"Art and Power"
A one-day graduate conference
School of English, University of Leeds (UK)
27 September 2008
artandpower2008.wordpress.com
Joseph Conrad expressed apprehension about the political and moral
utility of literature, W.H. Auden claimed that poetry makes nothing
happen, and Theodor Adorno asserted that there could be no poetry after
Auschwitz. Yet, in the postmodern era there is no shortage of art or of
theories that speak to political realities, conflict and calamity. In the
21st century and in the 7th year of the official "War on Terror" we ask: is
the pen mightier than the sword? Is art acting as a social corrective? Is
it politically effective? Or conversely, how and when is it co-opted and/or
appropriated, and to what ends? This conference invites papers that speak
to art's politicisation, neutralisation, instrumentalisation, and its
relationship(s) to power more generally. Our objective is to establish a
dialogue that takes up the various intersections between art and power in
contemporary "globalised", "capitalist", "postmodern", and "post"-colonial
societies. Art and Power is an interdisciplinary conference, and thus
topics for papers are not restricted to literature.
The keynote speaker will be Prof. Derek Attridge (University of York).
The conference will moreover include a session designed to advise young
scholars on publishing their academic work. Prof. Shirley Chew
(University of Leeds, general editor of Moving Worlds) and Dr. Mark
Taylor-Batty (University of Leeds, European editor of The Pinter Review
and co-editor of Performing Ethos) will give a talk on various aspects of
academic publication.
Presentation topics for the conference may include but are not limited to
the following:
- Art and totalitarianism
- Utopian/Dystopian visions in contemporary literature
- Paranoia and conspiracy theories
- The fluidity/rhetorical constructedness/abuses of the concept
"democracy" and its ideological derivatives
- The role of the artist and the academic under capitalism
- Globalisation, cultural imperialism and forms of cultural resistance
- Models of inclusion and exclusion in democracy and multiculturalism
- Expressions of dissent
- The instrumentalisation of art and journalism in "democratic" societies
- Politics and aesthetics
- Art and religion, art and atheism
- Issues of epistemological "access" and perceptions and discursive
constructions of "non-democratic" cultures and political crises through
western art and the media
- Creating feminist art within patriarchal societies
Abstracts for twenty minute presentations should not exceed 300 words
and should be accompanied by a short CV. Please direct your submission
to: artandpower2008_at_googlemail.com by 1 May 2008. Visit the
conference website at: artandpower2008.wordpress.com
--
Iain Robert Smith
Institute of Film and Television
School of American and Canadian Studies
University of Nottingham
University Park
NG7 2RD
Head of Communications,
MeCCSA Post-Graduate Network
website: http://www.meccsa.org.uk/pgn/
Articles Editor,
Scope: An Online Journal of Film and Television Studies
website: http://www.scope.nottingham.ac.uk/
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