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italian-studies: Scholarly discussions in any field of Italian studies Dear colleagues, thanks to those of you who have expressed their interest in our proposed panel! Since we may have extra abstracts, we would like to aim for a panel in two sessions. In order to fill also this second one, we are extending the deadline for submission of abstracts to the 31st October 2016. We hope therefore you will consider submitting an abstract for the panel 'Space and Crime Fiction' at the next SIS biennial conference (Hull, June 2017). Proposed panel: Space and Crime Fiction Call for papers – SIS 2017 (University of Hull 27th-30th June) Crime fiction as a genre seems to rely on a special relationship with space. The detective’s main talent lies in the ability to read the space of the crime as a text, by making sense of clues that can be gathered therein. The city is probably the space that has benefitted more overtly from this privileged relation, and the detective has often been compared with the literary figure of the flâneur, an idle walker and watchful observer that, according to Walter Benjamin, is able ‘to catch things in flight’. Within Italian crime fiction tradition, the work of Giorgio Scerbanenco, set in 1950s and 1960s Milan, establishes the concrete topography of the city as the scene for enquiries and investigations. The first English work on Italian crime fiction, edited by Giuliana Pieri in 2011, acknowledges a particular focus on the representation of space, and especially on – but not limited to – city space. Setting has acquired increasing centrality to the point where some regard crime fiction as the most plausible version of contemporary social novel. Barbara Pezzotti suggests that crime fiction is particularly well-positioned to explore the “sense of a place” that is “the result of the amalgamation between reality and culture and between visual and symbolic reality” (2012: 3). Contemporary Italian detective storywriters present a very regional voice and may be identified with well-defined geographical poles and metropolitan areas, which have given rise to specifically local traditions: amongst others, one thinks of Milan with its Scuola dei Duri, Bologna and the Gruppo 13, Rome and the so-called Neonoir. Has crime fiction contributed to changing the representation and perception of space(s) and place(s)? How far, in turn, do local identities affect the type or style of narrative? Are these cases where the genre of crime fiction has proved particularly effective in recording a specific relation with space? To what extent do different media influence this particular connection between crime stories and space? These are only samples of the issues we would like to address in this panel, which seeks to bring together a range of perspectives to investigate the relationship between spatiality and crime fiction. We invite proposals for 20-minute papers addressing the interplay between space and the genre of crime fiction, in relation to different aspects: topographical, sociological, cultural, and narratological. Please send a 300-word abstract in English or Italian and a short bio to the panel organisers by 23rd October 2016: Marzia Beltrami (PhD candidate, Durham University): [log in to unmask] Giulia Brecciaroli (PhD candidate, University of Warwick): [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]> ********************************************************************** To join the list, send the message: subscribe italian-studies YOUR NAME to: [log in to unmask] To send a message to the list, address it to: [log in to unmask] To leave the list, send the message: unsubscribe italian-studies to: [log in to unmask] In order to report problems or to contact the list's owners, write to: [log in to unmask] For further information, visit our web site: http://www.jiscmail.ac.uk/italian-studies