CfP: 'Decadence and the Senses', Goldsmiths, 10-11 April 2014

Decadence and the Senses, An Interdisciplinary Conference
Goldsmiths, University of London, 10 – 11 April 2014

Keynote Speaker: Catherine Maxwell (Queen Mary, University of London)

From the perfumed verse of Baudelaire to the ‘fleshly’ poetry of Swinburne, from the extravagant and perverse sensory experiences of Des Esseintes in A Rebours to the refined visual aesthetics of Dorian Gray, we encounter corresponding senses (synaesthesia) and extreme sensations, intensified by nervous or pathological psychological states.  Reading Decadence, from ancient times to the present day, is to indulge in voluptuous pleasures (and pain), to sample exotic tastes and sounds, and to envisage states of mind in highly visual terms.  ‘For each emotion’, as Oscar Wilde imagined for his drama, Salomé (1894), ‘a new perfume’.

This interdisciplinary conference explores the relationship of Decadence and the senses, and the ways in which Decadent writers attempt to capture fleeting sensations.  It is an opportunity to trace common visual, aural and ‘perfumed’ motifs in Decadent works, and to reflect on the extent to which the senses are important to our understanding of the tradition.

We welcome proposals on any aspect of Decadence and the senses.  Papers (about 20 mins in length) might include discussion of:

sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch
decadent objects: fur, perfume, jewels
correspondences
synaesthesia
kinaesthesia
hypersensitivity and hypersensuality
nerves and nervousness
perception
pleasure and pain
hypersexuality and erotomania
appetite and femininity
feasts
fecal, feral, floral
bodily fluids
perversity
dream states and memory
invention and ornamentation
symbolism
nature and the organic
artifice
altered states
decay and degeneration
deliquescence

Abstracts of 500 words plus brief biography should be sent to: decadence2014@gold.ac.uk by 31st December 2013

For further details and updates please see the website: decadence2014.wordpress.com

Call for Abstracts: 'Fire Stories' Symposium, University of Melbourne, 4-6 December 2013

Call for Abstracts: 'Fire Stories' Symposium presented by The Australian Centre, The ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions (Europe 1100-1800) and The University of Melbourne.

Full-size PDF of poster available here.

Confirmed keynote speakers:
Dr Danielle Clode (Flinders University), Professor Bill Gammage (Australian National University), Associate Professor Alan Krell (College of Fine Arts, UNSW), Associate Professor Pablo Mukherjee (University of Warwick).

A source of survival, comfort and terror, humans have struggled to control and harness fire since its discovery tens of thousands of years ago. This symposium will address emotional responses to fires in literature and history, looking particularly at how the fleeting destruction of a blaze is conveyed in narrative terms. Participants will be invited to consider a dialogue between ancient and modern representations of fire (including the mythical) and the affective responses that they evoke. Speakers are also encouraged to address the role that fictional representations of burning landscapes or cityscapes can play in the aftermath of a major disaster.

Topics may include:
• fire and mythology
• disaster narratives/environmental  catastrophe
• The ecology of fire
• Representations of bushfires/wildfires
• Climate change
• performing fire/ the aesthetics of fire
• The poetics of the flame
• fire in the colonies
• sati
• fire and colonial settlers
• indigenous representations of fire
• fire and childhood
• fire and folklore
• fire and national identity
• firescapes and emotions
• psychological responses to fires
• survivor stories
• fire and memory
• Artefacts/conservation
• Trauma
• Arson/pyromania
• Campfires
• The domestic hearth
• destruction/reconstruction

Please send abstracts to: fire-stories@unimelb.edu.au  by no later than August 31st 2013.

Please note that the conference will  incorporate a symposium to be convened by the Australian Centre, on species:  ‘Narrative, Indigeneity, Ecology’. This  symposium will take place on Wednesday December 4 and a program will be released  in due course. Confirmed keynote speaker: Professor Ursula Heise (UCLA).