‘Ex/changes: multi-disciplinarity, Wales Studies and beyond’
The Twenty-Ninth Annual Conference of the Association for Welsh Writing in English
Gregynog Hall, Newtown, Friday 12th May - Sunday 14th May 2017
Gregynog Hall, Newtown, Friday 12th May - Sunday 14th May 2017
In Welsh literary and cultural studies there is a strong tradition of engagement across disciplines: of exchanges between women’s history and literature, post-devolution politics and poetry, art history and the creation of cultural traditions, to give but a few examples. Wales Studies, as it is being developed by The Learned Society of Wales,* may provide further opportunities for multi-disciplinary thinking about Welsh literature. But what are the rewards or challenges of working across disciplines? What might Wales Studies mean in an increasingly fragmented UK?
A further strand of the conference will focus on theoretical and methodological directions in the field. What is the future direction of gender studies, queer theory and other identity-based approaches? Does postcolonial theory still offer any useful models? How far will the much vaunted spatial turn influence the interpretation of Welsh writing in English? What might the digital turn yield in this field? Is there a case for the return to a more text-focused approach, what one scholar recently described as ‘just reading’?
This conference aims to encourage a conversation about the values and challenges of multi-disciplinary approaches to literature, to map the kinds of critical, methodological and theoretical practices that seem to be of most value at the present time, and to look ahead to the likely preoccupations of the field over the next decade.
Keynote speakers:
Professor M. Wynn Thomas OBE FLSW (Emyr Humphreys Professor of Welsh Writing in English, Swansea University)
Professor Roger Scully FLSW (Professor of Political Science, Cardiff University)
Dr Jon Anderson (Reader in Human Geography, Cardiff University)
Creative Keynote:
Dr Jasmine Donahaye (Author and Associate Professor of Creative Writing, Swansea University)
We welcome papers from new and emerging scholars.
We welcome papers which explore Welsh writing in English with insights gleaned from work being done other fields, including (but not limited to): Wales in the archives, Digital Humanities, Literary Geographies, Gender Studies, Cymraeg, Theology, Philosophy, Life Writing, Four nations/Archipelagic approaches, Cultural History, Disability studies, Welsh writing in English in Education, Visual Arts, Creative critical, Performance, TV and Film, documentary, Devolution, Migration or border studies, Publishing and material culture.
We also encourage the submission of papers which engage reflectively with particular theoretical approaches which are themselves often multi-disciplinary and often seen as intrinsic to literary studies; postcolonialism, queer theory, feminism, ecocriticism, psychoanalysis and so on.
Workshops:
Workshops for MAs, PhDs and post-docs will be held before the conference begins on Friday.
Organisers:
Learned Society of Wales and CREW, Centre for Research into the English Literature and Language of Wales
*The Learned Society of Wales has adopted the study of Wales as a high profile theme. The aim of the project is to bring together existing organisations and networks who share a strongly held belief that a vibrant and successful development of Wales Studies has much to offer Wales, its people and the delivery of the well-being goals of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act. The Society is developing a series of activities, including public lectures and research in to the state of the field, and further details are available at https://www.learnedsociety.wales/our-projects/welsh-studies/.
DEADLINE: Tuesday 28 February 2017
A further strand of the conference will focus on theoretical and methodological directions in the field. What is the future direction of gender studies, queer theory and other identity-based approaches? Does postcolonial theory still offer any useful models? How far will the much vaunted spatial turn influence the interpretation of Welsh writing in English? What might the digital turn yield in this field? Is there a case for the return to a more text-focused approach, what one scholar recently described as ‘just reading’?
This conference aims to encourage a conversation about the values and challenges of multi-disciplinary approaches to literature, to map the kinds of critical, methodological and theoretical practices that seem to be of most value at the present time, and to look ahead to the likely preoccupations of the field over the next decade.
Keynote speakers:
Professor M. Wynn Thomas OBE FLSW (Emyr Humphreys Professor of Welsh Writing in English, Swansea University)
Professor Roger Scully FLSW (Professor of Political Science, Cardiff University)
Dr Jon Anderson (Reader in Human Geography, Cardiff University)
Creative Keynote:
Dr Jasmine Donahaye (Author and Associate Professor of Creative Writing, Swansea University)
We welcome papers from new and emerging scholars.
We welcome papers which explore Welsh writing in English with insights gleaned from work being done other fields, including (but not limited to): Wales in the archives, Digital Humanities, Literary Geographies, Gender Studies, Cymraeg, Theology, Philosophy, Life Writing, Four nations/Archipelagic approaches, Cultural History, Disability studies, Welsh writing in English in Education, Visual Arts, Creative critical, Performance, TV and Film, documentary, Devolution, Migration or border studies, Publishing and material culture.
We also encourage the submission of papers which engage reflectively with particular theoretical approaches which are themselves often multi-disciplinary and often seen as intrinsic to literary studies; postcolonialism, queer theory, feminism, ecocriticism, psychoanalysis and so on.
Workshops:
Workshops for MAs, PhDs and post-docs will be held before the conference begins on Friday.
Organisers:
Learned Society of Wales and CREW, Centre for Research into the English Literature and Language of Wales
*The Learned Society of Wales has adopted the study of Wales as a high profile theme. The aim of the project is to bring together existing organisations and networks who share a strongly held belief that a vibrant and successful development of Wales Studies has much to offer Wales, its people and the delivery of the well-being goals of the Well-being of Future Generations (Wales) Act. The Society is developing a series of activities, including public lectures and research in to the state of the field, and further details are available at https://www.learnedsociety.wales/our-projects/welsh-studies/.
DEADLINE: Tuesday 28 February 2017
Conference Organisers
Dr Sarah Morse (Learned Society of Wales) and Professor Kirsti Bohata (Swansea University)
Responses
- Aidan Byrne (The Plashing Vole) published a set of conference photos on flickr.
- The conference used the Twitter hashtag #awwe17 for commentary during the event, and afterwards.
Documentation
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Download the 2017 call for papers here:
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There was no 2017 booking form, as all bookings were handled online.
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Download the 2017 programme here:
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Download the 2017 book of abstracts here:
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