CALL FOR PAPERS
Proposed Special Session
Modern Language Association 2002 Conference
December 27-30, New York City
A Woman _with_ a Past:
Gertrude Stein's Scientific Inquiry
For a special session to be proposed for this year's MLA
conference, I am looking for papers or presentations
that examine how Gertrude Stein's early scientific
interests are carried over into her writing. Stein's
shift in career is usually seen as a complete change in
tack; however there is ample evidence in her writing
that she did not abandon scientific inquiry and become a
writer as an alternative.
Too often Stein is considered to be simply a playful
writer and her relationship to scientific inquiry is
left unexamined. Scientific inquiry, however, was
brought to bear upon her. A doctor who heard her read
"Tender Buttons" during her tour of the United States
made a diagnosis that her style probably was the result
of sleeping sickness. B. F. Skinner in his famous attack
assembles facts as if scientific proof to suggest that
Stein was a "woman without a past" that had "very little
to say."
Some readers are now suggesting that her writing comes
from something deeper, especially given her exposure to
the nascent social sciences. In examining the
relationship of Stein's writing to scientific inquiry,
the panel will seek to enlarge readings of Stein to
examine how her early interests are reflected in her
work. Papers might consider the following:
>> Stein claims to have "read everything," and one
can often see a critique of book learning in her
writing. How does Stein construct her poetics around
a critique of knowledge? In what way and to what
purpose does she disrupt linearity, hierarchy, and
logic?
>> In what ways are Stein's poetics antiscientific?
Based on her writing, is it possible to construct a
theory of what she found so offensive about science
that caused her to abandon the profession, and how
does her poetics grapple with this offense?
>> Moving forward, how might Stein's writing be used
pedagogically as a starting point for an examination/
discussion of positivism in general?
>> How can we use Stein's "new language" to create new
modes of thinking? How do these new modes of thinking
operate?
>> Synergies between her work and that of her mentor,
William James, and other contemporary philosophical/
psychological thinkers will be considered as long as
the papers use these other writers to illuminate
readings of Stein.
Approaches other than these are certainly welcome.
Please send e-mail abstracts of 250-500 words for a 17
minute presentation, a brief vita, and contact
information to <cleslie@gc.cuny.edu> before March 10 to
be considered. Be sure to indicate your MLA membership
status; only confirmed members of the MLA may be part of
the final proposal. (If not already members, panelists
may join the MLA after notification of their selection
if they are quick about it.) Inquiries in advance of a
formal proposal are welcome.
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