CFP New England Studies Area (10/1/2018; PCA/ACA Washington DC 4/17-20/2019)

New England Studies at PCA CFP
https://nepca.blog/2018/09/21/new-england-studies-at-pca-cfp/

NEW ENGLAND STUDIES — CALL FOR PAPERS (2019)

The 2019 Popular Culture/American Culture Association Conference will be held in Washington, DC, April 17-20, 2019,. The New England Studies Area invites presentations on any aspect of New England popular culture: Architecture; Art; Ecology/Environment; Economics; Fashion; Film and Theater, especially films made in New England, and plays set in the region, e.g. ‘The Crucible’; Folklore; Food; Language and Literature; Politics; History; Music; Sports; Celebrities; Entertainment; Gambling/Casinos; Industries, e.g. Fishing; Regional Cultures; Sports and Recreation; Tourism and Travel; and numerous other topics. The subjects are endless.

Quite welcome will be papers or panels that focus on any of these topics:

• New England politics and the Washington connection, e.g. presentations on political issues, such as the Massachusetts politicians who became Speakers of the House (Joseph Martin, John McCormack, Thomas ‘Tip’ O’Neill) and their impact on the nation and on the state.
• Sports and New England, especially a discussion of fan loyalties with champions such as the New England Patriots and the Red Sox; baseball rivalries (Red Sox v. Yankees); football rivalries, such as the old quarterback rivalry between Tom Brady v. Peyton Manning; Tom Brady and the rest of the NFL quarterbacks; Patriots v. NY Giants or NY Jets).
• New England tourism sites and architecture. A good presentation would be how New England holds its own against the Washington, DC, tourist trade.
• U.S. Capitol v. six New England capitols. How many were based on the national capitol? How has the Bulfinch capitol in Boston been imitated elsewhere in other state capitols and buildings?
• Multi-culturalism of New England today compared to its former ethnic separatism, e.g. Irish in Boston, Portuguese in Gloucester or Fall River, French in parts of Rhode Island. Impact of immigration in making New England a vast, diverse culture over the decades.
• Films and plays set in New England or filmed there, e.g. ‘The Departed,’ ’Mystic River,’ ‘On Golden Pond,’ ‘The Magnificent Yankee.’
• Infamous figures, such as Whitey Bulger in Boston, Lizzie Borden in Fall River, or Buddy Cianci in Providence, whose cases became national profile with the attendant media attention.
• Holiday celebrations, such as St. Patrick’s Day parades, various ethnic Christmas celebrations, and Halloween in Salem, Massachusetts, at Halloween.
• Also of interest would be presentations on literary personalities, such as Nathaniel Hawthorne, Louisa May Alcott, Henry Thoreau, Mark Twain (and his Connecticut connection), and Harriet Beecher Stowe.
• Cultural attractions, e.g. Freedom Trail, Boston Pops, Fenway Park; any of our higher institutions of learning.
• Role of religion on New England life and community.
• Famous personalities born in New England, such as Bette Davis; Katherine Hepburn; John F. Kennedy and the Kennedy family; Rosalind Russell; Harriet Beecher Stowe; Howie Long; and Kurt Russell.. How many kept their New England roots or left them behind for other geographic locations. Example: Kurt Russell was born in Springfield but you now think of him more as a Californian. Howie Long is from Somerville but he is now a resident of Charlottesville, VA, where he raised his family. Has anyone heard or read Howie mention Massachusetts in his professional life?

Please submit a proposal to only one area at a time. All proposals and abstracts must be submitted through the PCA Database. See the website at ncp@pcaaca.org. . Presentations should be 15-20 minutes in length and lively in nature! The deadline for the submission of a 200-word abstract is October 1, 2018. Acceptance will be earlier than usual as well to enhance your ability to seek funding. Although all proposals should be submitted to the PCA Database directly, please also cc: me, and include university or organization affiliation (if applicable), telephone number, and e-mail address. Graduate students welcome. Individual and full panel proposals are considered. Please feel confident about attendance if you are accepted.

If you give a paper, you must register for the conference. See: http://www.pcaaca.org. Site also includes information on travel grants and rates at the conference hotel.



Send inquiries and paper proposals to:

Martin J. Manning

4701 South Park Court

Woodbridge, VA 222193

E-mail preferred: ManningMJ@state.gov

Call for Book Proposals in "Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture" Series

Of potential interest:

Call for Book Proposals -- R&L "Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture"
Discussion published by Bob Batchelor on Tuesday, September 8, 2015
https://networks.h-net.org/node/GROUP_NID/discussions/82290/call-book-proposals-rl-sports-icons-and-issues-popular-culture

Hello, please see the Call for Proposals/Authors below. I would be happy to answer questions at your convenience. This book series is aimed at smart, general readers, so the emphasis is on strong research and writing. I have suggested some topics that I would like to see and those favored by the Senior Editor I work closely with at Rowman & Littlefield. I welcome additional suggestions!

Please contact me at your convenience: Bob Batchelor, cultpopculture@gmail.com

Call for Proposals

Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture

A New Book Series from Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Series Editors: Norma Jones and Bob Batchelor

The editors of the Rowman & Littlefield Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture Series are currently accepting proposals for volumes focused on sports stars and how they reflect and influence not only their sport, but also broader popular culture. In an age when these sporting icons cross over into everyday lives and popular culture, the time is ripe for assessing, reassessing, and refocusing our gaze on the centrality of these athletes in our the contemporary world.

Rowman & Littlefield Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture Series will include single-author, co-author, and edited volumes that address the concerns listed above. The Series editors also hope to receive proposals that add to our current understanding of past and current sports icons as well as rising stars in the sporting world. This new series intends to demonstrate how these sports icons not only reflect and influence fandom issues but also broader audiences in terms of lifestyle such as fashion and music. The audience for this series is smart, general interest readers, so strong writing and research is preferred to academic jargon.

Potential Topics (among the endless possibilities):

• Lou Gehrig: An American Life
• Shaun White: Bringing Extreme to the Mainstream
• Arnold Palmer: Golf, Life, and the Modern World
• The Green Jacket: A History of the Masters
• Michael Jordan: Icon
• Sugar Ray Leonard and the Making of the 1980s
• Andre Agassi: An American Sports Icon
• New York: The History of a City’s Love (and Hatred) with Sports
• Gina Carano: Lady Fighter
• LINSANITY! An Asian/American Sports Icon

Volumes in the series will typically run between 80,000 – 110,000 words, exclusive of notes, bibliography, and index. Authors and editors are responsible for negotiating and securing their own permissions for use of images, illustrations, and other copyrighted material.

Proposals should include:

-- Discussion of the volume’s significance

-- Competitive titles/studies

-- A proposed table of contents,

-- Estimated length (and number of images, if applicable)

-- Projected timeline for completion,

-- A sample chapter/excerpt that demonstrates writing style and voice

-- Author/editor’s CV

For more information, please see the Rowman & Littlefield Publishers guidelines at: https://rowman.com/Page/RLAuthRes

Inquiries and proposals should be directed to both Series editors, Norma Jones at njones39@kent.edu and Bob Batchelor at cultpopculture@gmail.com, or to Rowman & Littlefield’s Associate Editor in Sports, Arts & Literature: Christen Karniski at ckarniski@rowman.com.

About the Editors:

Bob Batchelor is a cultural historian and media studies scholar who has written or edited 27 books, including John Updike: A Critical Biography (2013) and Gatsby: The Cultural History of the Great American Novel (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014). He is the editor of R & L’s Contemporary American Literature, Great Writers/Great Books, 100 Greatest…, and Cultural History of Television book series. He teaches in the Media, Journalism and Film Department at Miami University.

Norma Jones is a David B. Smith Fellowship recipient and doctoral candidate in the College of Communication and Information at Kent State University. Norma co-edited Aging Heroes: Growing Old in Popular Culture (R&L, 2015). She is the co-editor of two companion volumes on heroines of popular culture (Heroines of Film and Television: Portrayals in Popular Culture, Heroines of Comic Books and Literature: Portrayals in Popular Culture). In addition to contributing to popular press books regarding business and nontraditional student experiences, Norma has authored or co-authored eight chapters/entries in edited volumes such as the American History Thorough American Sports volumes, as well as the Asian and Pacific Islander Americans edition in the Great Lives from History series. She is also an associate editor for The Popular Culture Studies Journal, the official journal of the Midwest Popular Culture / American Culture Association.

CFP Collection on Nationalism and Popular Culture (proposals by 11/15/2015)

One last call for the night:

Call for Chapter Proposals - Nationalism and Popular Culture
full name / name of organization:
Tim Nieguth
contact email:
tnieguth@laurentian.ca
http://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/node/63374

Our world is a world of nations. The existence and fundamental importance of nations, national identities, or national boundaries is rarely questioned. Yet, the scholarly literature on nationalism has shown that national communities are socially constructed, that national identities are fluid, and that national boundaries are constantly contested. Clearly, maintaining nations requires a great deal of collective effort. How is it that this effort is rendered invisible? How have nations come to be seen as natural? Why do individuals buy into the idea of national identity?

In order to fully answer these questions, we need to examine the links between nationalism and popular culture. Movies, TV series, popular music, sport, video games, comics and other elements of everyday culture are intimately involved in the production (and contestation) of nationhood. Showtime’s hit series Homeland, for example, closely reflects American values and sensibilities; Britpop played a prominent role in British nation-branding; and the Beijing Olympics offered an important venue for the dissemination of official Chinese nationalism.

This volume will focus on three themes in analyzing nationalism and popular culture:

• Communities (e.g., what are the links between nationalism and social inequality? What, if anything, do members of the nation owe one another? What are the core beliefs, myths, and values of the nation? What are the origins of the nation, and what is its future?)
• Limits (e.g., what are the borders of the nation? Who belongs to the nation and who does not? Who are the nation’s “Others”? Are national boundaries secure or under threat?)
• Sovereignty (e.g., who is seen to rule the nation? What is the relationship between nations, states, and markets? Where does the nation fit in the global order? What actors, rules, or power structures govern the production of national identity and popular culture?)

The editor invites proposals for chapters that address one of these broad themes. The volume is primarily designed as an examination of empirical cases, but theoretically oriented chapter proposals are welcome as well. The editor aims to include case studies from a wide range of geopolitical contexts, covering both the Global North and Global South.

Please email chapter proposals of about 300-500 words to tnieguth@laurentian.ca by November 15, 2015, together with your full contact information and a short biographical statement. The editor will review proposals by early December. If accepted for inclusion in the volume, chapters should be completed and submitted to the editor by April 30, 2016. Chapters should be 7,000-8,000 words in length, must be original work, and must not be under review or accepted for publication elsewhere. Please note that it is the responsibility of individual contributors to secure permissions for any copyrighted material included in their chapter.

For further information, please feel free to contact the editor at:

Tim Nieguth
Associate Professor
Department of Political Science
Laurentian University - Barrie
130 Bell Farm Road, Suites 2 & 3
Barrie, Ontario
Canada L4M 5G6
Email: tnieguth@laurentian.ca
URL: https://laurentian.ca/faculty/tnieguth


By web submission at 08/10/2015 - 19:01

CFP Wrestling with Identity: Nation, Race, and Culture in Professional Wrestling (proposals by 12/31/2015)

Of potential interest:

Wrestling with Identity: Nation, Race, and Culture in Professional Wrestling
https://networks.h-net.org/node/13784/discussions/79109/wrestling-identity-nation-race-and-culture-professional-wrestling

Discussion published by Aaron Horton on Monday, August 17, 2015
Your network editor has reposted this from H-Announce. The byline reflects the original authorship.

Type: Call for Publications
Date: December 31, 2015
Subject Fields: Nationalism History / Studies, Race Studies, Cultural History / Studies
Call for Chapters: Edited Volume on Professional Wrestling (Tentative Title: Wrestling with Identity: Nation, Race, and Culture in Professional Wrestling)

We are seeking contributors to our project, an edited volume of essays examining various aspects of professional wrestling and its relationship to other themes (nationalism, gender, race, etc.). The scope is broad and open, and authors are welcome to write about any individual, period, or location. For our purposes, professional wrestling is broadly defined as grappling contests for pay, regardless of whether the outcomes are predetermined – hence, this could include “shoot” contests from the late-nineteenth century to the current televised “sports-entertainment” product, or even mixed martial arts, popularized in the last two decades by the Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) and other promotions. Both of the editors are trained as historians, but we welcome submissions from practitioners of all humanities and social science disciplines.

Examples of possible thematic topics include:

-Race in wrestling (example: "Nazis, Japs, and Pearl Harbor Attacks: German and Japanese Stereotypes in American Professional Wrestling")

-Gender in wrestling

-Pro wrestling and national or regional identity/culture

-Fan culture

-Mixed Martial Arts and (or even "as") pro wrestling

-Economic aspects of the business

-Profiles of particular individuals (example: "Rikidozan: Korean Icon of Japanese Nationality")

-Treatments of wrestling in other media (example: “Race and Villainy in The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity”)

Possible periods and locations for study include:

-The origins of pro wrestling in camp and carnival contests (1850s-1900)

-The early television era (1950s)

-The territorial era (1950s-1980s)

-Specific territories (examples: Mid-Atlantic in the Carolinas, WCCW in Dallas, AWA in Minnesota, Mid-South in Oklahoma, WWWF in the Northeast, etc.)

-Vince K. McMahon's drive toward monopoly (1980s)

-The "Attitude" Era (late 1990s) (example: “’Something strange has been happening…I don’t think there are good guys anymore, people seem to be sick of good guys’: National Identity, Authority, and the Hero in Professional Wrestling, 1996-1998”)

-Wrestling in Mexico, Japan, Europe, or elsewhere

Proposals should be no more than 1-2 pages, and should include a brief bio of the author. Interested individuals should email their proposals to Aaron Horton (Assistant Professor of History, Alabama State University) at ahorton@alasu.edu, or Zach Bates (M.A., history, Georgia State University, history PhD candidate, University of Calgary) at zachary.bates@ucalgary.ca. We hope to receive all chapter proposals by December 31, 2015 in order to move forward with the project in a timely manner.

Contact Email: ahorton@alasu.edu

CFP Music for New Frontiers: Re-Locating the Sounds of the Western (1/10/15)

An interesting idea for a collection:

Call for Abstracts: Music for New Frontiers: Re-Locating the Sounds of the Western (collection)/abstracts due 2015-1-10
Publication Date: 2015-01-10
Date Submitted: 2014-07-08
Announcement ID: 214937

Call for Abstracts: Music for New Frontiers: Re-Locating the Sounds of the Western (collection)

We all know the sound of the “classic” movie Western, and what it signifies: a sense of the bravura and heroics associated with the genre illustrated through clean-cut good guys and shifty-eyed bad guys, a rustic landscape, showdowns and brawls. In a 2014 television commercial for Nissan, two men display their car keys with a knowing look: who will win this horserace? In another, two women don cowboy hats to compete for a pair of fashionable shoes on display between them. Similarly, a commercial for the weedkiller “Roundup,” features narration in a rhythmic patter reminiscent of the song “Ringo,” while a chorus of men sing in the background and we hear a single crack of a whip, evoking the classic scores of Dmitri Tiomkin. All of these commercials feature a stylized music that we recognize from classic Westerns: open chords, simple harmonies, long melodies reminiscent of folk tunes, and the changes to those sounds brought about by the “Spaghetti” Westerns of the 1960s: percussion mimicking the sounds of the mythological American West with its jingling spurs, bird calls, and galloping hooves. Advertising companies know that we will respond positively (whether male or female) to the music that transports us to another time (and place?) when we stood up to competition, whether another person or a weed.

Westerns, and their scores, full of iconic motifs, timbres, and harmonies, have always helped us to interpret our past and our present, deal with political and social issues, and delineate the moral behavior of the various bad guys and good guys of the periods depicted. Whether in print, on the stage, or on the screen, the genre is unique and thus inspires a particularly unique soundtrack. This soundtrack changed when the Western was transplanted to Italy, but music for the Western by both American and non-American composers has endured and has been interpreted to new environments for a variety of reasons.

So what happens when that soundtrack is transposed to other settings? Recent films, anime, television shows, stage productions, and video games, including Quentin Tarantino’s 2012 Django Unchained, 2013’s The Lone Ranger, anime’s GunXSword, the 2012 Doctor Who episode “A Town Called Mercy,” and the recent Half-Life spinoff Fistful of Frags have embraced the Western aesthetic in their settings, costuming, plots, and music. While some of these productions use the American “old west” as audiences know it from Gunsmoke and High Noon, more of them explore locations and scenarios far from these traditional renderings. Even Bruce Springsteen has used the main title theme from The Magnificent Seven as his intro music at live shows, positioning him as essentially American.


This collection seeks to locate and relocate the Western and its soundtrack in recent media. Possible topics include music and the intersections of works that both reference the traditional Western and stand apart from it:

• Westerns set outside of the United States, including Japan, Australia, and Osterns from the Soviet bloc
• Space or Supernatural Westerns
• Anime
• Video games
• TV shows and series in non-Western settings
• Operas (aside from “La Fanciulla del West”)
• Popular musics, including sampling and mashups
• Sports
• Commercials
• Radio programs
• Shakespeare and classical literature
• Stage productions, including both plays and musicals
• Other non-Western literature

…In other words, places where you wouldn’t normally expect to hear “Western” music, but where it is used nonetheless as a recognizable musical signifier.


Please submit abstracts of 500 words by January 10, 2015 in .doc(x), .rtf. or .odt form to both Mariana Whitmer (samed@pitt.edu) and Kendra Preston Leonard (kendraprestonleonard@gmail.com). For accepted abstracts, full essays of 5,000-8,000 words will be due September 1, 2015.

Mariana Whitmer (samed@pitt.edu) and Kendra Preston Leonard (kendraprestonleonard@gmail.com)
Email: kendraprestonleonard@gmail.com