The School of English Postgraduate Colloquium
University of Sheffield, 29th May 2014
Identity
With the advent of the digital age and the ever-increasing pressure to sustain an online presence, the notion of identity has become newly relevant to our understandings of self and society. Similarly, the transition into a newly globalised world generates the need for individuals and collectives to redraw or reconstitute the boundaries of the various identities they assume.
This conference seeks to bring together postgraduates working in the Arts & Humanities to consider the ways in which identity is constructed, performed, represented and deconstructed, across all aspects and periods of literature, culture and history. By considering the implications of identity construction and representation throughout history, we hope to shed light on how the study of language and literature reveals a wider understanding of the human condition. We particularly welcome interdisciplinary approaches to the theme of identity.
Topics covered may include:
* Identity: personal, national, regional, racial, cultural, social, political, religious, sexual, historical
* Self-definition: construction and destruction, deconstruction
* Self and Other: centres/margins, domestic/foreign, oppositions, conflict, Gothic
* Self and society: the individual/the state, political identification, rebellion, the crowd/the mob, utopia/dystopia
* Projected/actual identities: performance, performativity, public and private, representation, the digital age, the act of writing, biography and autobiography
* Writing identities: character and characterisation, cognitive approaches
* Mind/body: gender, materialism, philosophy of mind, ethics
* Human/animal: animal studies, anthropomorphism, anthropocentrism, evolution and degeneration
* Human/machine: science fiction, genetic engineering, bioethics, cloning, transhumanism, cyborgs, androids
* Identity formations: memory, narrative, speech, trauma, psychiatry, psychology
* Language and identity: accent, dialect, language change, language rights, language politics
* Language acquisition: first- and second-language acquisition
The School of English’s annual Colloquium takes place on the 29th May 2014 at the University of Sheffield. Registration will open shortly.
IDENTITY 2014 