Chair of the Search Committee,
Department of English Literatures,
Mount Allison University
62 York St., Sackville, NB, E4L 1E2
E-mail: english@mta.ca

Applicants should arrange for three confidential letters of support to be sent to this address. The closing date for receipt of applications is June 1, 2012, or when the position is filled. Candidates are responsible for ensuring that all applications materials, including letters of reference, reach the Department in time.

Mount Allison University welcomes diversity in the workplace and encourages applications from all qualified women and men, including aboriginal peoples, persons with disabilities, and members of visible minorities. All qualified applicants are encouraged to apply; however, Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority. Canadians and permanent residents should indicate their citizenship status in their applications.

Polish Association for American Studies

 Conference

PAAS 2012

Americascapes:

Americans in/and their diverse sceneries

17-19 October 2012, Pulawy n/Lublin, Poland

Call for Papers

Americascapes, or sceneries have emerged at the cusp of culture and environment as a result of the process of their interaction in the course of American history. The same space may be a site of competing scapes projected by conflicting majority narratives and minority counter-narratives. These constructs have been invested ideologically, ranging from the indigenous, Native American visions of  home territory as cosmos through the promise of American dream that projected the new land as virginal and uninhabited, to its failure as a new Garden of Eden. For Puritans America’s promise was initially associated with the urban allegory of the city on a hill to be subsequently considered in terms of the Garden of Covenant surrounded with “howling wilderness,” while, as Louis Simpson suggests, the South articulated its colonial experience in terms of  the garden of chattel. The  violent beginnings of the Republic found reflection in the menacing Gothic scenery of American landscapes in the works of Charles Brockden Brown. Maintaining that terror is not of Germany but of the soul, E. A. Poe pointed to the affinity between the external scenery and American Gothic mindscapes. Transcendentalists construed landscape as revealing moral order, while the sites of battles and calamities of the Civil War, which still attract thousands of tourists every year, have become, over years, the ground of conflicting representations and theatrical reenactments. The nineteenth century  also saw dramatic transformation of the landscape that verged on ecological disaster due to the railway construction accompanied by mass buffalo shooting and economically driven destruction of American environment. Those transformations were concomitant with forcible relocation of Native Americans to reservations. Nostalgia for the disappearing wilderness has found its expression in the creation of urban parks such as Central Park. Even as the urban development gave rise to inherently American city-scapes, Charles Olson pointed out that Melville’s Pacific, prefigured in the Plains, was also a figure of the American West; prairies and the seascapes thus form an allegorical continuum. Mid-twentieth century is marked by the construction of the highways and the development of the car industry whose crises in the late twentieth century contributed to the decaying industrial landscapes of the Rust Belt. Twentieth and twenty first centuries have seen a proliferation of internal and external landscapes, landscape simulacra such as amusement parks and virtual scapes generated in and for the sake of the movies and electronic media. On the other hand the interest in the materiality of embodiment as well as the development of women and queer studies contribute to the celebration of bodyscapes.

The organizers hope to provide a forum for scholars in various disciplines ranging from literary history, history, sociology to political science and economics. You are invited to discuss, in English or Polish, questions and issues connected with (but not limited to) the following problems:

• Reading city-scapes and their meaning
• History of urban parks (Olmstead’s Central Park)
• Historical, Political and Environmental issues concerning National Parks
• Amusement parks & Disneyland
• America as a Garden
• The development of American suburbia
• American countryside and provincial America
• Landscapes of Southern trauma and memory
• The significance of wilderness in American culture
• Political and social tensions inherent in the dynamic  landscapes of the American frontier
• Historical, Political, Social and Environmental issues concerning Indian Reservations
• Hybrydity and borderland landscapes
• The significance of marine-, sea- and  ocean-scapes in American literature and culture
• America as a techno-scape
• The relationship between internal and external scapes in American tradition
• American dreamscapes and mindscapes
• Bodyscapes
• Mediascapes
• Nineteeth-century American hybrid art: panoramas
• The significance of models and miniatures in American literature
• Celluloid skyline: cinematic representations of  American city-scapes
• Representations of urban environment in comic books
• Virtual landscapes and their various uses in American culture
• Computer games and their scenery/landscapes
• Scenery archeology  in contemporary American mass culture
• Foreign scenery as constructed and construed in American fiction and poetry
• Monuments in public space and the politicization of landscape
• Landscapes and mindscapes of minority experience
• mythicization of American space (the myth of Aztlan in the Southwest and California)

The deadline for submitting paper proposals is 31 July 2012. Panel proposals are welcome The paper abstracts of 200-300 words, and in the case of panels 600-900 words, should be sent to the address: americascapes@gmail.com

For further information please consult the conference website: paas2012.pl

Debt: Money/Narrative/Belief

Department of English
Graduate Student Conference
Dalhousie University, Halifax N.S.
August 17-19, 2012

In her 2008 Massey Lectures, Margaret Atwood calls debt “that peculiar nexus where money, narrative or story, and religious belief intersect, often with explosive force.” Today, we are facing an explosion of discourses foregrounding financial debt. Whether in the Euro Zone Debt Crisis, the Occupy Wall Street Movement, or rising student loan debt, narrative and debt cannot be decoupled, nor can they be detached from a given political or affective investment. In addition to the obvious economic concerns, we are also interested in widening the discussion of debt: How do literature and cultural products help us make sense of these issues? In what ways are individual authors and texts indebted to the social, cultural, or historical moment in which they are situated? How are current and historic discourses–be they social, literary, or philosophical–shaped by representations of debt and indebtedness?

Since few know more about debt than graduate students, the Dalhousie Association of Graduate Students in English (DAGSE) invites submissions for paper presentations for its interdisciplinary graduate student conference: “Debt: Money/Narrative/Belief.” We welcome proposals from students at all levels and in all areas of graduate study. This three-day conference will be held August 17-19, 2012 at Dalhousie University, located in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and will investigate the ways in which literature, history, art, and culture shape and are shaped by discourses and experiences of debt.

We invite proposals for papers (15-20 minutes) on themes and subjects including, but not limited to:

•  Literary and cultural debts: mentors, movements, sources of influence
•  Marxist literary theory; the sociology of literature; cultural materialism
•  The Great Depression; the current Depression
•  Gambles, speculation, debtors’ prison
•  Wills, inheritance, legacies
•  Crashes, scams and financial scandals
•  Deals with the Devil
•  Religious debts (alms giving, sacrifice, forgiveness, etc.)
• Colonial aftermaths; reparations
•  Genre literature, genre studies
•  Plagiarism, quotation, “borrowing”
•  Worlds without capitalism: utopias and speculative fiction

We are pleased to announce our keynote speakers:

•  Glenn Willmott (Queen’s University), author of Modern Animalism: Habitats of Scarcity and Wealth in Comics and Literature (University of Toronto Press, 2011) and Modernist Goods: Primitivism, the Market, and the Gift (University of Toronto Press, 2008).
•  Len Diepeveen (Dalhousie University), author of Artworld Prestige: Arguing Cultural Value (co-author Timothy van Laar. Forthcoming, Oxford, 2012) and The Difficulties of Modernism (Routledge, 2003).
• Sara Malton (Saint Mary’s University), author of Forgery in Nineteenth-Century Literature and Culture: Fictions of Finance from Dickens to Wilde (Palgrave Macmillan, 2009).

Submission: 250-word abstract plus cover letter with name, current level of graduate study, affiliated university, and email address to dagse.conference@gmail.com. Include the words “conference abstract” in subject line, and include name on the cover letter only.

Deadline: March 30, 2012. Accepted presenters will receive notification by the end of April.

Contact the Organizers at dagse.conference@gmail.com if you have questions about the conference.

Visit the Dalhousie Department of English here: http://english.dal.ca

All current members and those who join in advance of the deadline are eligible.  Membership information can be found at our website.

The award will be announced at the 2012 conference, “Geographies of Promise and Betrayal–Land and Place in US Studies” (Toronto, Ontario, 25-28 October 2012).  The recipient will also be congratulated  in a future issue of the Canadian Review of American Studies, and their book cited on the CAAS webpage (for a list of recent winners of our prizes, see here).

Members who wish to be considered for the award should forward three copies of their book by 1 May 2012 to:

Dr. Jason Haslam
President, Canadian Association for American Studies
Dept. of English, Dalhousie University
6135 University Ave.
PO Box 15000
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
B3H 4R2

Please also email Jason.Haslam@dal.ca with your intent to apply.  We regret that books cannot be returned, but they will be made available to the review editor of the Canadian Review of American Studies for consideration for review.

Please forward to any colleagues who may be interested.

We also want to note that we will be extending the deadline for this year’s Robert K. Martin book prize competition.  We will post the details in a few days.

As before, we would be pleased to see any comments, of course (I should note that the comments have to be moderated because of problems we have with spam, so your comment may not appear immediately).

Interview with Robert K. Martin

Do you know of a member who has recently been honoured with a prize or award?  Is it you?  Let us know!

We invite anyone who may so wish to share memories of Robert in the comments on our blog or on Facebook.

All current members and those who join in advance of the deadline are eligible.  Membership information can be found at our website.

The award will be announced at the 2012 conference, “Geographies of Promise and Betrayal–Land and Place in US Studies” (Toronto, Ontario, 25-28 October 2012), sponsored by CAAS, York University, and the Centre for the Study of the United States, Munk School of Global Affairs, University of Toronto.  See the conference CFP here.  The recipient will also be congratulated  in a future issue of the Canadian Review of American Studies, and their book cited on the CAAS webpage (for a list of recent winners of our prizes, see here).

Members who wish to be considered for the award should forward three copies of their book by 17 March 2012 to:

Dr. Jason Haslam
President, Canadian Association for American Studies
Dept. of English, Dalhousie University
6135 University Ave.
PO Box 15000
Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada
B3H 4R2

Please also email Jason.Haslam@dal.ca with your intent to apply.  We regret that books cannot be returned, but they will be made available to the review editor of the Canadian Review of American Studies for consideration for review.

Please forward to any colleagues who may be interested.

Northeast Modern Language Association
44th Annual Convention
March 21-24, 2013 in Boston, Massachusetts
Host: Tufts University

The 2013 NeMLA convention continues the Association’s tradition of sharing innovative scholarship in an engaging and generative location. The 44th annual event will be held in historic Boston, Massachusetts, a city known for its national and maritime history, academic facilities and collections, vibrant art, theatre, and food scenes, and blend of architecture. The Convention, located centrally near Boston Commons and the Theatre District at the Hyatt Regency, will include keynote and guest speakers, literary readings, film screenings, tours and workshops.

Propose a session: NeMLA’s program of sessions is generated each year by its members. Propose a seminar, roundtable, creative session or panel. Submit your proposal online by April 15, 2012.
Submit an abstract: The full Call for Papers will be available online June 2012; the abstract deadline is Sept. 30, 2012.

Areas:
American
Anglophone
British Anglophone
Canadian
Comparative Languages
Composition
Film & Cultural Studies
French & Francophone
German
Italian
Pedagogy
Russian
Spanish/Portuguese
Theory
Transnational Studies
Women’s & Gender Studies
World Literatures

NeMLA 2012 membership is required to chair a 2013 NeMLA session.
Please see www.nemla.org for guidelines and more information
Questions? Email nemlachair@gmail.com

St. Thomas University is an undergraduate, liberal arts institution whose roots are in the faith and tradition of the Roman Catholic Church. With a full-time enrolment of 2,500, its students graduate with Bachelor of Arts, Applied Arts, Education, and Social Work degrees. The faculty members are distinguished teachers, researchers and scholars, and the University holds four Canada Research Chairs.

The successful candidate will be a scholar of American Literature (19th and 20th centuries) and will be able to contribute to our broadly-based Liberal Arts curriculum.

For more information about our curriculum, please see STU’s website:
http://w3.stu.ca/stu/academic/departments/english_lit/default.aspx

A PhD or imminent completion is required. Applicants are to submit a curriculum vitae, samples of scholarly work, evidence of teaching effectiveness (teaching portfolio preferred), and arrange to have three letters of reference sent directly to Dr. Kathleen McConnell, Chair, Department of English Language and Literature, St. Thomas University, Fredericton, NB, E3B 5G3.

Closing date: Monday, March 19, 2012, or when position is filled. Applicants are responsible for ensuring that their completed applications, including letters of reference, are received by this date.

An equal opportunity employer, St. Thomas University is committed to employment equity for women, Aboriginal peoples, members of visible minority groups, and persons with disabilities. The university welcomes applications from all faiths and backgrounds. All qualified candidates are encouraged to apply; however, Canadians and permanent residents will be given priority.