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Identity Politics and the Politics of Identity
in the 19th Century, March 4-6, 2004
Keynote Speaker: Ron Bosco of SUNY-Albany,
President of the Thoreau Society
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Deadline for submission: November 15, 2003
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"One's-self I sing, a simple separate person,
Yet utter the word Democratic, the word En-Masse."
--Walt Whitman
American, imperialist, woman, slave, homosexual-each
of these words connotes a particular identity, a
particular set of qualities defined and codified by a
reported set of public behaviors. However, there is
often slippage between the public identity and the
private self, between how an identity is defined and
how it is lived. Identities are both constructed and
construed, both a means of joining and of defining a
group. The reflexive nature of identities, especially
highly charged identities, can make them both positive
ideological state apparatuses and negative repressive
state apparatuses.
In the nineteenth century numerous and rapid changes
resulted in a sharp foregrounding of these
contradictory aspects of identity politics.
Eighteenth-century political revolutions had given
voice to individuals while the nineteenth-century
Industrial Revolution and the rise of working class
re-silenced them. Nineteenth-century thinkers such as
Darwin, Marx, Hegel, Mill, Emerson, and Freud fostered
theoretical changes in the individual and his/her
perception of self. The growth of cities necessitated
a renegotiation of the individual's place in a larger
corporate entity.
Our second annual graduate conference is looking for
papers that highlight how the unique circumstances of
the 19th century affected the relationship between
self (the private individual) and identity (the public
individual). Literature exposes these relationships
in many ways: within single texts, between a text and
its author, within a group of writers, etc. For
example, how are imperialist prejudices revealed,
refuted, or embraced within a single work? How does
the initial stigma of being a novelist affect the
public relationship between a writer and that writer's
works? Or, how are identifiers such as "Romantic" and
"Transcendentalist" contested?
Possible topics could include but are not limited to:
* Sexuality and gender
* Class
* Religion
* Rise of fiction and fictional genres
* Science/Technology
* Education
* Nationalism, Imperialism
* Race/Postcolonialism
* Publications and their imagined communities (gift
books, periodicals, travel narratives)
*Reevaluations of 19th century
Abstracts of 250 words or less are due by November
15th, 2003. Please include your name, the name of your
institution and program, and any A/V needs you may
have. Submit abstracts electronically on the web at
www.uscgradconference.org or via e-mail to:
--American Literature--
Chris Heafner
[log in to unmask]
--British Literature--
Jamieson Ridenhour
[log in to unmask]
--Comparative Literature--
Kristi Krumnow
[log in to unmask]
--General Information--
Margee Husemann
[log in to unmask]
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