Annual Conference: Intersections of Resistance in the Space Between
June 7-9, 2018
University of Northern Colorado, Greeley, CO
The 20th annual meeting of the Space Between Society is partnering with the recently formed Feminist inter/Modernist Association (FiMA) to provide a unique opportunity to forge deeper connections within our research and pedagogy. By combining the mission of each society, we unite in the hopes of rethinking and producing new intersections in scholarship of the WWI, interwar, and WWII periods, especially as they uncover the rich vein of feminist practices across the space between. Central to our conversations at the conference will be this question:
What becomes possible for our understanding of the cultural productions of the space between and of feminist intermodernisms when we begin to look at how various forms of resistance intersect?
Shifts in the world’s political climate have energized humans to re-imagine structures of power that oppress, silence, and immobilize. Those who cultivate communities where diversity, inclusivity, and civil discourse thrive, unite under the term “resistance” to rally against forces that seek to neutralize differences and impose restrictions on civil liberties. Yet, as a term, an idea, and a practice, “resistance” requires critical inquiry. Resistance does not always suggest overhaul or revolution, but rather, invites ways in which existing structures might be reconfigured to make space for multiple voices. Culture makers of the interwar period critiqued the values of both antagonists that led to the ambiguous causes, goals, and unnecessary human losses of WWI. By contrast, writers of WWII called for the activation of humanistic values to defeat the Axis powers' unambiguous goal of global conquest. Resistance is now back in significant ways, and carries cultural capital that is rich for analysis in our scholarship, our teaching, and our everyday actions.
We seek paper proposals that engage possible intersections and modes of resistance rooted in the World War I, interwar, and World War II periods across disciplines and media. Potential topics include but are not limited to:
- Engaging with Terms: Intersection/Intersectionality, Resistance, Refusal, Persistence
- Feminist Work (suffrage, economics, the home, the front, etc…)
- Activism of Resistance (militant, pacifist, union organizing, etc…)
- Social and Political Networks/Community Groups and Initiatives
- Class Privilege and Limitations
- Feminist Interventions into Genre and Canonicity
- Intermodernist Reconfigurations
- Embodiment and Identity
- Feminist Spaces (urban, suburban, rural, natural, mechanized, hybrid etc…)
- Religion and Spirituality
- Commemoration and Monuments
- Resistance by Design (fashion, architecture, art, music, dance, etc…)
- Media and New Technologies (film, radio, print, etc . . .)
- Rhetoric of Slogan and Image: propaganda and advertising
- Archives, Self-Fashioning, Narrative Preservation, Recovery, Recuperation
- Lines of Least Resistance: Complicity, Collaboration, Treason/Betrayal
NEW FEATURE:
In addition to traditional thematic panels, we will be organizing roundtables on the conference theme, both on research and on pedagogy. Potential participants are invited to submit a roundtable presentation proposal, which should consider these two questions in light of either your research or your teaching:
What can “resistance” mean for feminism, modernism, intermodernism, and today?
How does thinking about “intersection” open up new ways of understanding resistance?
Potential participants may submit both an abstract for a traditional paper and a roundtable proposal.
Please send abstracts and roundtable proposals of no more than 300 words to sarah.cornish@unco.edu by December 1, 2017. Submissions should include the author’s name, affiliation, and contact information.
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