HURRY!!! HURRY!!! TIME'S ALMOST OUT!!! DEADLINE EXTENSION!!!
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TOLERANCE, MULTICULTURALISM, AND THE CONTEMPORARY AMERICAN NOVEL
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Abstracts (1-2 pages) and brief vitae sought for a Special Session of
Modern Language Association's (MLA) annual Convention:
December 27-30 2000 in Washington D.C.
Submission deadline: March 15, 2000
This panel seeks to explore how the social forces of tolerance and
multiculturalism affect the interpretation of the contemporary American
novel. How does an ethos of tolerance and a political awareness of
multiculturalism influence our aesthetic understandings of the novel?
If it is the case that discussions about multi-ethnic novels often wind
their way to the effect of differences on a dominant community, then
tolerance must play some sort of role. Like generosity, respect, and
justice, tolerance would appear to be a simple, unambiguous virtue. And
yet critics as varied as Locke, Milton, Mill, and Marcuse have all
expressed conflicting opinions as to the value and place of tolerance.
The interplay between social forces and aesthetics continues to be an
actively debated and controversial issue in American universities. Many
current critics disparage the traditional, consensus-based reading of an
American national identity that only tends to tolerate minority discourse.
Newer voices have questioned the dominance implied in an ethos of
tolerance. Instead of tolerance, critics have often highlighted terms
such as hybridization, fragmentation, interaction, and empowerment rather
than the traditional pluralist and liberal vocabulary of aesthetic
excellence, the human condition, and disinterested literary merit that
seems to go hand-in-hand with a discourse of tolerance.
For example, almost everyone agrees that signification and the sign
only arise under shifting, unstable, radically contingent conditions.
But in spite of this agreement on the rupturing of fixed identities and
authoritative knowledge, we continue to champion the "meritorious,"
the "literary," and the "aesthetic." Or is it the case that these
traditional terms are only tolerated by critics? Surely a discourse of
tolerance helps to authorize a democratic American canon, one that accents
social equality, empowerment, and ethnic solidarity.
In an age of multiculturalism, how exactly shall we read social toleration
in relation to the opposing notions, to the undemocratic and exclusionary
notions of excellence and merit?
An ancillary and broader question might be: what is the current
state of multiculturalism and tolerance within American canonicity today?
A few possibilities include (but are not limited to):
the role of American tolerance in relation to aesthetics
gender/sexuality/ethnicity and transcultural literary merit
cultural relativism, American exceptionalism, and social tolerance
the difference between toleration and tolerance in aesthetic merit
social equity and the politics of canonicity
the utopian role of "disinterest" and American diversity
tolerance as an interpretative strategy for the American novel
Marcuse's "tolerance" in an age of multiculturalism
tolerance as a meta-narrative for multiculturalism
hierarchies of aesthetic value and tolerance as transhistorical
ideological power and a "tolerant" aesthetic
Send brief vitae and abstracts Lou Caton
for 15 minute papers to: English Department
Auburn University
9030 Haley Center
Auburn, AL 36849-5203
Deadline: March 15, 2000
Hard Copy submissions only phone: (334) 844-9002
Conventional Mail or FAX FAX: (334) 844-9027
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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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