> From:   Anette Hoffmann
>         Univ. of Amsterdam
>         <[log in to unmask]>
>
> The organisers of this conference are pleased to anounce
> that prof. Ato Quayson has agreed to be our third keynote
> speaker:
>
> Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA)
> University of Amsterdam
>
> CALL FOR PAPERS: "IDENTITIES AND ALTERITIES"
>
> Amsterdam, March 24-26, 2004
>
> Keynote speakers: Peter Hitchcock, Brian McHale and Ato
> Quayson
>
> The Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis (ASCA) invites
> proposals for an international conference on Identities and
> Alterities, to be held in Amsterdam on March 24-26, 2004.
> The conference will explore the concepts of identities and
> alterities, their interrelations and their relevance in
> current academic, public, and political discourse and
> practice. The usability of the concepts of identity,
> identities and identity politics is highly disputed, but it
> nevertheless functions as an important term for the
> self-definition, articulation and emancipation of
> individuals and groups. The concept of "identity" has been
> much-criticized for its presumed tendency to essentialism,
> where identity is primordial, given and determinate, as well
> as for its alleged positing of the subject as a complete,
> centered, being in complete control of his or her actions.
>
> However, as Paul Gilroy has pointed out, "we make our
> identities, but with inherited resources and not under the
> circumstances of our own choosing." In recent years,
> identity has ceased to be an individual, internal term for
> subjectivity, but has evolved into a collective term with an
> inextricable link to alterity, making it a highly useful
> tool for political and historical analyses. Identities are
> continually re-constructed, re-invented and re-interpreted
> in the light of political developments (such as
> decolonisation), in the light of interactions with the
> actual, external other (intersubjectivity), and in the light
> of our position in a postmodern discourse.  We want to
> approach the concepts of identity and alterity from three
> different angles:
>
> * Postcolonialism: Formation as Representation/
> Representation as Formation. This angle explores the
> concepts of identity and alterity in changing societies in
> terms of Stuart Hall's ideas on the politics of articulation
> and representation, and their tactical value for
> establishing identity in terms of shifting alliances and a
> continuous redefinition of boundaries. The very nature of
> the postcolonial necessitates an approach that takes its
> complexity into consideration. The colonial experience is
> diverse in space and time and should not be essentialised as
> a unifying force between different communities. As Richard
> Werbner puts it: "The postcolonial describes at once a
> presence and absence. The now in tension with the not-now,
> which creates a politicized reality."
>
> In the contemporary postcolonial context we are faced with
> numerous identity formations and representations. The
> question arises whether and how these can be systematically
> accounted for. How do we deal with identity formations that
> are "open-ended, productive and fraught with ambivalence"
> (James Clifford), yet constitute and represent communities
> with regard to cultural politics and global economies? And
> if identity is dependent on history and culture, what are
> the effects of colonization and decolonization on its
> conceptualization?  Can indigenous identities transcend
> colonial disruptions in terms of a shared past? In what way
> can a non-essentialist theory of identity engage with the
> reality of conservative manifestations of identity politics?
>
> * Intersubjectivity: Identities in-between self and other.
> We want to explore how identities are established and
> re-established in and through intersubjectivity, in and
> through relations between self and other, both individual
> and collective. The empirical, external other emerges as a
> crucial force in relation to subjectivity, embodiment and
> identity in the work of Mikhail Bakhtin and in Peter
> Hitchcock's elaboration of Bakhtin's concept of exotopy,
> which posits "outsideness as a form of affirmative
> alienation." Similar priority to the other as a positive
> force has been given in various recent psychoanalytic
> approaches (Jean Laplanche, Kaja Silverman, Jessica
> Benjamin).
>
> Questions we want to raise are: Can there be a subject or
> self without the other? Is there identity without alterity
> (without difference, otherness, the other)? In which ways
> can the other form and reform the self, both in line with
> and contrary to dominant cultural representations? What role
> do language, vision, the body, space-time, and translation
> play in the process of establishing identities in-between
> self and other? How can we formulate an ethics or politics
> of intersubjectivity? How do we conceptualize
> intersubjectivity on the collective level of social or
> political groups and/or in relation to postcolonialism and
> transnationalism?
>
> * Postmodernism: after and beyond the "death of the
> subject."  Postmodernism, understood as a discourse (Brian
> McHale), is preoccupied less with the formation of
> identities than with their fragmentation and ultimately,
> dissolution. However, the talk about the "death of the
> subject" has by now grown somewhat stale and it also cannot
> account for those individuals and groups who are not granted
> identity and subjectivity in the first place. The third
> panel will therefore raise the following question: how can
> we theorize the identity of individuals and groups within a
> postmodernist discourse, but in such a way that they retain
> or gain agency?  Postmodern theories have to a large extent
> been preoccupied with the epistemology of subjectivity as it
> had already been envisioned in German idealism, and have
> neglected the active and narrative processes involved in
> identity formation. We will therefore consider what role the
> performative and performativity (Mieke Bal) play in
> producing identities and alterities. It is in this context
> that the concept of alterity can develop its full analytic
> potential, because it allows for an intersubjective
> interplay between real, empirical groups and individuals.
> Questions to be asked include: what is the relation between
> identity and alterity, between self and other in
> postmodernist discourses, artworks and political practices?
> How are identities and alterities produced, performed, and
> challenged?
>
> *   *   *
>
> Participants should outline what conception(s) of identities
> and/or alterities they are proposing, as well as their
> theoretical, political, practical or cultural relevance. The
> concepts may be addressed together or separately and they
> may be correlated with cultural objects such as film,
> artworks, television, literature, photography, music,
> museums, scientific objects/practices, religious
> objects/practices, etc.  This conference is the latest in a
> series of ASCA graduate conferences and is inspired by the
> Theory Seminar organized by Mieke Bal in 2002-2003 on "How
> to do Cultural Analysis." Participants will be expected to
> explain how their work connects to the practice of cultural
> analysis. Papers should aim to establish a dialogue between
> theory and cultural objects, asking not only what the theory
> says about the object, but also what the object says about
> the theory, how it prompts theoretical reformulations - what
> Mieke Bal calls "letting the object speak back."
>
> Please send your one-page proposal, accompanied by a short
> CV, by October 1st 2003.  Proposals will be selected
> according to their relevance to the topics of the
> conference. The workshop format of the conference is
> designed to stimulate the discussion in the panels.
> Participants will be asked to send the final version of
> their papers (4000 word maximum)  by January 25th, 2004. A
> reader will be prepared for each of the panels, which will
> be circulated before the conference.  Instead of "reading"
> their papers at the conference, participants will be asked
> to give a 15-minute presentation on their work, connecting
> their paper to the other papers in their panel and to the
> overall concerns of the conference. Please send your
> proposal to the ASCA office:
>
> Dr. Eloe Kingma (Managing Director ASCA), Spuistraat 210,
> 1012 VT Amsterdam, The Netherlands; tel. +31 20 525 3874,
> fax: +3120 525 3052, <[log in to unmask]>
>
>         <http://www.hum.uva.nl/asca>
>
> Organizing committee: Dr. Silke Horstkotte, Anette Hoffmann,
> Saskia Lourens, Esther Peeren
>
>