edited by David Callahan (Aveiro, Portugal) and Adi Wimmer (Klagenfurt)
After Berne in 1991, Barcelona in 1993, and Copenhagen in 1995, EASA's 4th biennial conference will be hosted by the city and university of Klagenfurt, the provincial capital of Carinthia, Austria´s southernmost region. The conference will start with an introductory paper and a welcome buffet in the evening of Wednesday, September 24th, and end with an all-day excursion to the heartland of Carinthia on Sunday 28th.
Our Call for papers has had an excellent response from all over the world, and conference participants can look forward to an unparalleled variety of stimulating papers.
The keynote address will be given by Graeme Turner of the University of Queensland. He will reconsider the issues he explored in his book "Making it National" (1994) and the uses of nationalism in contemporary Australia. Kay Schaffer's paper (University of Adelaide) " 'Dances With Wolves' or 'Strictly Ballroom': How feminisms negotiate with Australia's nationalist histories and mythologies" is subtitled "A Pas de Deux about questions of identity and difference", and will be the first of a dozen of feminist discourses on Nationalism. Livio Dobrez, whose work at ANU on questions of post-modern approaches of the national has been well received also outside Australia will be the third plenarist. The title of his paper is "Australian discourses of contact, appropriation, nationalism, consciousness and post modernity".
As had become customary, there will be three parallel sessions to accommodate the approximately 65 papers (20 minutes only please) that will be given in three days. Their range and diversity has surprised and delighted the conference organizers. European and US contributors will, understandably, concentrate on questions of nationalist subtexts in the works of individual Australian authors. A few examples: Yonka Krasteva (Bulgaria) will discuss Janette Turner Hospital, Igor Maver (Slovenia) contemporary Oz poets, Luisa Percopo (Italy) Thea Astley, David Callahan (Portugal) Alan Moorehead, and Tania Peitzker (Berlin) Dymphne Cusack; while a Japanese Australianist (Yasue Arimitsu) will chip in with her paper on Brian Castro.
Australian contributions will address a wide range of issue under the umbrella of "Australian Cultural Studies." These range from the Sydney Olympics ("The sale of the millennium", Enno Hermann), to the "Macdonaldization of Australia" (Paul Gillen,), from representations of Australia´s "Red Centre" (Michael Cathcart) to no fewer than four papers on a certain exciting and excitable new MP and book author. Very well represented are issues of Australian Media and popular culture, Aboriginality, Multiculturalism, Contemporary Theory (with Robin Gerster coming all the way from Tokyo), and the Re-Mythologization of Australia. Three papers will examine Australian autobiography writing, four Racism - apart from the already mentioned four on Pauline Hanson MP. The presentation I am personally most looking forward to is Cassandra Pybus' "James McAuley and Australian Colonial Policy in Papua and New Guinea.". The quality of her previous work, notably her re-assessment of the Sidney Orr case, promises some revelations here.
A conference is not only an academic event, but also a social one. There will be a number of Australian lecturers in Klagenfurt whom to meet will be a personal pleasure to us Europeans. Among them are Helen Thomson, Kerryn Goldsworthy, Laurie Hergenhan, Carl Bridge, John Barnes, Bruce Bennett, Ken Stewart, Anthony Hassall, Albert Moran, Wenche Ommundsen, Andrew Taylor and many more.
We all recall conferences where parallel sessions sometimes made hard choices necessary, where participants flit from one conference room to another in a desperate attempt to catch a presentation of particular importance to them - only to find that the order of papers has been changed. This time we will try to find a way out of this dilemma. All presentations will be videotaped, and conference participants may order selected video copies afterwards, at rock bottom prices. The conference management is interested to hear from registered persons how many are likely to take up such an offer.
A complete conference programme will go out about one month before the event.
Because DEETYA has been pleasantly supportive of this conference, we will also have a WORDFEST involving quite a number of creative writers and poets. Star amongst them is Marion Halligan, whose work is well known and apprediated both in Australia and Europe. There will be a second novelist, Venero Armanno, a rising star on the OZ literary horizon. Then a number of poets: Diane Fahey, who has published seven volumes of poetry and has recently worked on poetic re-fabulations of the brother Grimm fairly tales. John Kinsella, who is a poet of considerable reputation, currently living and (I believe) also teaching in Cambridge, England. Kinsella has just published a first novel titled "Genre"; "quirky, challenging and with a typically idiosyncratic approach to novel-writing" as a reviewer wrote. We are still hoping for a modest Australia Council subsidy to make possible the presence of Mark O'Connor, eco-nationalist-activist extraordinaire, whose re-vamped and considerably expanded version of Banjo Paterson's "The Man from Snowy River" caused such a flap a few years ago. Then there is Beate Josephi, well known for her poetry reviews in the ABR and elsewhere. Beate will attend the conference both in her capacity as OZ media expert and as a poet. There may be other writers as well, depending on some as yet unsettled circumstances.
I am also negotiating with a group of Queensland Aboriginal activists, the ones who travelled to California and forced Marlo Morgan to "fess up". They are planning a European tour to present their story and its wider implications, and if it comes about they will most certainly come to Klagenfurt.
Because of the fantastic response to our Call for papers, additional paper proposals can only be accepted in very exceptional circumstances.
All registered members are called upon to check on their registration copies whether they provided information on their arrival and departure dates. Quite a number of registrations were received that did not give us arrival and departure dates.
You may wish to know when the excursion on Sunday 28th ends. A slight change has been made. We will be back in Klagenfurt by 5 p.m., so that participants can still catch a train, the 18.10 flight to Frankfurt or the 18.20 flight to Vienna.
For further information on the conference, on travelling to Klagenfurt, accommodation, and the like, please contact the conference organizer. I hope to see as many EASA members at the conference as possible. Have a triumphant summer and a safe journey.
OR:
Assistant to the Organizer:
Aurora Alonso
(same address as Adi W.)
phone: +43 463 2700 342
email: [email protected]
First Announcement and Call for Papers
Theme: 'Subject to Change: Reorienting Cultural Studies'
Now that Cultural Studies has attained the status of a recognised discipline in terms of the Australia Research Council and other national organisations, it would seem important to ask questions about the present and future orientations of Cultural Studies in Australia and elsewhere. For example, as a consequence of such recognition, will Cultural Studies be able to retain its fluid and interdisciplinary focus? What changes may result from economic imperatives such as the ARC preference for empirical research, or outcome-driven DEETYA (Dept of Education) scores? What is, or should be, the relationship between Cultural Studies, cultural policy and economics? What are the consequences for the discipline in terms of institutional, political and economic pressures? Has Cultural Studies been distracted by the need to defend itself as a form of intellectual practice rather than engaging with the more immediate and rapidly changing articulations of economics and culture in specific social contexts? Is Cultural Studies keeping up with social change? In other words, what should the `work' of Cultural Studies entail and is this being done?
Papers are invited on any or all of the above questions addressing the idea of Cultural Studies as a discipline and speculations about its present and future role. Papers are also invited which demonstrate and reflect on current research in cultural studies as examples of possibilities and practice within the discipline.
Abstracts of no more than 200 words (preferably in e-mail form) should be submitted before August 30th, 1997 to:
SPEAKERS: We will confirm our keynote speakers at a later date. At last year's CSAA conference speakers incuded Ernesto Laclau, Chantal Mouffe, John Hartley, McKenzie Wark, Ien Ang, Tom O'Regan, John Frow, Dana Kolar-Panov and British journalist Beatrix Campbell.
1998 Conference, University of Wales, Lampeter, 3rd-6th September 1998.
"Australian Archaeologies: Cultural Landscapes in the Unique Continent"
The conference will address the range of cultural/environmental interactions which have moulded Australian culutral and physical environments as the continent approaches the millenium.
The previous BASA conference, in 1996, Comparing Australia, succeeded in attracting contributions from a very wide range of disciplines, including, for the first time, a substantial number with an environmental component. The theme chosen for the 1998 conference is again deliberately broad in the hope that it will attract participants from a similarly wide spectrum of interests and disciplines. Comparative approaches are again encouraged. The inclusion of 'archaeologies' is intended to be interpreted in the widest possible sense of the word. The conference will provide an opportunity for exchange of knowledge, ideas and interpretations between individuals from very different academic backgrounds, but centring on Australia as a continent.
Participation and offers of papers are invited from those involved in cultural studies and literature; from historians, archaeologists, economists, geographers and environmentalists; and from representatives of Australian indigenous and immigrant groups
The aim will be to look at the cultural and environmental history from a variety of specific perspectives:
Offers of papers for the conference will be considered if received by Monday 1st December 1997, and must include a title and a brieg abstract of up to 100 words.
The inaugural conference of the Asian Association for the Study of Australia (AASA) was held at the Fort manor Hotel in Trivandrum, hosted by the recently established Centre for Australian Studies at the University of Kerala.
The conference represented an unusual feat of organising with an Australian convenor, Dr Cynthia Vanden Driesen, Department of English, Edith Cowan University, the Australian Vice-President of the Association, and Professor K. Radha of the Institute of English, University of Kerala, and Asian Vice-President of the Association, as the Indian convenor. Despite the relative youth of the Association (founded in Colombo, Sri Lanka, in August 1995) the conference aroused a great deal of interest attracting a large number of respected academics from Australia and considerable participation from Indian academia as well. A distinctive feature was the large number of respected academics from Australia and an innovative Writers' Meet was held where Australian writers met Indian writers to discuss aspects of each other's culture.
The theme of the conference was "Creative Configurations-the Expanding Australian Experience" and a range of papers tracing the theme were offered, though papers on literary works dominated. Scholars from a range of disciplines such as media, education, women's studies, even medicine, also presented papers. Keynote speakers at the conference were Professor C.D.Narasimhaiah, Editor of the long-lived Indian journal The Literary Criterion, Alison Broinowski, well-known writer and researcher on Asian Australian relations, author of The Yellow Lady: Australian Impressions of Asia, and Chris Wallace-Crabbe.
The conference participants numbered over 46 Australian participants and 130 Indian and other Asian participants from Sri Lanka and Singapore. (The only European present was Isabel Santaolalla from the University of Zaragoza).
Generous asistance was given the conference by the Australia-India Council. The Literature Fund of the Australia-India Council supported the participation of most of the large group of writers. Edith Cowan University's Faculty of Arts and the office of the Dean of Overseas Programmes also provided generous support
The next conference is planned for 1999, although at present the venue is unknown. However, the success of the inaugural conference has meant that several institutions in more than one Asian country are interested in hosting the 1999 conference.
Cynthia Vanden Driesen
The Australian day was opened by two inaugural speeches by the Vice Chancellor of the University of Bologna and the Australian Ambassador in Rome Mr. Rory Steele.
Contributions were centered around various aspects of Australian culture such as poetry, literature and music. The speakers included well established critics and scholars as well as young researchers from different parts of Italy and Australia. The Australian writer in Rome, Peter Bakowski, was also invited to read from a selection of his poetry. The conference attracted people from several universities in Italy, and the discussion following the papers was lively and interesting.
This is a list of the speakers with the papers they gave:
The 12th annual conference of the American Association of Australian Literary Studies was held for the first time in Canada, which gave it a different dynamic. The presence of a number of Canadian scholars contributed a useful comparative angle to add to that provided by scholars >from the United States. A significant number of Australian academics also made the long trip, albeit generally remaining so jetlagged they kept referring to "this country," much to the consternation of Canadians, alarmed to find they had John Howard as Prime Minister and Helen Darville as literary prize-winner.
Always a friendly and manageably-scaled conference, comparative issues were directly dealt with by Jim Hoy (Literary Response to Settling the American Plains and the Australian Outback) and D'Arcy Randall (Teaching The Searchers and the film of The Chant of Jimmie Blacksmith to Texans), not to mention Jenny Strauss's investigations into Mary Gilmore's versions from the Spanish. Other papers might be seen as examinations of other sorts of comparison, other sorts of interaction, as in John Salter's look at Australian Minority Literatures: Homeland and "Forgetting," Sonia Mycak's exposition of her research into the literary culture of post-war "new Australians," Janine Little Nyoongah's rumination on Issues in the contemporary reception of Australian Aboriginal literature and Robert Zeller's eco-criticism of Judith Wright's nature poetry. A pair on interesting, even sobering, papers were given by Marian Arkin and Anthony Hassall on publishing history. Authors dealt with from a variety of standpoints included Catherine Helen Spence (Mary-Robyn Adams), David Malouf (Sarah Caskey), Henry Lawson (Bansari Mitra), Rolf Boldrewood and Rosa Praed (David Callahan), Elizabeth Jolley (Brian Dibble) and Mudrooroo (John Ball). Gillen Wood contributed a droll summary of sections of the biography of Peter Carey he is working on, while Murray Martin gave his customarily entertaining observations, this time on the Scottish settlements in Nova Scotia, Australia and New Zealand of inspirational leader Norman McLeod. This time, however, he didn't begin with a quote from the Eagles.
Mudrooroo was the invited guest, and he gave a thoughtful and calm reading of elements of his work along with reflective comments on some of the issues they suggested. He also bravely, or intimidatingly, sat centre front during John Ball's paper on "Diminshing Discourse: Satire and Colonialism in Mudrooroo's Historical Novels," and was unfailingly courteous to anyone interested in his work. In reply, everybody was courteous in return, and he was not asked about the recent controversy surrounding his ethnicity. At no stage, however, did Mudrooroo problematize or shrink from positioning himself squarely as he always done.
The next conference is scheduled for St Louis, Missouri, next year. Enquiries to Bob Zeller,
David Callahan
A day devoted to the work of Janette Turner Hospital, organized by Selina Samuels, on behalf of the BASA Literary Group, provided the occasion for a relaxed but stimulating day for enthusiasts at the Sir Robert Menzies Centre, introduced by Centre Director, Carl Bridge.
In an easygoing and supportive morning, papers were given by the encyclopaedia of world literature, Alistair Stead (Leeds), entitled "Notes from Underground," by Silvia Albertazzi (Bologna), who spoke on "Violence, Angels and Missing People in Janette Turner Hospital's World," and by David Callahan, on "Aberrant Decoding and Witness in Isobars." As usual with such focused encounters, question time was informed, friendly and helpful.
In the afternoon, Janette Turner Hospital read from her work, and answered questions in her usual lively and unpretentious fashion. It was interesting to see attention being given to her mystery novel, A Very Proper Death, published under the pseudonym Alex Juniper, linking it to themes and characters in her other fiction.
In some ways of more use than larger conferences, such days are to be encouraged, although in the usual London fashion most people rush off to catch trains etc at the end and the ancillary socializing becomes diluted.
A booklet containing extended versions of the papers given plus Janette Turner Hospital's Trevor Reese lecture from the previous evening on the work of Christina Stead is planned to be published by the Robert Menzies Centre.
See the new Australian Studies Network and/or contact Dr. Frank Poyas at email: [email protected].
Issue 5 features: Articles on Anton Hart, Christopher Langton and art writing. Reviews from Melbourne, Sydney and Los Angeles. And John Barbour talks with Shaun Kirby.
Also Introducing the Australian Contemporary Art Mailing list, Check under ACAM-L to see how to subscribe to the list.
To visit the new GLOBE E take your browser to: http://www.arts.monash.edu.au/visome.html
Prof. David Callahan, email: [email protected]
Departamento de Linguas e Culturas
Universidade de Aveiro
3810, Aveiro, Portugal
Home phone and fax: +351-34-26854