21.034 CFP: Practical Criticism and its Legacies (Manchester 26-7.6.08)

                Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 21, No. 34.
       Centre for Computing in the Humanities, King's College London
  www.kcl.ac.uk/schools/humanities/cch/research/publications/humanist.html
                        www.princeton.edu/humanist/
                     Submit to: humanist_at_princeton.edu

         Date: Mon, 21 May 2007 06:35:53 +0100
         From: John Sears <j.sears_at_MMU.AC.UK>
         Subject: CFP: Practical Criticism and its Legacies
(Manchester 26-7.6.08)

With apologies for cross-posting.

Call for papers:

PRACTICAL CRITICISM AND ITS LEGACIES

An international conference to be hosted by the
English Research Institute at Manchester
Metropolitan University, 26th-- 27th June 2008.

Conference website:

http://www.eri.mmu.ac.uk/events/legacies-of-practical-criticism/

Confirmed keynote speakers:

Professor Ben Knights, Director of the HEA English Subject Centre
Dr Gary Day, De Montfort University

I. A. Richards' foundational text Practical
Criticism, which he described as "in part =85 the
recoord of a piece of field-work in comparative
ideology", was published by Cambridge University
Press in 1929. Its methodological and theoretical
assumptions constitute the basis of all
subsequent teaching and much critical analysis of
literary texts. Practical criticism is still the
first mode of encounter with literary texts for
most students, and major traditions of literary
analysis and theory, from New Critical approaches
to deconstruction, from psychological and
psychoanalytic approaches to linguistic and
reader-response theories, owe conceptual and
methodological debts to Richards' project in
Practical Criticism. The book provided a series
of models for the reading of texts, the
comprehension of contexts, and the processes of
interpretation, analysis and composition, which
has influenced subsequent critical practice in profound ways.

This conference will explore the arguments and
assumptions, influences and legacies, reactions
against and developments from, and contemporary
versions of and responses to the traditions of
critical reading established by Richards' text. A
selection of the papers will be included in a
planned volume marking in 2009 the 80th
anniversary of the publication of Practical
Criticism. Proposals are invited for papers of 20
minutes duration which may consider, but are not
restricted to, the following themes:

- pre-cursors and origins of Richards'
methodologies and practices: close reading before Practical Criticism
- the publishing history of Practical Criticism =AD editionss and variations
- theorising and historicising versions of
practical criticism in practice: close reading,
blind reading, textual analysis, passage comprehension
- Richards' methods, categories, arguments,
strategies: ethical, political and practical implications
- Richards, Leavis, Empson and reading the English canon
- Practical Criticism and European and American literary theories
- Objective and subjective readings, negotiated
meaning, protocols and stock responses in literary analysis
- Cognitive approaches to practical criticism; schema theory and other models
- Practical criticism of prose, drama, poetry
- Practical criticism and reader-response theories
- Practical criticism and efferent / aesthetic reading
- Practical criticism and identity politics
- Practical criticism and genre theory
- Languages of practical critical analysis; rhetorics, terminologies, terms
- Tracing the influences of Practical Criticism
on subsequent critical and theoretical developments in literary analysis
- Practical criticism in contemporary teaching and learning
- Practical criticism and models of creativity
- Re-reading Practical Criticism in the light of recent theory and post-theory
- Practical criticism and deconstruction
- Practical criticism and linguistic criticism
- Practical criticism and new media; digital and other textualities
- Applications of practical criticism outside literary studies
- Futures of practical criticism in and outside the academy

Please submit proposals (250 words) before 15th July 2007 to:

Dr John Sears
Department of Interdisciplinary Studies
MMU Cheshire
Crewe Green Road
Crewe, CW1 7JE, England

Or by email to J.Sears_at_mmu.ac.uk

Dr John Sears
Senior Lecturer, English Literature
Department of Interdisciplinary Studies
MMU Cheshire
Crewe Green Road
Crewe CW1 5DU

"Before acting on this email or opening any attachments you
should read the Manchester Metropolitan University's email
disclaimer available on its website
http://www.mmu.ac.uk/emaildisclaimer "
Received on Mon May 21 2007 - 01:53:25 EDT