Mapping Austen’s World: Movement and Journeys in the 19th Century
An interdisciplinary graduate student conference hosted by the University of Michigan's Nineteenth Century Forum and Special Collections Library
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
January 19-20, 2018
Keynote speaker: Miranda Burgess, University of British Columbia
In honor of the 200th anniversary of Jane Austen’s death, the Nineteenth Century Forum and the Special Collections Library at the University of Michigan invite interdisciplinary papers that explore movement, mapping, or the margins within the late-eighteenth or nineteenth centuries. Austen famously described her work as staged on a “little bit (two inches wide) of Ivory,” a wry statement that has at times obscured the dynamism of her novels. Indeed, traveling and movement are central components of Austen’s works. From Frank Churchill dashing off to London in Emma, to a silenced question about Antiguan slave plantations in Mansfield Park, to Pride and Prejudice fan fiction on the Internet, Austen’s characters and novels have often circulated in unexpected, contested, or wide-ranging places.
NCF has put together this conference, in cooperation with the Special Collection Library, to build off their exhibit “The Life and Times of Lizzy Bennet” and to explore the journeys and boundaries that suffuse -- and serve as context for -- Austen and her works. The organizers therefore welcome any paper that speaks to the broader theme, in addition to those specifically about Jane Austen.
Possible paper topics might include, but are not limited to:
Historical maps and mapping practices
The circulation of people and objects to, from, and within England
Travel writing or missionary work
Imperial expansion
Immigrants and refugees
Representations of space, travel or maps in literature or art
Theories of character or character spaces
The place of “marginal” figures in literature or art
Representations of encounters at the margins
Marginalia and paratexts
Circulation of printed materials and the press
New or unexpected reading communities
Transnational reception
Print, film, televisual, and stage adaptations
Authorial fandoms
Submission Guidelines: Please email abstracts of no more than 300 words to austenmaps@gmail.com by October 1, 2017. More information can be found at https://umncf.wordpress.com. Any additional questions can be directed to austenmaps@gmail.com.