Wednesday 22 April 2015

Programme - Including rooms and times

Imagined Spaces: Literature and Environments

University of Bristol, Wednesday April 29th 2015
MA Conference Programme 2015

11.00-11.30: Registration
G5, 3-5 Woodland Road

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11.30-12.00: Plenary
Professor Ralph Pite (University of Bristol), LT1, 3-5 Woodland Road

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12.00-13.30: Session 1

Panel 1: On the Stage
 LR1, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Emily Derbyshire (University of Bristol)

The Communal Magic If - Creating Physical, Imaginative and Performative Spaces in the Rehearsal Room - Danielle Arden (Actor, Writer, Filmmaker)

Reshaping Memory through Space: The Case of the Coppola Theatre- Stefania Placenti (University of Bristol)

Beyond Dionysian Liminality: Rethinking Space in Euripides’s The Bacchae- David Bullen (Royal Holloway, University of London)

The Dark Back of Literature: Shakespearean Allusions in Contemporary European Fiction- Ian Ellison (University of Bristol)

Panel 2: Vistas
G11, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Andrew Giles (University of Bristol)

Like Shakespeare’s Day: Green Pleasure and Avant-garde Nostalgia in Audience Responses to Shakespeare Outdoors - Evelyn O’Malley (Exeter University)

Place Destruction and the Crisis of Meaning in Environmental Fiction- Sophia David (University of Exeter)

Antholomorphism: The Landscaping of Poetry Anthologies - Lucy Summers (Bath Spa University)

Landscape in the Poetry of Elizabeth Bishop- Erin Fox (University of Bristol)

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13.30-14.15: Lunch
 G5, 3-5 Woodland Road
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14.15- 15.45: Session 2
Panel 3: There and Back
LR1, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Rowan Evans (University of Bristol)

As I Walked Out in the Mystic Garden’: Bob Dylan’s American Adam- Craig Savage (University of Bristol)

Freedom and Fatherland: The Childhood Idyll and the Voyage in the Literary Criticism of Theodor Adorno and Gilles Deleuze- Frederick Myles (Goethe-Universität)

Pastorealism: Poetry of the Contemporary Landscape- Mark Haworth Booth (University of Exeter)

Panel 4: Branching Out
G11, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Josie-Jade Johnson (University of Bristol)

Kalevala: The Trees and Forests of the Finnish National Epic- Kayleigh Toyra (Bristol University)

Thinking in Place: The influence of Heidegger’s Hut- Jeremy Walton (University of the West of England)

The Fairy Tale World: Spatial Representation in the Stories of the Brothers Grimm- Catherine Stiles (Bristol University)

A Logic of Sense of Place: a ramble around meaning - Nina Lyon (Cardiff University)

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15.45-16.00: Tea break
G5, 3-5 Woodland Road
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16.00-17.30: Session 3
Panel 5: In the School-Room
LR1, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Mike Foster (University of Bristol)

Joseph Cottle and the Displaced Influence of John Henderson on Bristol’s Romantic Circle- Richard Kerr (University of Bristol)

The Metaphorical Campus: Imagination and Resistance in the Academic Novel - Jonathan Brierley (University of Bristol)
“Please, sir, I want some more”’: Dickens, Place, and Popularity- James Cutler (Royal Holloway, University of London)

‘Human Associations’: The Past in Hardy’s Schoolrooms- Jonathan Memel (University of Exeter)

Panel 6: Cityscapes
G11, 3-5 Woodland Road
Panel Chair: Rowena Finlayson (Manchester School of Art)

Queering the Blitz: Sexual Counterpublics in Elizabeth Bowen's ‘The Heat of the Day’ and Sarah 
Waters' ‘Night Watch’- Leonie Thomas (University of Bristol)

Scents in the city: Exploring the urban in Patrick Süskind's Perfume- Hannah Scott (University of Bristol)

Psychogeography and ‘Topolgangers’: The Psychological Environment and Identity Construction in China Miéville’s ‘The City & the City’ - Tiffany Soga (University of Bristol)

“above the Springs of Wandel…”: Remembering London’s Forgotten Rivers through Literature Trevor Turpin (Bath Spa University)

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17.30-18.00: Tea and Cake
School of Modern Languages Common Room, 11 Woodland Road
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18.00-19.00: Keynote: Professor David Morley (Warwick University)
LT3, 11 Woodland Road

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19.45-21.00: Conference Dinner- Venue TBC 

Tuesday 10 February 2015

The City of Bristol

One of the inspirations for the theme of our conference is Bristol, the city that we are all currently proud to call home. A city that is full of different zones, industries, communities and histories, and one that constantly reminds of how complex the textures of space really are.

Just a casual stroll around the city unearths many hidden spaces and stories, and I often find myself becoming curious about all the little nooks and crannies of the city that I walk through every day.

Here are some urban spaces that I find compelling:

Queen Square where heavy rioting took place in 1831, is a genteel square surrounded by lawyers' chambers, with the old Custom House and the first American Consulate reminding us of Bristol's political and merchant past. A place of apparent social cohesion, but also one of political unrest and dissent. 

The Christmas Steps which used to be a muddy medieval thoroughfare to the village of St Michaels saw Civil War battles fought on its steps. Now it boasts many independent shops and businesses, as well as a pub and a gallery. The cobbled steps and the narrow street still bear some marks of its medieval character. 

The old North city gate where the Bristol mayors would hold their inaugural fishing ritual for good luck is still standing near the old Guildhall, now it has been painted by local street artists as a symbol of Bristol today. As you pass through this old symbolic arch you can look up to see a spray-painted blue sky, one that feels to be oddly timeless and reminiscent of the Medieval and Renaissance painted heavens.

Welsh Back, once the centre of Bristol's wool trade, has become a centre for food and drink in the city, its cobbles frequented by a different kind of Bristolian than the early traders in wool. Old historic pubs remind us of our sea-faring culture full of stories and legends of far-away places that are connected to our city in their own way. 

These, and many other allusions, drift in and out of my mind as I wander the streets, feeling the layers of history and changing society in the old buildings, signs and sights.

~Kayleigh~

Monday 19 January 2015









Call for Papers

The Graduate School for Humanities at the University of Bristol is pleased to announce its forthcoming Postgraduate Conference ‘Imagined Spaces: Literature and Environments,’ due to take place on Wednesday April 29th 2015 at the University of Bristol.

Keynote speaker: Professor David Morley, University of
Warwick

The conference will build on recent space and place studies in literature and culture questioning the spatial relationship between humans and our environment. We want to explore how emerging literary ecology studies are opening up new interdisciplinary ways of mapping space.

Broadly, we will examine the relationship between texts and their “locatedness” in space, opening discussion on issues such as globalization, travel, eco-criticism, spatial poetics, imagination, memory, and mapping.

We imagine space as a diverse spectrum and we hope to see discussion of traditionally ‘green spaces’ opening up to their prismatic potential.

Questions to consider include: What is the significance of regional literature? How do books and texts travel through space and place? How do imaginative places shape us? How do urban and rural environments affect human experience and identity? How are modes of mapping influenced by special experience? How is space performed and how does it ‘perform’ us?

We are currently accepting 200-300 word abstracts for individual papers on any aspect of imagined spaces. Presentations of papers must not exceed 15 minutes.

We particularly welcome papers on the following subjects:
Performing Space and Performed Spaces
Cultural Memory & Identity
Lives of Specific Cities
Regionalism & Regional Literature
‘The Travelling Book’: how books travel through time and space
Mappings: Place and Cartography
Imaginary and Mythical Place: children’s and young adult literature
‘Prismatic Environments’: eco-criticism today
Waterways and Seas: navigations & narratives

Please note that this approach is not limited to these subjects or literary narratives. We also welcome interdisciplinary and collaborative papers.

Please submit your abstract as a Word doc along with your institution, paper title and a brief biography to imaginedspacesbristol@gmail.com by 9th March 2015.


Start the conversation @imaginedspaces.