CFP: Women and Death (6/30/05; MAPACA, 11/4/05-11/6/05)

Mid-Atlantic Popular Culture Association Annual Conference
New Brunswick, NJ: November 4-6, 2005

Special Topic in Women's Studies: Death Becomes Her

According to Edgar Allan Poe, "the death of a beautiful woman is,
unquestionably, the most poetic subject in the world." From
nineteenth-century American literature and culture through contemporary
literature, film, television and advertising, women are often popularly
represented as not only harbingers of life, but also keepers of death. The
nineteenth century had particularly fascinating rituals for death, almost
always centered around feminine artifacts and performances--for example,
mourning hair jewelry and clothing, elaborately drawn-out mourning
etiquette for widows, and psychic mediumship. Furthermore, death itself is
often presented in such a way as to seem markedly if not problematically
feminized: it is sensational and sentimental (the tragic heroine's deathbed
scene); it is beautiful and noble (the sacrifice of her life her most
shining moment); and, overall, it is a source of good drama (just as any
"good" woman is).

Women's abilities to die beautifully, to mourn properly and to connect with
the dead supernaturally all speak to an important intersection of cultural
values and aesthetic principles in and of American life. Why are the deaths
of women so prolifically, if artfully, rendered? What values are behind the
cultural linkage of women and death? Why are women collectors of the
memorabilia of death? Why is mediumship feminized in the first place (why
are women "naturals" at mediumship?)? The Women's Studies Area of MAPACA
invites presentations at the November 2005 conference that consider the
artistic, cultural, and political currency of connecting women to death and
connecting death to the feminine.

Possible focuses include:
Analyses of women's deathbed scenes, suicides, murders, funerals, and
autopsies in literature, film, and television

Analyses of women as psychics, spirit mediums, and spiritualists in
literature, film, and television

Legendary female ghosts and the cultural implications of their hauntings

Television and women's deaths (i.e., the dying heroines of soap operas;
programming "investigating" the gruesome, spectacularly dead corpses of
women such as Law and Order: Special Victim's Unit)

Abstracts should be 150-500 words long and accompanied by a c.v. Please
include AV needs (carousel projectors, screens, and VCR/Monitors).

Send proposals to elizdill_at_hotmail.com, or snail mail to:

Sheri Weinstein and Elizabeth Dill
Department of English
Kingsborough Community College
2001 Oriental Blvd.
Brooklyn, NY 11235

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Received on Wed May 11 2005 - 15:11:54 EDT