THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL IN POSTMILLENNIAL EUROPE
9th International SELICUP Conference (Spanish Society for the Study of Popular Culture)
organized by
The Department of British and American Studies, Pavol Jozef Šafárik University in Košice, Slovakia
& SKASE (Slovak Association for the Study of English)
in collaboration with
The University of the Balearic Islands’ Research Group in British and Comparative Cultural Studies (BRICCS)
and The ‘21st-Century Anglophone Literatures: Narrative and Performative Spaces’ Research Network
22 – 24 October 2020, Košice, Slovakia
Conference website: http://kaa.ff.upjs.sk
CALL FOR PAPERS
Scholarly debates increasingly revolve around the influence of global economic processes on cultural production. As Jeffrey Nealon (2012) argues, contemporary concerns with the ‘structuring mutations in the relations among cultural production and economic production’ have gained prominence as a reaction to intensified neoliberalism and globalization. Nealon has noted how capitalism has lately increased its control over social and cultural mechanisms—an increase he relates to the ‘intensification of the existing biopolitical sources’. The relationships between globalization, cultural production and identity construction are further complicated by the myriad processes that have fundamentally reconfigured the economic, political, social and cultural spheres. Representing both the ‘tendency towards homogeneity, synchronization, integration, unity and universalism’ and the ‘propensity for localization, heterogeneity, differentiation, diversity and particularism’ (Bornman, 2003), globalization seems to give rise to structural tension in postmillennial societies.
This tension is particularly apparent in the interactions between globalization and identity discourses. Since the former has affected all traditional processes of identity construction, there are many in postmillennial societies that are experiencing identity struggles, in a complex process that may include self-construction (Bauman, 2001; Bornman, 2003), the creolization of identities (Bourriaud, 2009), the rise of hyperindividualism (Lipovetsky, 2005) and pseudoautism (Kirby, 2009), the collapse of the sense of community (Bauman, 2001) and the rise of surrogate communities—interest groups, professional groups, virtual groups (Bornman, 2003); the appearance of new identities—not only a cosmopolitan identity marked by a sense of disembeddedness but also a global identity that implies ‘global self-reflection’ and ‘identification with the total of humankind’ (Bornman, 2003).
On the other hand, the pressure of globalization has also revitalized ethnic, regional, and communal identities and encouraged the emergence of ‘glocalization’ (Robertson, 1995), which includes the ‘innovative hybrid practices that local cultures have invented to assert their identity’ (Tartaglia and Rossi, 2015). This has also provoked an increase in regionalism rooted in local identity; i.e. an identity which ‘harbours emotional and symbolic meanings that people ascribe to a sense of self and the attachment to place’ (Tartaglia and Rossi, 2015). The complex tension emanating from opposing forces like globalization and glocalization, global and local identities, the creolization of culture and the preservation of ethnic and regional cultural specifics lies at the centre of current phenomena affecting languages and cultures around the world—becoming especially visible in the sphere of literature and the media.
Since mass production, consumption and communication have all produced a world in which it is increasingly difficult to identify a cultural centre, the previously dominant postmodernist and postcolonial theories no longer have the capacity to effectively address the changing character of the globalized world, as several scholars have noted (O’Brien and Szeman, 2001; Lipovetsky, 2005; Bourriaud, 2009; Kirby, 2009; Vermeulen and van den Akker, 2010; Nealon, 2012). An effective examination of the influence of globalization on literary, cultural and media production and its effects on contemporary identity struggles calls for the employment of novel research strategies.
In light of the above, this conference will foster the analysis of contemporary cultural productions. It will do so by providing an interdisciplinary forum for the discussion of the intersections between theoretical approaches to globalization, identity and those recent formulations attempting to define a new cultural paradigm.
The conference will prioritize (but will not be necessarily limited to) the following thematic strands:
- The influence of globalization and the evidence of identity struggles across languages and cultures
- Local vs global spaces in contemporary literature and media
- The role of the so-called ‘transnational novel of globalization’ in contemporary literature
- A new cultural paradigm? Theoretical approaches and case studies
- Gender challenges in postmillennial societies
- Sustainability and ecocriticism: new perspectives from the humanities and social sciences
- The emergence of new fields of sociocultural inquiry: city and urban studies, cultural mapping, food studies, neuro-literary studies…
The Organizing and Scientific Committee will also be happy to consider individual paper or whole panel proposals addressing the conference’s main topic from perspectives other than those specified in the above-mentioned thematic strands.
Organizing Committee:
- Dr Patricia Bastida-Rodríguez (University of the Balearic Islands, Spain)
- Dr Šárka Bubíková (University of Pardubice, Czech Republic)
- Prof Isabel Carrera Suárez (University of Oviedo, Spain)
- Prof Sabine Coelsch-Foisner (University of Salzburg, Austria)
- Prof María José Coperías-Aguilar (University of Valencia, Spain)
- Prof Reghina Dascal (West University in Timisoara, Romania)
- Prof Robert L. Davis (University of Oregon, USA)
- Prof Ákos Farkas (Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest, Hungary)
- Prof Milada Franková (Masaryk University in Brno, Czech Republic)
- Dr Eduardo de Gregorio-Godeo (University of Castilla-La Mancha, Spain)
- Prof Jane Ekstam (Østfold University College, Norway)
- Dr Angela Fabris (University of Klagenfurt, Austria)
- Dr Maria Losada Friend (University of Pablo de Olavide in Sevilla, Spain)
- Dr Mihai Iacob (University of Bucharest, Romania)
- Dr Dragos Ivana (University of Bucharest, Romania)
- Dr Rubén Jarazo-Álvarez (University of the Balearic Islands, Spain)
- Dr Milena Kaličanin (University of Niš, Serbia)
- Dr Janka Kaščáková (Catholic University in Ružomberok, Slovakia)
- Prof Wieslaw Krajka (Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin, Poland)
- Prof Tiziana Lippiello (Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, Italy)
- Prof Vesna Lopičić (University of Niš, Serbia)
- Prof María Jesús Lorenzo-Modia (University of A Coruña, Spain)
- Dr Natalia Magnes (Saint Petersburg State University, Russian Federation)
- Prof Belén Martín-Lucas (University of Vigo, Spain)
- Prof Gerardine Meany (University College Dublin, Ireland)
- Prof Anne-Marie Motard (Paul Valéry University of Montpellier, France)
- Dr Sara Martín-Alegre (Autonomous University of Barcelona, Spain)
- Dr Armela Panajoti (University of Vlora ‘Ismail Qemali’, Albania)
- Prof Dana Percec (West University in Timisoara, Romania)
- Dr Roberta Piazza (University of Sussex, UK)
- Dr José Igor Prieto-Arranz (University of the Balearic Islands, Spain)
- Prof Paul Julian Smith (Graduate Center, City University of New York, USA)
- Dr Alcina Sousa (University of Madeira, Portugal)
- Dr Julia Szoltysek (University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland)
- Dr Bledar Toska (University of Vlora ‘Ismail Qemali’, Albania)
- Dr Elke Weismann (Edge Hill University, UK)
- Prof Nadia Yesypenko (Yuriy Fedkovych Chernivtsi National University, Ukraine)
Panel and Abstract submission:
We invite proposals for twenty-minute papers. Panel proposals are also welcome. Submissions will be subjected to double-blind peer review. Abstracts (250-300 words) clearly defining the topic and the aims pursued in the paper should be submitted by e-mail as WORD attachments to:
Dr. Soňa Šnircová (selicup2020@gmail.com) by 10 April 2020.
Deadlines:
- Abstract submission: by 10 April 2020
- Notification of acceptance: by 10 May 2020
- Early bird registration: by 30 June 2020
- Standard registration: 1 July – 5 September 2020
Registration fees | Early bird registration (until 30 June 2020) |
Standard registration (from 1 July to 5 September 2020) |
1. SELICUP members presenting a paper | €40 | €85 |
2. SELICUP members (attendance only) | Free | Free |
3. Non-SELICUP members presenting a paper | €75 | €100 |
4. Non-SELICUP members and accompanying persons (attendance only, excluding categories 5 and 6 below) | €50 | €100 |
5. PhD candidates presenting a paper | €50 | €100 |
6. University students and unemployed persons (attendance only) |
Free | Free |
*Delegates in categories 5 and 6 should provide evidence of their special status when registering (by attaching e.g. scanned copies of their university registration forms or documents / documentation certifying jobseeker status).
Conference website: http://kaa.ff.upjs.sk
The ‘21st-Century Anglophone Literatures: Narrative and Performative Spaces’ Research Network (RED2018-102678-T)