UPDATE
WEIRD SCIENCE:
ALTERNATIVE WISDOMS IN VICTORIAN LITERATURE
A One Day Conference at University College Worcester
Saturday April 17 1999
THE DEADLINE FOR ABSTRACTS HAS NOW BEEN EXTENDED
UNTIL JANUARY 25.
PLENARY SPEAKERS NOW INCLUDE:
CLIVE BLOOM on The Seance and Capital
JENNY BOURNE-TAYLOR on Francis Cobbe and Psychology
APPLY NOW FOR PARTICIPATION (Cost: stlg18/10(students))
Despite the traditional view of the Victorian literary canon as an
exploration in real terms of the nature of society in an age of
industrial and capital progress, a significant body of literature was
primarily concerned with subjects that fly in the face of this
mainstream culture. This conference will investigate these
alternative forms of wisdom (such as mysticism, spiritualism or the
occult) as well as other marginal structures of knowledge
(archaeology, phrenology, or displaced evolutionists) by placing them
both within and against the common ideologies of Victorian literature
and culture. By doing so the conference aims to answer, among others,
the following questions: "What place do these unorthodox beliefs have
in Victorian writing"?; "are these alternatives to pragmatic thought
really alternative wisdoms or merely hollow forms of dissent"?; and,
"can these subjects be dismissed as 'weird' eccentricities or are
they representative of paradigm shifts in literature and culture"?
Papers are invited, but not confined to, the following topics:
mysticism
spiritualism
the occult
mesmerism
phrenology
theosophy
physiognomical theory
astrology
paganism
anthropology
archaeology
sexology
psychoanalysis
evolutionary theory
ABSTRACTS FOR 30 MINUTE PAPERS SHOULD BE
APPROX. 300 WORDS IN LENGTH
DEADLINE: JANUARY 25 1999
All enquiries should be addressed to either:
Dr Martin Willis
Department of English Studies
University College Worcester
Henwick Grove
Worcester
WR2 6AJ
UK
email: m.willis@worc.ac.uk
OR
Dr Richard Pearson
Department of English Studies
University College Worcester
Henwick Grove
Worcester
WR2 6AJ
UK
email: r.pearson@worc.ac.uk
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From the Literary Calls for Papers Mailing List
CFP@english.upenn.edu
Full Information at
http://www.english.upenn.edu/CFP/
or write Erika Lin: elin@english.upenn.edu
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