Renaissance Border Crossings: Documented and Undocumented – Call For Papers

Renaissance Border Crossings: Documented and Undocumented
Pacific Northwest Renaissance Society Conference
Portland, Oregon
October 19-22, 2017

Plenary speakers:

  • Fran Dolan, Distinguished Professor of English, UC Davis
  • Daniel Vitkus, Professor of Literature, UC San Diego

In an era of rising nationalism manifested in contentious plans to ban immigration and erect walls, it is fitting that the Pacific Northwest Renaissance Society, which spans a region encompassing two countries and is devoted to a historical period of always-contested boundaries, should devote a conference to the theme of border crossings.

This year’s meeting, hosted by Portland State University and co-sponsored by Marylhurst University, invites papers that engage borders – disciplinary, ideological, formal, national/ethnic, textual, etc. – and that consider, in the broadest sense, how we encounter the in-between spaces of contact, conflict, and possibility in the Renaissance. Some possible topics could be (but are not limited to):

  • Historicizing the categories of “East” and “West”
  • Nationality before the nation state
  • Migrants, nomads, vagrants, refugees
  • Borders, crossings, and early modern space/place
  • Xenophobia amidst globalization
  • Hospitality and the stranger
  • Periodization and queer temporalities
  • Genre crossings
  • Global Shakespeares, “Ethnic” Shakespeares
  • Intertextual Crossings
  • Corporeal boundaries, gender crossings, trans studies
  • Interdisciplinarity, intersectionality
  • Empathy and intersubjectivity
  • Reputation, rumor, censorship, “fake news”
  • Allegiance and alliance across difference

The PNRS treats “Renaissance” more generously than merely British Literary Studies 1500-1660 and seeks to work actively with all Northwest scholars of European and transatlantic culture and society from 1300-1700, including art historians, economists, historians, scholars of religion, historians and practitioners of the performing arts, scholars in the history of science and medicine, political scientists, and comparatists.

Deadline for submission of abstracts, session, and roundtable proposals: June 1, 2017.

Please send proposals via email to: Eliza Greenstadt, Associate Professor of Theater + Film, Portland State University, at greens@pdx.edu, Subject line: PNRS Submission, Word Count: 250 words.

Please be sure to include: Name, professional affiliation, address, phone number, and e-mail address with each abstract, whether submitted individually or as part of a session/roundtable proposal.

Papers must be kept to a twenty-minute reading time, including any technical and electronic support. All papers are to be essentially new and never before presented in public.