Northeast Victorian Studies Association                                                             2006 Conference

 

Ennui (Sickert)CALL FOR PAPERS

VICTORIAN FATIGUE

32nd  Annual Meeting:  April 7-9, 2006 at Drew University, Madison, NJ.

 

NVSA welcomes proposals for papers on the topic of Victorian Fatigue

 

                In a culture proverbially work-obsessed, relentlessly energetic, innovative, imperially and technologically expansive, endlessly inventive, why does fatigue play so important a role in its art, its theory, its science, even its pharmacopeia?  What might the Victorians look like seen through the lens of fatigue rather than of work?  How are various forms of fatigue (exhaustion, indolence, boredom, stress, degeneration, entropy, etc.) understood, not only ethically, or in economic discourse, but in medicine, aesthetics, psychology, technology, and the emerging social sciences?  What role does fatigue play in the era's major scientific theories?   How and to what extent are norms within these diverse realms defined in terms of, or motivated by, the challenge of fatigue?  How might fatigue be imagined, not only as a threat but also as a potential pleasure, an objective or completion or fulfillment?

 

Topics might include (but are not limited to):

The gospel of work and its discontents: fatigue as anxiety, impetus, fulfillment, ground of resistance

Body and mind: weakness, nervous exhaustion, invalidism, depression, insomnia, narcolepsy, neurasthenia, indolence (debilitating and/or luxuriant), boredom, ennui, sensory overload, affective exhaustion, the gendering of fatigue

Social and cultural fatigue: degeneration, decadence, decline; worn-out or exhausted ideologies, artistic forms, discourses, traditions, points of view

Natural and technological fatigue: entropy, degeneration, mechanical fatigue (engineering stress, metal fatigue, corrosion), technological obsolescence

 Forms of treatment: exercise, sport, relaxation, vacations, rest cures, spas, stimulants (chemical and otherwise), opiates, sleep, asylums, domestic comforts, cultural renewal

 Energy and fatigue in the discourses of empire and national identity

 

      For a teaching roundtable, we also welcome separate proposals regarding the relations between undergraduate and graduate instruction in Victorian literature and culture: how do the aims, expectations, emphases, and challenges of teaching the Victorians vary at different levels?  (Roundtable contributors should aim at creating an atmosphere for stimulating discussion rather than presenting a formal paper.)

 

Proposals (no more than two double-spaced pages) by Oct. 15, 2005 (e-mail submissions encouraged):

 

Professor Eileen Gillooly                 e-mail: eg48@columbia.edu
Chair, NVSA Program Committee
English Department
602 Philosophy Hall
Columbia University
New York, NY 10027

 

Please do not send complete papers, and do not include your name on your proposal: we review proposals anonymously.  Please do include your name, institutional and email addresses, and proposal title in a cover letter.  Papers should take 15 minutes (20 minutes maximum) so as to provide ample discussion time.

(OVER)

The Coral Lansbury Travel Grant ($100.00) and George Ford Travel Grant ($100.00), given in memory of key founding members of NVSA, are awarded annually to the graduate student, adjunct instructor, or independent scholar who must travel the greatest distance to give a paper at our conference.  Apply by indicating in your cover letter that you wish to be considered (and mention if you have other sources of funding).

 

To join NVSA, or to renew your membership for the 2005-2006 membership year, please return the attached tear-off to Prof. Joan Dagle.  Dr. Hartley Spatt (24 Center Street, Woodmere, NY 11598) urges all members to send him a note subscribing to the Victorian Studies Bulletin ($5.00 a year).

 

Finally, our Vice-President for Information Services, Professor Glenn Everett, has established a NVSA e-mail list (NVSA-L) and NVSA Home Page  (www.stonehill.edu/nvsa).  The Web site offers items of interest to NVSA members.  NVSA-L is a place to summarize and share conference activities and logistics, and to conduct NVSA business.  It’s used mainly around conference time, so don’t worry that it will clutter up your mailboxes.  To subscribe, send a message to ListProc@stonehill.edu.  Leave the subject line blank; on the message line write SUB-NVSA-L <first and last name>.

 

James Eli Adams, President, NVSA
Department of English                                                 phone: 607-255-4895/255-6800
Cornell University                                                        fax: (607) 255-6661
Ithaca, NY 14853-3201                                                email: jea29@cornell.edu  

 

 

 

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To: Professor Joan Dagle, Secretary/Treasurer. NVSA
Dept. of English, Rhode Island College
Providence, RI 02908

 

I wish to renew my dues or become a member of the Northeast Victorian Studies Association. I have enclosed a check to NVSA for ---$15 in U.S. dollars (regular membership) or ---$10 (student)

 

 

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