Rome?s Modernity: Trauma, Fracture, Narration
17-18 October 2012
The British School at Rome
Conference organisers: Fabio Camilletti, Jennifer Burns, Lesley
Caldwell, Dom Holdaway, Filippo Trentin.
Abstract deadline: 31 May 2012
The conference Rome?s Modernity: Trauma, Fracture, Narration, to be
held in Rome on 17-18 October 2012, was conceived by the Department of
Italian at the University of Warwick as a part of a broader project on
Rome?s modernit(ies), in partnership with University College London,
the British School at Rome, the Archivio di Stato di Roma and the
Centro per lo studio di Roma (CROMA) at the University of Roma 3. It
aims to gather scholars from different backgrounds, disciplines and
fields of specialization in order to take Rome?s cityscape as a point
of departure for addressing questions of literary, art-historical,
cinematic, and architectural manifestations of urban modernity.
Commentary on the city of Rome and the changes that it underwent
during its modernisation tend to foreground and underline the
degradation of the city, particularly in relation to its glorious
past(s). This leads to rigid dichotomies and a restrictive diachronic
history of the Italian capital whereby the fractures and metamorphoses
undergone by the city throughout the centuries produced an urban
landscape in which the importance of classical tradition seems always
to haunt the present. By genealogically analysing the legacies of
nineteenth- and twentieth-century processes of modernisation undergone
by the ?eternal city?, our conference interrogates the way in which
Rome deals with the cultural fracture caused by capitalist modernity,
from the moment in which it becomes the Italian capital in 1871 up to
the present. Rather than looking at contemporary Rome as the outcome
of an uni-linear history where past and present stand as oppositional
notions, our objective is that of establishing the foundations for an
archaeology (Benjamin, Foucault, Agamben) of the Italian capital.
Emphasising, comparing and contrasting singular case studies, from
representations such as the borgate of Pasolini to the postmodern
rephrasing of the Gazometro, can help to map Rome?s modernisation and
to discard the dialectical opposition between past and present.
By adopting a quintessentially inter- and multi-disciplinary scope, we
welcome proposals from a wide range of disciplines, including (but not
limited to) literary and film studies, urban studies, architecture,
history of art, visual culture, feminist, queer and postcolonial
studies. Possible topics may include:
- Analyses of the ways in which Rome?s multistable modernity
has been portrayed, visualised and interpreted in literature, cinema,
visual and performing arts, from the Italian fin-de-siècle to the most
recent years, also including experiences of literature and cinema di
genere;
- Attempts to configure continuities and discontinuities in
the process of Rome?s modernity, from 1871 to the present (e.g. after
the 1871 breach of Porta Pia, the 1922 March on Rome, the 1945
liberation from Nazi-fascism, the 1968 riots at Valle Giulia, the
urban sprawl and the city?s current multi-culturalization, etc.)
- Theoretical reflections on issues of narration, portrayal and
urban design, with specific references to such notions as those of
fragmentariness, montage, haunting and survival, as well as the
relationship between history and fiction;
- Experiments in reassessing the theme of Rome within the
frame of such crucial experiences in intellectual modernity as Walter
Benjamin?s use of fragments, Aby Warburg?s montage of images and his
conceptualisation of a new science of culture (Kulturwissenschaft),
Gilles Deleuze?s conception of the cinematic image-temps, the notions
of rhizome, palimpsest, haunting, anachronism, survival.
Please send an abstract of maximum 500 words (in English or Italian),
together with a short bio-bibliographical profile, by 31 May 2012 to
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>,
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>, or
[log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>. The results
of the selection process will be communicated by 30 June. A detailed
programme will circulate in summer 2012 Unfortunately, we are unable
to provide financial support for travel and lodging, but suggestions
for accommodation will be supplied on request.
--
The University of Edinburgh is a charitable body, registered in
Scotland, with registration number SC005336.
|