CALL FOR PAPERS
Centre for the Study of Hispanic Exile
Department of Hispanic Studies
University of Birmingham
International Conference
on
Spanish Republican Exile Geographies
10-12 September 2008
This conference aims to reflect critically upon the different geographies
of exile produced by the Spanish Civil War, ranging from mapping the routes
taken by individuals fleeing Spain to representing their relationship with
the territories in which they settled and the ways in which these
contributed to rearticulate local and global understanding of the
interrelations between nation, territory and culture. In particular, we
would welcome papers on the 'imagined geographies' produced by the
experience of exile, whether through critical scrutiny of the metaphors
typically associated with exile around the relationship with the
lost 'home', roots, wandering and dispossession, or through exploration of
the landscapes painted by exile writers and artists, both of Spain and of
the lands that received them as refugees. We would welcome contributions on
the phenomenon of exile geographies from a range of disciplinary
approaches: historical, literary, anthropological, geographical, cultural
and political, as well as reflection on the ways in which the Spanish
Republican exile experience impacted on work within the different
disciplines: whether in the reaffirmation of cultural, political and
historical links between Spain and the Americas in order to reinvent the
notion of a deeper Hispanic 'home' or in investigation through
identification with the loss and dispossession of the indigenous American
peoples.
Sessions will be organized on the following themes:
1. Paths or Passages of Exile: on the different routes taken by exiles
fleeing Spain and their effects on the territories through which they
passed: from the mountain villages along the Pyrennean borders to the
concentration camps of France and Germany and the African and American
ports en route to their new 'homes'.
2. Places of Exile: on the individual and group experiences of exile
in particular countries and territories, the relationships formed with the
home populations and the networks between different groups and countries.
3. Landscapes of Exile: on the ways in which the spaces of Spain and
the receiving countries were re-imagined by exile writers and artists.
4. Displaced geographies: the way in which the experience of exile
contributed to changing paradigms within different disciplines concerned
with mapping the relationship between language, territory and identity.
5. Stages of Exile: the ways in which exile geographies were evoked in
Spanish Republican exile theatre.
6. Return Journeys: mental and physical mappings of the return to
Spain, and the confrontation between different and often irreconcilable
geographies.
If you wish to offer a paper, please send a title and abstract of up to 250
words to [log in to unmask] by 20 June 2008. A selection of
papers will be considered for publication after the conference. We would
also like to publish selected papers online on the Exile Remains website.
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