ARC Centre for the History of Emotions Collaboratory
“The Voice & Histories of Emotion: 1500-1800”
Department of Performance Studies, The University of Sydney
29 September- 1 October, 2014
Keynotes: Prof Will West, Northwestern University and Dr Richard Wistreich, Royal Northern College of Music
Focus:
The Centre for the History of Emotions (CHE) Performance Programme explores how emotions were performed and experienced within their historical contexts. The voice is a principal instrument of human communication and expression and as such, a crucial site of our investigation. Spoken, thundered, squeaked, screamed, coughed, solo or in chorus, on stage or in the street, the voice invites critical consideration as the circumstances and circulations of its performance as captured in archival, textual, imagistic traces are varied and variable. This collaboratory affords the opportunity to interrogate research methodologies available; question what research evidence of the ‘voice’ in history comprises – its validation processes and the problems it presents – and explore new theoretical and methodological approaches to ‘voice’ and the histories of emotion in which it operates. Though voice is a broad category embracing physiological and phenomenological concerns, this collaboratory proposes four main rubrics:
Skill and the Natural Voice
Skilled delivery is a significant component of musical and rhetorical performance through history, and yet ideas of naturalism are pervasive in vocal discourses. This rubric considers training programmes, manuals, exercises and the pedagogy or entrainment of the voice. It asks what attributes of voice were valued and developed and for what purposes or audiences as well as how conventions of naturalness were sought and produced in early modern Europe.
Material Histories of the Voice
The site of performance and its cultural context informs vocal performance. This rubric invites consideration of the embodied and situated voice asking how voice and emotion have been shaped by architecture, acoustics, physiology and gesture.
Harmonies and Disharmonies
What and where are the spaces between voices, between sounds and between voices and sounds (including musical instruments accompanying and/or emulating voices)? What happens in the cracks, breaks, and dissonances? And where does voice begin and end?
Audiencing: the generative work of listening to and interpreting the voice
To address any of the collaboratory’s questions we must problematize our own listening now as a historically delimiting factor. The evidence of our senses makes ‘truth claims’ that can seem compelling and even transhistorical. How might specific historical receptions of the voice be recuperated? Might the critical history of sense perception or ‘historical phenomenology’ be useful or necessary critical paths to take?
Proposals:
Participants are encouraged to collaborate in performance workshops, discussion forums as well as present more traditional papers in order to develop better insight into how to repopulate history with the oral/aural/gestural textures and complexities of voice as emotional communication. We are accepting proposals for workshops (90 mins), discussion panels (90 mins) or single paper presentations (20 mins). Written proposals must not exceed 400 words and include the following: Name of author(s), affiliation(s), names of other participants (e.g., performers), format of presentation (workshop, papers etc.), title, aims, context, method, technical requirements (i.e. performance space etc.). Note that in the case of workshops, we shall encourage delegate participation from the floor, but if actors, singers, instrumentalists are required, these need to be included as part of the author/presenter team and rehearsed appropriately in advance of the event. Working groups will be established in line with the overarching rubrics of the collaboratory- you may wish to indicate which you feel your work particularly responds to or builds on in your proposal, however, all participants will have the opportunity to explore all frameworks.
Important dates:
- Proposals submitted, Monday 14th April.
- Outcomes of submission, Monday 12th May.
- Registration deadline, Monday 4th August.
- Collaboratory registration from 8am, Monday 29th September.
- Collaboratory closing session, 3.30pm, Wednesday 1st October.
Up to 10 PG/ECR travel grants will be available up to a max of $500 per Eastern States applicant and $800 for WA applicants.
Cost information:
A registration fee will be applied to cover the cost of refreshments during the days of the collaboratory. Evening meals and accommodation are to be arranged independently by delegates.
Fee:
- Full $175
- Student/unwaged $95
Collaboratory organising committee:
- Ian Maxwell, Glen McGillivray, Alan Maddox (University ofSydney hosts)
- Jane Davidson, Penelope Woods (CHE)
Enquiries and submissions: