CFP: Children's and Young Adult Literature and Culture (11/15/04; SW/TX PCA/ACA, 2/9/05-2/12/05)

Call for Papers on Children's and Young Adult Literature and Culture –
Southwest/Texas Popular Culture Association Conference
 
Abstract Deadline November 15, 2004
 
The Southwest Texas Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association
will be sponsoring sessions dealing with Children's and Young Adult
Literature and Culture at the 26th Annual Conference to be held at the Hyatt
Regency Conference Hotel in Albuquerque, NM, February 9 - 12, 2005. For
further details regarding the conference (listing of all areas, hotel,
registration, tours, etc.) please visit the developing web site: http://www
h-net.org/~swpca/
 
Any aspect of Children's or Young Adult Literature (traditional or
contemporary) and/or Children's/YA popular culture issues – television,
comics, films, toys, music, gender role models, fashion – will be reviewed
for acceptance. Please send queries, 250 word paper proposals, and 500 word
panel proposals, including full contact info for all participants for review
to area chair by deadline of November 15, 2004. (See below for list of
possible topics)
 
Interdisciplinary approaches and all scholarly fields are welcome.
Presenters also need not have a university affiliation; we embrace all forms
of experiential knowledge potential presenters might offer.
 
Note: Please note the change in submission and contact address as it is
different from that listed on the Conference Poster:
 
Submit to:
Diana Dominguez
Dept. of English & Communication
U. of Texas-Brownsville/Texas Southmost College
80 Fort Brown
Brownsville, TX 78520
 
Phone: 956.544.8853
gypsyscholar_at_rgv.rr.com
 
Electronic submissions highly preferred to the above e-mail address. Please
put "Popular Culture submission" in the subject line. Also please be aware
that the e-mail listed on the poster is only an alternate e-mail address,
which is not as reliable as the preferred e-mail listed above.
 
Please note two special items:
1) Graduate students are highly encouraged to submit and present. The
Associations award monetary prizes between $100-$500 in several categories
for a graduate paper presented at the conference. The deadline for awards
is January 10, 2005. Visit the award page on the PCA/ACA web site:
http://www.h-net.org/~swpca/Awards/awards.htm.
 
We ask that professors or others who have contact with graduate students
please encourage graduate students to submit abstracts to any of the wide
variety of areas sponsored at the PCA/ACA conference, and to seriously
consider submitting a paper for an award.
 
2) Papers and panels may be presented in any language, as long as presenters
provide 500 word summaries of their presentations to hand out to audience
members. Presenters planning to deliver papers in a foreign language should
prepare to have 50 copies of summary for handing out during session.
 
Possible topics include (but are not limited to):
Trends and the publishing explosion in the YA market – especially the YA
Market for young girls – book series tied in to television series like Buffy
 Angel, Alias, and Charmed, but also series featuring strong female
characters like those written by Tamora Pierce and the series penned by
Francine Pascal (Fearless); these series and others have become a huge
market, and have spawned countless web fan sites. It's an area worth
looking into.
 
This could also include a historical look at the girls' series markets --
Nancy Drew, Trixie Belden, Judy Bolton, Anne of Green Gables and Emily of
New Moon, the Little House books, as well as others throughout the years;
this is always a fascinating subject! Think of the possible studies of
comparisons about the girls of yesteryear and today; what are the qualities
and capabilities?
 
Any other popular and prolific children's, 'tween, and young adult authors
who bear some study.
 
Films and television for children/young adults, including popular children
s/YA literature turned into popular films – like the recent Holes, Ella
Enchanted, or A Wrinkle in Time – or television shows specifically marketed
to the 'tween and younger crowd, like Disney's KimPossible, Lizzie Maguire,
and That's So Raven, as well as the quite popular shows like Charmed, Joan
of Arcadia, and Smallville, which all boast large young adult and 'tween
audiences
 
Toy culture – any aspect of toys: gender, socialization, cultural aspects,
consumerism issues, etc.
 
Fantasy Literature, especially retold/modernized fairy tales in the
tradition of Donna Jo Napoli and Robin McKinley, or series featuring
children/young adult protagonists, like Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials
Series (The Golden Compass, The Subtle Knife, and The Amber Spyglass)
 
Children's/YA Literature and the depiction/dissemination of cultural, ethnic
 racial, and other minority groups (including sexual orientation and
disabilities) – depictions and issues about the Southwest (Hispanic and
Native American), given our conference location would certainly be relevant
and welcome.
 
Any other topic related to children's and Young Adult literature, culture,
and the intersection of these items with popular culture are welcome.
 
As I have done in the past, I will be offering a general discussion session
during which all Children's/YA participants (and general public) can gather
to discuss issues in Children's/YA literature and culture and to
propose/suggest possible topics for the next conference. I will try to have
it scheduled in the middle of the conference so we can attract a large
enough audience (and will attempt to have it scheduled so it does not
conflict with any other Children's or YA session).
 
Presentations will be limited to between 15-17 minutes in order to allow for
a vibrant discussion and question/answer session. Please adhere to this
limitation since we are always on a tight time constraint and everyone
deserves a chance to be heard. Please also send any Audio/Visual requests
with abstracts. The conference can only supply the following: Cassette/CD
player, Overhead projector/screen, TV/VCR combo (DVD players are limited to
Film Area presentations), and Slide Project/Screen (presenter MUST bring own
slide carousel).
 
 
 
Diana Dominguez
gypsyscholar_at_rgv.rr.com

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Received on Mon Oct 11 2004 - 10:56:31 EDT