Seen in UPenn CFP:
Backward Glances: 31st August - 1st September
University College, Cork
contact email: backwardglances@ucc.ie
Call For Papers:
Backward Glances: History, Imagination, and Memory
University College Cork, Ireland.
31st August – 1st September 2011
Society is marked by a fascination with its past, yet this need or desire to look backward and understand, is complicated by the illusive nature of the past. Accessible only through the sites of text, memory and imagination, the past is, in essence, unstable and transitory. Both individual and communal in nature, it is continually exposed to processes of re-interpretation, revision, and re-writing. Anchored in the present, the backward glance is influenced by the concerns and needs of that present, and subject to the dominant ideological perspectives of a fleeting contemporary moment.
Backward Glances, a two-day interdisciplinary conference at University College Cork, seeks to generate dialogue and debate about the nature and function of the retrospective gaze. Exploring the diverse modes by which culture strives to assimilate its history, the conference considers the manner in which constructions of the past are conditioned by the lens of the present. The desire to reflect on and reshape former times is not limited to literature. The organisers invite 20-minute papers from a wide variety of fields. Topics may include but are not confined to:
• National history and national memory
• Spaces of Memory
• Historical fiction
• Individual and collective pasts
• Contested histories
• History and trauma
• History and gender
• Memoirs/Biography
Abstracts of approximately 200-250 words to be submitted to backwardglances@ucc.ie by 12th May 2011.
Please direct any queries to this address or see our website www.ucc.ie/backwardglances for more information.
Showing posts with label gender. Show all posts
Showing posts with label gender. Show all posts
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Tuesday, May 11, 2010
Conference: Forms and Functions of Social Memories
From UPENN CFP:
Call for Papers (see website here):
Forms and Functions of Social Memories -- Perspectives from Social and Cultural Sciences
The conference "Forms and Functions of Social Memories -- Perspectives from Social and Cultural Sciences" takes place at the Institute for Sociology of the University of Erlangen. It starts at December 10th and ends December 12th around noon. It is planned as a mixture between plenary and panel sessions.
Please send a 500 words proposal for a 30 min. paper by September 30th, 2010 to: info@soziale-erinnerung.de.
The conference aims at collecting and re-considering the manifold empirical research on social memories on behalf of their theoretical potential. It is an astonishing fact, that despite of a lot of research in social and cultural sciences on social memories there are rather few comprehensive theoretical considerations. Therefore, we want to set the focus on the integration of different theoretical approaches and empirical research.
In the self-definition of modernity multiple social memories take the place of the "Great Narrative" on different levels that don't have to be compatible. A theory of social memories faces the problem of integrating social dynamics, cultural pluralisation and processes of social differentiation without ignoring contexts of interactions like families or milieus. However, the circulating terms and definitions of forms of social memories should not just be placed side by side. Instead we want to focus, empirically and theoretically, on the processes of formation and constitution that underlie these conceptualizations to work out both lines of conflict and potentials of integration.
The conference would like to discuss theoretical concepts and empirical studies concerning social memories in an interdisciplinary framework. Based on these discussions we would like to ask for theoretical enhancements. From performative acts to narrative situations of interaction or discourse, constructions and representations of the past should be observed in conjunction with problems like oblivion, authenticity, factuality and validity or breaches in the transmission of the past. On the one hand the future directedness of social memories in form of again and again constituted horizons of expectations should be clarified. On the other hand it is deemed to analyse social memories in their function as mechanisms of "Transmission" regarding the specific selectivities that evolve at the intersections (of persons, groups, generations, discourses, etc.) and that constitute the specific relationship between remembrance and oblivion. According to this, the definition of the particular functionality of memories for the processes of social and individual formation of meaning is important, on both counts biographically and systemically.
Of equal importance is the reflection of institutionalised remembrance and of the own position of a speaker: Scientists are directly or indirectly involved in the practice of (institutionalised) remembrance and therefore are facing the challenge of concerning themselves with its contexts, conditions, (political) purpose and the implicit ideologies.
We have invited the following speakers: Paul Connerton (Oxford/UK), Elena Esposito (Modena/Reggio Emilia/ Italy), Mary Fulbrook (London/UK), Jeffrey K. Olick (Virginia/USA), Gabriele Rosenthal (Goettingen/Germany), Joanna Tokarska-Bakir (Warsaw/Poland), Christian Gudehus (Essen/Germany)
Topics include:
* Individual -- Interaction -- Society: boundaries and transitions between the different forms of memories
* Metaphors, terms and forms of social memories and their conditions of formation
* Influence of social differentiation on social remembrance (generations, classes, cultural pluralisation, gender, etc.)
* Transformation of social memories (interdependency of social transformations, processes and social memories)
* Facticity, authenticity and the realm of experience
* Media, discourse and their functions for remembrance
* Re-presentations of the past (body memory, rituals, sites of remembrance, etc.)
* Social and individual practices of remembrance
* Transgenerational transmission and breaches of tradition
* Remembrance and oblivion between institution, power and ideology
The conference languages will be English and German. The presentations are intended to be published in a special volume of a sociological journal after the conference.
Deutsch
Call for Papers (see website here):
Forms and Functions of Social Memories -- Perspectives from Social and Cultural Sciences
The conference "Forms and Functions of Social Memories -- Perspectives from Social and Cultural Sciences" takes place at the Institute for Sociology of the University of Erlangen. It starts at December 10th and ends December 12th around noon. It is planned as a mixture between plenary and panel sessions.
Please send a 500 words proposal for a 30 min. paper by September 30th, 2010 to: info@soziale-erinnerung.de.
The conference aims at collecting and re-considering the manifold empirical research on social memories on behalf of their theoretical potential. It is an astonishing fact, that despite of a lot of research in social and cultural sciences on social memories there are rather few comprehensive theoretical considerations. Therefore, we want to set the focus on the integration of different theoretical approaches and empirical research.
In the self-definition of modernity multiple social memories take the place of the "Great Narrative" on different levels that don't have to be compatible. A theory of social memories faces the problem of integrating social dynamics, cultural pluralisation and processes of social differentiation without ignoring contexts of interactions like families or milieus. However, the circulating terms and definitions of forms of social memories should not just be placed side by side. Instead we want to focus, empirically and theoretically, on the processes of formation and constitution that underlie these conceptualizations to work out both lines of conflict and potentials of integration.
The conference would like to discuss theoretical concepts and empirical studies concerning social memories in an interdisciplinary framework. Based on these discussions we would like to ask for theoretical enhancements. From performative acts to narrative situations of interaction or discourse, constructions and representations of the past should be observed in conjunction with problems like oblivion, authenticity, factuality and validity or breaches in the transmission of the past. On the one hand the future directedness of social memories in form of again and again constituted horizons of expectations should be clarified. On the other hand it is deemed to analyse social memories in their function as mechanisms of "Transmission" regarding the specific selectivities that evolve at the intersections (of persons, groups, generations, discourses, etc.) and that constitute the specific relationship between remembrance and oblivion. According to this, the definition of the particular functionality of memories for the processes of social and individual formation of meaning is important, on both counts biographically and systemically.
Of equal importance is the reflection of institutionalised remembrance and of the own position of a speaker: Scientists are directly or indirectly involved in the practice of (institutionalised) remembrance and therefore are facing the challenge of concerning themselves with its contexts, conditions, (political) purpose and the implicit ideologies.
We have invited the following speakers: Paul Connerton (Oxford/UK), Elena Esposito (Modena/Reggio Emilia/ Italy), Mary Fulbrook (London/UK), Jeffrey K. Olick (Virginia/USA), Gabriele Rosenthal (Goettingen/Germany), Joanna Tokarska-Bakir (Warsaw/Poland), Christian Gudehus (Essen/Germany)
Topics include:
* Individual -- Interaction -- Society: boundaries and transitions between the different forms of memories
* Metaphors, terms and forms of social memories and their conditions of formation
* Influence of social differentiation on social remembrance (generations, classes, cultural pluralisation, gender, etc.)
* Transformation of social memories (interdependency of social transformations, processes and social memories)
* Facticity, authenticity and the realm of experience
* Media, discourse and their functions for remembrance
* Re-presentations of the past (body memory, rituals, sites of remembrance, etc.)
* Social and individual practices of remembrance
* Transgenerational transmission and breaches of tradition
* Remembrance and oblivion between institution, power and ideology
The conference languages will be English and German. The presentations are intended to be published in a special volume of a sociological journal after the conference.
Deutsch
Thursday, January 7, 2010
The Children of Fascist Parents
In Germany, there is an entire sub-genre of "second generation" literature, which includes works not only by and about the children of Holocaust victims, but by and about the children of Nazi perpetrators. In Spain, the context with which I am most familiar, it is difficult, if not impossible, to recall memoirs written by the children of Francoist parents (not that the experiences of the children of Nazis and the children of Francoists are necessarily comparable). In recent years, the focus has really been on the victims of the Franco dictatorship and their descendants -- and with good reason. I am still waiting to read Esther Tusquets's Habíamos ganado la guerra (We Had Won the War), but from what I have heard, this memoir is one of the few to address openly a childhood in the heart of a pro-Franco family of the Catalonian bourgeoisie.
A recent BBC report addressed the children of "Blackshirt women." I wish I could have heard the broadcast, but unfortunately, it is only available in the U.K.
Blackshirt women's children live with shame
By James Maw
Presenter, Mother Was A Blackshirt
Children of Blackshirt women, who joined Oswald Mosley's pro-Nazi British Union of Fascists, often feel that they have had to live with the burden of the guilt and shame caused by their mothers' fascist sympathies.
When I was 11, I was taken by my mother to visit her birthplace in Kennington, London.
As we walked around my mother showed me where the air-raid shelters were during the war, but then she began telling me about the Blackshirt meetings.
At 11 it did not mean much to me but it has played on my mind ever since.
I decided to reopen the case of how the Blackshirts attempted to recruit my mother.
It led me to question how many British women supported Hitler during the war, and what was their fate?
"I could have ended up in prison," my mother said.
And many of these women did.
Now aged 88, my mother told me about the ink factory she worked in as a young girl.
"At first I was packing ink, it was horrible.
"There I met Primrose, nobody liked her, but she invited me home.
"I met her family and I fell for it - they were trying to get me to be a Blackshirt."
Inflammatory speeches
In documentaries about the Blackshirts, the pictures I have seen are only of men, marching in the streets in their paramilitary uniforms.
I knew about the daughters of the aristocracy, like Diana Mitford who married Oswald Mosley, but I had not realised that young girls, like my own mother, could have been sucked in too.
But speaking to the historian Julie Gottlieb (author of Feminine Fascism) I was surprised to learn that the first fascist political organisation in Britain was actually founded by a woman.
"It was called the fascisti, then changed its name to the British Fascists and it was founded... in 1923, by a Miss Rotha Lintorn-Orman," she told me.
Until then the most prominent political movement for women had been the Suffragettes.
One of the most influential Suffragettes was Norah Elam, who was in charge of propaganda and imprisoned for making inflammatory speeches on women's suffrage.
Sent to Holloway prison in 1914, she shared a cell with Emmeline Pankhurst, leader of the British Suffragettes.
But Norah Elam was imprisoned again during World War II, this time with Diana Mosley, wife of the fascist leader.
Like me, Norah's granddaughter and great-granddaughter Angela and Susan McPherson have been on a quest to find out more about their family's history.
They knew little about the colourful past of their granny Norah.
"It was a bit of a shock," they told me. A bit of a shock indeed.
'Battle of the shirts'
But women like my mother were not interested in politics, as Norah Elam was, so was it the comradeship or merely the appeal of the smart uniform that was the attraction?
Julie Gottlieb described the Blackshirt uniform as "a great marketing tool, and an incredible draw particularly for the youth. Some historians call this period the battle of the shirts".
The party grew and even children were recruited to support Hitler's ideology.
Diana Bailey, as a young girl in Bognor Regis, remembers her mother and father in their Blackshirt uniforms.
"We were told to paint slogans on the walls with 'Britain Awake' and 'Perish the Jews'. I was nine years old," she said.
Francis Beckett's mother Anne was also a young working woman, like my mother.
Anne was sent along to Mosley's headquarters by the Pitman's Shorthand temp agency to work as a secretary.
"She wanted to be an actress but she made what she said was a dreadful mistake, she learnt shorthand.
"Pitman's sent her to Black House, HQ for the Blackshirts. She found it exciting.
"She was never a racist but worked amongst racists," Francis Beckett said.
It was at fascist headquarters that Anne joined the Blackshirts and met and later married one of the Blackshirt elite, John Beckett, Francis's father.
John was sent to prison with Oswald Mosley during the war - and his family spent the rest of their lives living hand to mouth.
A former Labour MP, John Beckett should have taken his place in the post-war Attlee government. Instead, he worked as a night watchman for Securicor.
Seeing how easily Francis's mother had become a Blackshirt, I asked my mother if something similar had happened to her, with her factory workmate Primrose and her fascist family.
"They were talking about these meetings - I thought they had got me there for a reason.
"They were talking about Mosley, so after this I left, and later gave in my notice at the ink factory," she said.
So after all these years I can stop imagining my mother sitting in the rows of a mass meeting, 'sieg heiling' their leader and being hauled off to Holloway Prison.
But in talking to these families I can see how life could so easily have been very different for my family.
Diana Bailey continues to live with the consequences of her parents' actions - and says she will never lose her feelings of guilt.
"When Richard Dimbleby went into Belsen I felt the guilt of the whole of the world, I felt utterly responsible for what happened in those camps, because I did write 'Perish the Jews' on walls, it is something I will never get over."
Mother Was a Blackshirt will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Monday 4 January at 1100 GMT.
Or catch-up afterwards on BBC
(UK only).
Story from BBC NEWS
A recent BBC report addressed the children of "Blackshirt women." I wish I could have heard the broadcast, but unfortunately, it is only available in the U.K.
Blackshirt women's children live with shame
By James Maw
Presenter, Mother Was A Blackshirt
Children of Blackshirt women, who joined Oswald Mosley's pro-Nazi British Union of Fascists, often feel that they have had to live with the burden of the guilt and shame caused by their mothers' fascist sympathies.
When I was 11, I was taken by my mother to visit her birthplace in Kennington, London.
As we walked around my mother showed me where the air-raid shelters were during the war, but then she began telling me about the Blackshirt meetings.
At 11 it did not mean much to me but it has played on my mind ever since.
I decided to reopen the case of how the Blackshirts attempted to recruit my mother.
It led me to question how many British women supported Hitler during the war, and what was their fate?
"I could have ended up in prison," my mother said.
And many of these women did.
Now aged 88, my mother told me about the ink factory she worked in as a young girl.
"At first I was packing ink, it was horrible.
"There I met Primrose, nobody liked her, but she invited me home.
"I met her family and I fell for it - they were trying to get me to be a Blackshirt."
Inflammatory speeches
In documentaries about the Blackshirts, the pictures I have seen are only of men, marching in the streets in their paramilitary uniforms.
I knew about the daughters of the aristocracy, like Diana Mitford who married Oswald Mosley, but I had not realised that young girls, like my own mother, could have been sucked in too.
But speaking to the historian Julie Gottlieb (author of Feminine Fascism) I was surprised to learn that the first fascist political organisation in Britain was actually founded by a woman.
"It was called the fascisti, then changed its name to the British Fascists and it was founded... in 1923, by a Miss Rotha Lintorn-Orman," she told me.
Until then the most prominent political movement for women had been the Suffragettes.
One of the most influential Suffragettes was Norah Elam, who was in charge of propaganda and imprisoned for making inflammatory speeches on women's suffrage.
Sent to Holloway prison in 1914, she shared a cell with Emmeline Pankhurst, leader of the British Suffragettes.
But Norah Elam was imprisoned again during World War II, this time with Diana Mosley, wife of the fascist leader.
Like me, Norah's granddaughter and great-granddaughter Angela and Susan McPherson have been on a quest to find out more about their family's history.
They knew little about the colourful past of their granny Norah.
"It was a bit of a shock," they told me. A bit of a shock indeed.
'Battle of the shirts'
But women like my mother were not interested in politics, as Norah Elam was, so was it the comradeship or merely the appeal of the smart uniform that was the attraction?
Julie Gottlieb described the Blackshirt uniform as "a great marketing tool, and an incredible draw particularly for the youth. Some historians call this period the battle of the shirts".
The party grew and even children were recruited to support Hitler's ideology.
Diana Bailey, as a young girl in Bognor Regis, remembers her mother and father in their Blackshirt uniforms.
"We were told to paint slogans on the walls with 'Britain Awake' and 'Perish the Jews'. I was nine years old," she said.
Francis Beckett's mother Anne was also a young working woman, like my mother.
Anne was sent along to Mosley's headquarters by the Pitman's Shorthand temp agency to work as a secretary.
"She wanted to be an actress but she made what she said was a dreadful mistake, she learnt shorthand.
"Pitman's sent her to Black House, HQ for the Blackshirts. She found it exciting.
"She was never a racist but worked amongst racists," Francis Beckett said.
It was at fascist headquarters that Anne joined the Blackshirts and met and later married one of the Blackshirt elite, John Beckett, Francis's father.
John was sent to prison with Oswald Mosley during the war - and his family spent the rest of their lives living hand to mouth.
A former Labour MP, John Beckett should have taken his place in the post-war Attlee government. Instead, he worked as a night watchman for Securicor.
Seeing how easily Francis's mother had become a Blackshirt, I asked my mother if something similar had happened to her, with her factory workmate Primrose and her fascist family.
"They were talking about these meetings - I thought they had got me there for a reason.
"They were talking about Mosley, so after this I left, and later gave in my notice at the ink factory," she said.
So after all these years I can stop imagining my mother sitting in the rows of a mass meeting, 'sieg heiling' their leader and being hauled off to Holloway Prison.
But in talking to these families I can see how life could so easily have been very different for my family.
Diana Bailey continues to live with the consequences of her parents' actions - and says she will never lose her feelings of guilt.
"When Richard Dimbleby went into Belsen I felt the guilt of the whole of the world, I felt utterly responsible for what happened in those camps, because I did write 'Perish the Jews' on walls, it is something I will never get over."
Mother Was a Blackshirt will be broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on Monday 4 January at 1100 GMT.
Or catch-up afterwards on BBC
(UK only).
Story from BBC NEWS
Thursday, December 3, 2009
Gendering Historiography
I am so excited to take a look at this book (left)! I just read a very interesting article in the latest issue of the PMLA (special topic: war), which got me thinking again about the often-overlooked connections between memory and gender and all that is still left to explore.Info:
Gendering Historiography
Beyond National Canons
244 pages, 5 1/2 x 8 3/8
Paper $40.00
ISBN: 9783593389608 Published November 2009
Comparing various European and American historiographies from the past two hundred years, Gendering Historiography provides insights into the establishment and cultivation of gendered power relations in different societies and outlines the devastating effects that exclusionary practices can have on each national canon. This detailed and revealing book will change the face of history writing, bringing overlooked and previously excluded histories back into modern historiography.
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