Area to become the Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area. I'll be updating the blog title later tonight to reflect this change.

Michael Torregrossa
Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area Chair

Award News

The 2014 Mythopoeic Awards for fiction and scholarship were announced earlier this month. Details at http://www.mythsoc.org/news/mythopoeic-awards-2014-winners-announced/.

And, this past weekend, the 2014 Hugo Awards for prose, graphic, and dramatic fiction were announced. Details at http://www.thehugoawards.org/2014/08/2014-hugo-award-winners/.

Area Schedule 2014

Here is the tentative listing of the sessions for the Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Legend Area. The complete schedule for the conference and registration information can be found at NEPCA's blog: http://nepca.wordpress.com/fall-conference/.

Northeast Popular/America Culture Association
2014 Conference
Providence College, 24-25 October 2014

Friday, 24 October

SESSION II: Friday, October 24, 2:45–4:15 pm
PANEL FOURTEEN | HARKINS LL13 | SCIENCE FICTION, FANTASY AND LEGEND: HORROR AND THE FANTASTIC
CHAIR: *Faye Ringel, United States Coast Guard Academy
1. “ ‘You’re a Trickster Singular, Rachel Morgan’: Collective and Individual Magic in Kim Harrison’s The Hollows Series”
*Amie Doughty, SUNY – Oneonta
2. “Just Desserts: NBC’s Hannibal and the Evolution of Cultural Morality”
*Douglas Howard, Suffolk County Community College
3. “ ‘Monstrosity Will Be Called For’: Holly Black and Melissa Marr’s Urban Gothic Fairy Tale”
*Rhonda Nicol, Illinois State University
4. “Horrific Science and the Great Unseen in the Fiction of Francis Stevens”
*Sabrina Starnaman, University of Texas at Dallas


Saturday, 25 October

SESSION IV, Saturday, October 25, 9:00–10:30 am
PANEL THIRTY-ONE | HARKINS 331 | SCIENCE FICTION, FANTASY & LEGEND: SCIENCE AND SCIENCE FICTION
CHAIR: *Sabrina Starnaman, University of Texas – Dallas
1. “Prophesized Futures and American Myths: SF and American Exceptionalism”
Amy Marie Fehr, University of Rochester
2. “Cyborgs in Western Science Fiction: Triumphs and Tribulations in Human-Machine Relations”
Petra Vannucci-Henkel, University of Denver
3. “ ‘I Miss Science Class’: Emasculating Scientists in The Walking Dead”
*Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
4. “Did Chris Carter Want to Kill His Franchise? A Feminist Reading of The X-Files: I Want to Believe”
*April Selley, Union College


SESSION V: Saturday, October 26, 10:45–12:15 pm
PANEL THIRTY-THREE | HARKINS 104 | SCIENCE FICTION, FANTASY, & LEGEND: SCARY SPACES
CHAIR: *Amie Doughty, SUNY – Oneonta
1. “Rethinking Edmund Burke’s Sublime in Ann Radcliffe’s The Italian”
Michelle Germinario, Montclair State University
2. “Identifying Frankenstein’s Creature in Nature”
Janna Andrews, Arcadia University
3. “Far From the Haunts of British Tourists: Amelia Edwards’ Ghostly Critique of English Tourism”
Indu Ohri, University of Virginia
4. “Back From the Dead: Premature Burial in Early Modern England”
Nicole Salamone, Independent Scholar


SESSION VI: Saturday, October 25, 1:30–3:00 pm
PANEL FORTY-SIX | HARKINS 330| SCIENCE FICTION, FANTASY, AND LEGEND: MANUFACTURING MONSTERS
CHAIR: Michael Torregrossa, Independent Scholar
1. “Should Your Car Kill You?”
Don Vescio, Worcester State University
2. “Echoes of Frankenstein: Recasting the Story”
Michael Torregrossa, Independent Scholar
3. “The Cosmic Gaze: Polyocularity in H.P. Lovecraft-Related Visual Culture”
Nathan Wallace, Ohio State University


SESSION VII: Saturday, October 26, 3:15–4:45 pm
PANEL FIFTY-FOUR | HARKINS 330 | SCIENCE FICTION, FANTASY, AND LEGEND: CREATURE FEATURES
CHAIR: *Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University
1. “Dracula: Monster of Masculinity”
Michael Paul Pecora, Worcester State University
2. “’Nature Selects the Horla: Darwinian Influences on Guy de Maupassant’s Horror Tale”
*Sharon Yang, Worcester State University
3. “Like Lovecraft for the Little Ones: ParaNorman’s Gothic New England”
*Faye Ringel, US Coast Guard Academy & *Jenna Randall, Independent Scholar

NEPCA 2014 Update

NEPCA has posted the first tentative schedule for this year's conference. Details at http://nepca.wordpress.com/fall-conference/2014-conference-tentative-schedule/.

CFP Myth and Fairy Tales Area (11/1/14; SWPCA 2/11-15/15)

CFP: Myth and Fairy Tales Area, SWPCA Conference, Feb 11-15, 2015
full name / name of organization:
Southwest Popular/American Culture Association
contact email:
weeksj@iupui.edu
Abstract/Proposals Due: 1 November 2014
Source: http://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/node/57791

Southwest Popular/American Culture Association’s 36th Annual Conference
Albuquerque, NM February 11-15, 2015
Hyatt Regency Albuquerque
330 Tijeras
Albuquerque, NM 87102
General information and online registration

Panels now forming on topics related to all areas of myth and fairy tale and their connections to popular culture. To participate in this area, you do not need to present on both myths and fairy tales (one or the other is perfectly fine), but we have seen that bringing both genre categories into conversation has led to extremely valuable and stimulating conversations.

Papers relating to the 2015 Conference Theme: “Many Faces, Many Voices: Intersecting Borders in Popular and American Culture” will be given special consideration. This is an immensely broad topic, and paper topics might be as variable as (though certainly not limited to):

• --Myths and Fairy Tale Narratives from WWII
• --Irish Myths and the Great Famine
• --Fairy Tales Adaptations from Comic Books to Graphic Novels
• --Parallels Between European American and American Indian Mythmaking
• --Storytelling: Scheherazade Traditions in 21st Century American Culture
• --Picture Books: Illustrating International Fairy Tales
• --Joseph Campbell and Asian Mythology
• --Eastern European Film Adaptations of “Cinderella”
• --Musical Adaptations of Myths and Fairy Tales
• --The American Tall-Tale Tradition

*Since we are approaching the centenary of The Great War, papers on the myths and fairy tales relating to WWI will be especially appreciated.*

Additional general areas of interest might include:

• --Where Fairy Tales and Myth Overlap
• --Non-Western Myths and Fairy Tales
• --Fairy Tales in/as “Children’s Literature”
• --Disney
• --Urban Fairy Tales
• --Ethnic Myths and Fairy Tales
• --Gendered Readings of Myths and Fairy Tales
• --Postcolonial Myths and Fairy Tales
• --Myths and Fairy Tales in Advertising Culture
• --Reading Myths and Fairy Tales in the Popular Culture of Past Centuries
• --Performing Myths and Fairy Tales: Drama and/or Ritual
• --Genres of Myths and/or Fairy Tales: Film, Television, Poetry, Novels, Music, Comic Books, Picture Books, Short Stories, or Graphic Novels

Scholars, teachers, professionals, and independent scholars interested in Myths and Fairy Tales are all heartily encouraged to participate. Graduate students are particularly welcome, and should consider submitting their conference papers for one of the Graduate Writing Awards, especially the Kenneth Davis Award for Folklore Studies, which recognizes “an outstanding graduate essay in the field of folklore studies.” (full papers due January 1, 2015) http://southwestpca.org/conference/graduate-student-awards/

If you wish to form your own Myth or Fairy Tale-focused panel, I would be glad to facilitate (panels focused on one particular myth/tale are especially encouraged). If your work does not focus on Myth or Fairy Tale but fits within the broad range of areas designated for the upcoming conference on American & Popular culture, I strongly encourage you explore the long list of areas at http://southwestpca.org/conference/call-for-papers-subject-area-chairs/. And please do pass along this call to any friends and colleagues who work with myths and fairy tales. We’ve had some wonderful and wonderfully diverse panels over the last few years, and I look forward to seeing that tradition continue in 2015.

Please submit 200 word abstracts (or panel proposals with separate abstract submissions for each presenter) by 1 November 2014. Please note that all presenters must be registered for the conference by 31 December 2014. The full conference schedule will be available for perusal by January 3.

Abstracts must be submitted to the SWPACA database at: http://conference2015.southwestpca.org/

**New Publication CFP**: As of 2014, the SWPACA has begun publishing 5,000-7,000 word articles in its brand new peer-reviewed journal Dialogue: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Culture and Pedagogy (inaugural issue released Feb 2014). For further details, please see http://journaldialogue.org.

But if you have any additional questions about the “Myths and Fairy Tales” area, please feel free to contact me.

Dr. Jacquilyn Weeks: weeksj@iupui.edu
Visiting Assistant Professor
Indiana University-Purdue University, Indianapolis
Department of English
Cavanaugh Hall 501
Indianapolis, IN 46202


By web submission at 07/29/2014 - 14:22

CFP University of Alabama 2015 Symposium in English and American Literature (11/3/2014; Tuscaloosa 3/5-8/2015)

Of potential interest:

CFP: Literature of Status / The Status of Literature (11/3/2014; 3/5-8/2015)
posted on JUL 30, 2014
Call for Papers
University of Alabama 2015 Symposium in English and American Literature
March 5-8, 2015
Deadline: November 3, 2014
Source: http://navsa.org/2014/07/30/cfp-literature-of-status-the-status-of-literature-1132014-35-82015/

Within the institutional context of a “crisis in the humanities” now stretching into its fifth decade, and within the historical context of a “curse of modernity” that, according to Michael McKeon’s Origins of the English Novel, achieved critical mass in the seventeenth century, what, we might ask, is the status of literature—as a field of study, as a creative enterprise, as a professional vocation, as a tool of socialization?

Contemporary theoretical discussions of status may suggest responses grounded in the work of early twentieth-century sociologist Max Weber and late-twentieth-century cultural theorist Pierre Bourdieu. In Economy and Society (1922) and Distinction (1979), respectively, Weber and Bourdieu identify a range of individual and collective practices designed to assert social dominance on the basis of status defined by “style of life” or “habitus.” Traditionally, literary expertise has served as a primary indicator of the possession of individual status, and hence the study of literature has carried with it what Weber would label as “occupational prestige” and Bourdieu would denominate “cultural capital.”

Of course, further, historically-situated explanations emerge from the kaleidoscopic variety of McKeon’s “novelistic usage”—whether in actual novels, or in poems, plays, and literary essays—produced over the past four hundred years throughout the English-speaking world. Individual writers have long been interrogating their own status as literary producers and interpreters, whether indirectly through the travails of their characters or more overtly through their responses to others’ texts. To cite only one palimpsestic example, Anglo-Indian writer William Makepeace Thackeray fictionalized his own experience as a rusticated university student turned lawyer turned novelist in Pendennis (1848-50), whose uncompromising portrait of London’s publishing industry incited a periodical debate over “the dignity of literature” at precisely the same time that literature in English was gaining institutional respectability at Thackeray’s alma mater, Cambridge, and that literary expertise was becoming a central qualification for civil service positions in the colonies, most significantly in India.

This symposium asks participants to consider the productive problematic of literature and status from a variety of historical, national, and theoretical perspectives. Papers are invited from established and emerging experts in seventeenth-century, eighteenth-century, nineteenth-century, twentieth-century, and contemporary literatures throughout the global Anglophone community, as well as from disciplinary historians and critics concerned with the changing status of English within the complex landscape of international higher education. Topics might range from, but are certainly not limited to:

• the representation of status hierarchies and/or incongruities in individual literary works;
• the status accrued, or not, from the production and/or consumption of literary texts in discrete historical periods and national traditions;
• status, authorship, and the problem of international copyright
• the comparative status of literary modes or genres at particular moments and places in the past four hundred years of English-language literary history;
• definitions and/or theories of a specifically literary form of status;
• the status of literature in higher education, whether historical or contemporary;
• the role of English-language literary texts in the attribution of status in colonial or post-colonial settings.

Please submit a 300-500-word proposal and a one-page CV by Monday, November 3, 2014 to Professor Albert Pionke at uasymposium2015@ua.edu.

Further information is available on the symposium website: http://uasymposium2015.as.ua.edu/