>
>From: Craig Howes <[log in to unmask]>
>
>First call for papers
>
>Fourth International Auto/Biography Association (IABA) Conference
>
>INHABITING MULTIPLE WORLDS: AUTO/BIOGRAPHY IN AN (ANTI)GLOBAL AGE.
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>Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin, Hong Kong, 15-20 March 2004
>
>What implications are there for life-writing in an age that is at once
>increasingly global and anti-global? In which locality, nationality, race,
>ethnicity and creed are becoming less important in some places and yet
>strongly resurgent in others?
>
>Many contemporary auto/biographers write of inhabiting multiple worlds, of
>living between different cultures, languages, ideologies, discourses,
>localities, domains, or dimensions of experience. Their narratives are often
>intersected by multiple allegiances, to here and there, past and present,
>actual and imagined, traditional and modern, centre and periphery, descent
>and consent. What does this signify? That living in multicultural societies
>and with rapid intercontinental travel, global media, education and
>communications, individuals are tending less and less to configure their
>identities simply within the confines of nation, locality, gender,
>ethnicity, or race? At the same time, there are signs that identity seems to
>be enacted by some writers as resistance to such things as linguistic and
>cultural homogenisation, immigration, multiculturalism, secularisation and
>economic transnationalism. Are we seeing the end of "identity politics" or
>its transformation? The beginning of "global culture" or the beginning of
>its end?
>
>We welcome any topics or suggestions for panels that seem relevant to the
>overall theme. The following are a few suggestions:
>
>… Immigrant and diasporic self and life narratives, especially (given our
>location) the Chinese diaspora.
>
>… Travel writing as auto/biography - diary, letters etc. Marco Polo and
>others as "global subjects".
>
>… Electronic self and life writing, the internet, global identity online,
>"digitised subjects".
>
>… Global media - film, video, TV, internet -- and identity construction.
>
>… Blockbuster memoirs and auto/biographies, global publishing, the
>manufacture of global fame.
>
>… The bi- or multilingual self, non-Anglo self narratives and identities,
>(resistance to) English as world language.
>
>… Education, the media, and the multiplication of worlds.
>
>… Inhabiting multiple worlds in auto/biography before and after the mid
>twentieth century - e.g. in colonial situations.
>
>… New identities enacted via global movements - e.g. peace, green, women's,
>human rights, anti-capitalism and anti-globalisation.
>
>… New forms of auto/biographical writing that deal with the multiple worlds
>of contemporary life.
>
>Venue: The conference will be held in Hong Kong, "Asia's world city" and the
>meeting place of many worlds. The venue is The Chinese University of Hong
>Kong, located on a beautiful wooded site overlooking Tolo Harbour in the New
>Territories. In one direction the campus is about twenty minutes by train
>from downtown Kowloon and in the other about twenty minutes from Shenzhen, a
>vibrant new city in the PRC. In March the climate is moderate, in the mid
>20s centigrade. The Hong Kong Arts Festival and the Hong Kong Film Festival
>are held annually at about this time.
>
>Closing date for abstracts: 15 September 2003
>
>Abstracts: should be about 200 words and include a 3 or 4 line bio. Send to
>Tracy Liang, Department of English, Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shatin,
>Hong Kong or email to [log in to unmask] A conference website will be
>constructed at www.cuhk.edu.hk/eng.
>
>Accommodation: can be provided on campus for about US$50 (including
>breakfast) per night. Please indicate if you would like us to reserve you a
>room.
>
>Organizing committee: David Parker, KK Tam, Timothy Weiss, Lisa Wong, Benzi
>Zhang
>
>IABA conferences: This conference is the fourth in a series that began at
>Peking University in 1999. Others have been held at the University of
>British Columbia in Vancouver in 2000 and at La Trobe University in
>Melbourne in 2002. Further conferences are planned for the University of
>Mainz in Germany in 2006 and Hawaii or Michigan in 2008.
>
>
>David Parker
>Professor and Chair, Department of English
>Acting Director, English Language Teaching Unit
>Room 338 Fung King Hey Building
>Chinese University of Hong Kong
>Shatin NT
>Hong Kong
>
>phone: (852) 2609 7001/7006
>fax:   (852) 2603 5270
>http://www.cuhk.edu.hk/eng/
>