December 1910 Centenary Conference issues call for papers

Two newly formed networks, the Scottish Network of Modernist Studies and the British Association of Modernist Studies, will host their first major international conference at the University of Glasgow Dec. 10-12.

This inaugural conference is based around Virginia Woolf’s famous and controversial statement in an essay of 1923, often taken as indicating a possible starting-point for modernity, that

on or about December 1910, human character changed.

 The groups invite scholars and practitioners from all disciplines to respond to any aspect of this statement. Relevant disciplines might include but are not restricted to literature, history of art, cultural history and the history of ideas.

Topics might include but are not restricted to:

• glossing the symptoms of change in 1910 that Woolf cites in her explanation of that slogan.
• broader contexts and tangents, literary, cultural, political, historical, which might include:
  • death of the King; Asquith government crisis; suffragettes and other political unrest;
  • Post-Impressionist show; Dreadnought hoax;
  • events beyond Britain in Europe, Mexico, Africa etc.;
  • books published in 1910;
  • activities of key cultural figures at that moment;
  • 1910 diary entries.

• philosophy on or about 1910 – idealism, pragmatism and beyond.
• religion, spirituality, modernity.
• periodization and theories of change.
• theories and representations of ‘human character’.
• 1910 seen from the 1920s.
• ‘in or about’ or ‘on or about’?
  • Prepositions and temporality.
  • Versions of Woolf – Leonard Woolf as editor.
• accuracy and arbitrariness.

Organizers have already received panel proposals in the following areas and would also welcome expressions of interest in these areas:

• Scotland 1910
• Film around 1910
• Modernism and Theory
• Women at 1910
• On or about December 2010: Human Character in the Age of Climate Change
• Politics 1910
• The periodical scene in 1910
• Literature and the visual arts
• The book in 1910
• 1910 and middlebrow culture
• Music and 1910
• Europe 1910
• 1910 and intermodernism
• Periodising the century
• Theatre and 1910

Paper abstracts of 200 words; or proposals for panels, round-tables, seminars or other expressions of interest, should be sent to conference organizers Bryony Randall and Matthew Creasy via e-mail at snms@arts.gla.ac.uk by May 1

Visit the conference Web site for more details.

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