CALL FOR PAPERS
Nation building is a spectacular event. Not only is the nation
spectacularized in the imaginary consciousness of its citizenry, but
spectacles are also incorporated into the discourse of nationhood and
national identity. This collection of essays, entitled Visible Nations,
will attempt to tease out the connections and interdependencies of "nation"
and "spectacle" as constructions. The purposes of this volume are to
foreground spectacle as a discursive ideological apparatus in the narrating
of nation and, at the same time, to unveil the place of spectacles in
counter-narratives that resist the dominant or institutional logic of
national discourse and identity. Much recent scholarship has documented the
relationship of film spectacle to ideology and nationalism. This collection
moves away from considering spectacle in strictly filmic terms, and instead
seeks to focus on the intersections of spectacle, nation, and ideology in a
world in which such information is more visible and more available than ever
before, and where interest in cosmopolitanism, transnationalism, and related
effects of globalism loom large. Possible topics and subjects of inquiry
might include:
Parades and national events (National Day parades, war hero parades,
national holiday parades)
Sub-cultures as national spectacles
National campaigns (political and otherwise)
Media and spectacles
Tabloids
Sex and politicians
Sporting spectacles; the Olympics
Tourist attractions
War as spectacle
Protests and riots; native "frenzy"
Colonial and postcolonial spectacles
Body as spectacle
National trauma and national suffering
Celebrities and crime
Politics and elections
Internet and web spectacles
Excess and containment
Works may explore nationally sanctioned displays, and how such spectacles
relate to the officially intended agenda, as well as events that consciously
reify national norms. Is spectacle a mode of containment? Of protest? In
what ways does the virtual world cause us to rethink what constitutes
spectacle? Essays exploring these questions from a variety of
approaches-contemporary and historical, feminist, GLBT, postcolonial,
cultural studies, and a variety of national traditions-are welcome.
Please send a 500-word abstract of your essay via e-mail and a Microsoft
Word attachment to:
Kenneth Chan or Julia Gardner
corchank@nus.edu.sg corgjd@nus.edu.sg
Or send a hard copy to either of the above at:
National University of Singapore
University Scholars Programme
10 Kent Ridge Crescent
Singapore 119260
Deadline for abstracts: Jan. 15, 2001
===============================================
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
===============================================
This archive was generated by hypermail 2b29 : Fri Nov 10 2000 - 14:55:55 EST