[NIS_GS:] CFP: Ghosts, Gender, History (no deadline noted; ACLA, 3/23/06-3/26/06)
Paper proposals are invited for the following seminar at the 2006 American Comparative Literature Association Annual Conference in Princeton, NJ:
"Ghosts, Gender, History"
Seminar Organizer: Sladja Blazan, Humboldt University (Berlin)

In most cultures the figure of the ghost stands for a forceful separation of past and present. Some cultures integrate the ghost figure into the present in order to provide a sense of continuity.
In literature and film the ghost motif has been directly associated with particular cultural meanings, but has also been used as a plot element free of the confines of realism. The meaning of the ghost is deferred (Derrida). This quality of the ghost, neither dead nor alive, neither present nor absent, provided a forum for addressing feminist issues.
Some of the first ghost stories were written by women. Charlotte Perkins Gilmans classic The Yellow Walpaper (1892) was only the best-known of an enormous body of fiction of its type. Many examples address ethnic/race issues. This seminar examines and asseses the various versions of the ghost motif in literature as an opportunity to articulate identity questions, cultural fears, and minority issues.
We will focus on ghostly ambitions written by women writers. The figure
of the ghost crosses boundaries of language, nationality, culture,
class, rase/ethnicity, gender and sexuality. At the same time it is the Other within who speaks for all of them. How has this oppositional quality been used and by whom? Papers on classic incarnations of ghost literature as well as more recent sightings in fiction are welcome.

Abstracts should be 250 words, and submitted online at:
http://aslamp01.princeton.edu/%7Eoitdas/acla06/

The American Comparative Literature Association annual conference is
organized primarily into seminars (or "streams"), which consist either
of twelve papers, if they meet on all three days of the conference, or
eight to nine papers, if they meet on two days. Papers should be 15-20
minutes long-no longer-to allow time for discussion. For further
information about the conference, including the format, please see:

http://webscript.princeton.edu/~acla06/site/

Please feel free to contact me with any questions, but all abstracts must be submitted through the online form above.

Sladja Blazan
Humboldt University
Berlin
Germany

S.Blazan@gmx.de
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