CFP: Diasporic Narrative and the Ethics of Representation (Finland) (5/31/05; 9/30/05-10/1/05)

Call for Papers

Diasporic Narrative and the Ethics of Representation

Conference at the University of Turku, Finland
September 30 - October 1, 2005

Keynote Speakers:
- Alison Donnell, Nottingham Trent University, UK
- Tabish Khair, University of Aarhus, Denmark
- Maria Olaussen, Växjö University, Sweden
- Justine Tally, University of La Laguna, Spain

The term ‘diaspora’ has been used to refer to the Jewish diaspora (both
the earlier dispersal and the more recent displacement in the context of
the Holocaust) and the movements of people launched by the era of
post/colonialism and globalization. In recent theoretical debates,
diaspora has been connected with the constructed and transnational
nature of identity formation. It has also been related to concepts like
mestizaje, creolisation and hybridisation. Essentially, the concept of
diaspora refers to the voluntary and involuntary migrations and
movements resulting from shifting power structures. Contemporary ethical
criticism, here brought into contact with issues of diaspora, is closely
linked with discussions of otherness. It examines the questions of how
to represent otherness in a text, how to respond to the other and how to
bring the concept of otherness to bear on the experience of reading.
Narrative representations of diasporic communities are fertile ground
for ethically informed analysis. The mixing of different cultures brings
to the fore various ways of responding to encounters with people from
various cultural backgrounds and of constructing narrative strategies
that dismantle such binaries as ethical-political or local-global.

How are power structures represented in diasporic narratives? Can there
be an ethical way of representing these structures? How are scattered
nations and identities represented in diaspora literature? How are
issues of subject formation and agency represented within this field and
what are the ethical approaches to them? Furthermore, how are issues
like belonging, home, community and locality addressed in diasporic
representations? The conference will explore the above questions in
narratives of displacement or belonging, nationalist narratives of
exclusion and borderline narratives. We invite proposals that examine
literary and cultural representations of diasporic experience.

Papers addressing questions of diaspora in the contexts of the following
issues are particularly welcome:

-Creolization -Gender and transnational feminism
-Diasporic subject formations -Migration and migrant bodies
-Ethics and encounters -Postcolonialism
-Ethnicity and hybridity -Queer and the borderlines of sexuality

The language of the conference is English. Please submit an abstract
(max. 250 words) by May 31st, 2005.

Abstracts are to be sent to Outi Hakola (outi.hakola_at_utu.fi)
For further information, please contact: Tuomas Huttunen (tutahu_at_utu.fi)
Links to local hotels and other additional information will appear on
www-pages bearing the conference title soon.

The conference is organized by the following research projects funded by
the Academy of Finland:
-Disturbing Differences. Feminist Readings of Identity, Location and
Power, University of Turku
-Fictional Constructions of Cultural Identity, University of Turku
-Fragments of the Past: History, Fiction and Identity in the New English
Literatures, University of Turku
-Reconstructing 'America': Racial, Gendered and Diasporic Identities,
University of Joensuu

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Received on Wed Apr 06 2005 - 19:32:26 EDT