The Fan Studies Network

This conference explores the transatlantic dimensions of nineteenth-century constructions of fame and fandom. It considers the ways transatlantic celebrity affected relationships between, and the identities of, celebrities and fans, and facilitated a questioning of geographically located notions of identity, race, gender and class. In the context of new forms of communication, transport and media that irrevocably altered celebrity cultural exchanges across the Atlantic, this conference focuses on the nature of celebrity encounters and the complexities of relationships between famous Americans and their British fans; British lions and their American devotees; and British and American celebrities.

Possible topics include:

• Anglo-American celebrity encounters in nineteenth-century British and/or American literature or culture

• Transatlantic fandom as a subject in nineteenth-century British and/or American literature or culture

• American celebrities/fans in nineteenth-century Britain

• British celebrities/fans in nineteenth-century America

• The transatlantic reception of British and/or American writers and artists

• Gender, race, nationality and class in transatlantic celebrity exchanges

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS:

David Haven Blake (The College of New Jersey)

Tom Mole (University of Edinburgh)

Richard Salmon (University of Leeds)

Please send abstracts of no more than 300 words, together with a brief biographical note listing your affiliation, to: paraic.finnerty@port.ac.uk. The deadline for submission is 31st of March 2014.

The Institute of English Cultures and Literatures, University of Silesia (Poland) is happy to announce a CFP for an upcoming international conference:
“The Popular Life of Things. Material Culture(s) and Popular Processes” to be held in Sosnowiec (Poland), 3-4 July 2014
 
In the preface to Les Mots et les choses (1966), a work on the relationship between discourse and things, Michel Foucault observes that “the fundamental codes of culture – those governing its language, its schemas of perception, its exchanges, its techniques, its values, the hierarchy of practices – establish for every man (…) the empirical orders with which he will be dealing and within which he will be at home.” A predominant cultural code today, popular culture, “offers” processes, mechanisms and representations which mediate the experience and uses of things, changing the ways we understand / approach materiality and engage with objects in our domestic, social and professional lives.
Appropriating and rewriting Arjun Appadurai’s famous phrase: “the social life of things”, with which he inspired scholars to take material culture more seriously and, as a result, treat it as an important and revealing area of cultural studies, the conference wishes to address the relation between the material and the popular shaped by the post/late popular condition. We wish to ask about the impact popular processes, such as popularization, customization, serialization etc., have made on everyday practices, activities, and habits involving objects as well as about if and how this influence contributes to the exchange with(in) other cultural domains. 
We cordially invite papers that explore the following areas focused on (pop)cultural biographies of things: new shapes of long-established material traditions as influenced by popular culture, popular reinventions of cultural routines, changes in domestic, pastime and professional practices, as well as meanings that emerge with the modes (accessibility, convenience, user-friendliness) and manners (individual, group, autonomous, social) of the popular. 
Suggested topics include but are not limited to:
 
representation of objects in popular culture/ popular narratives
temporal and spatial trajectories (biographies) of objects in popular contexts
popular culture and processes of objectification, reification/ subjectification of objects
commodification, circulation and exchange in the context of the popular
the fetish and the popular
materializing the immaterial
objectification of services/ turning  objects or material practices into services
(im)material objects in video games/ virtual environments
(popular) materiality and cultural routines (e.g. reading, watching TV, etc. )
“tangibility” and “value” of experiences
the question of agency and effect
authenticity and cultural mimicry
uniqueness, exceptionality, rarity
the popular, objects and distinction
romanticizing material practices
gadgets, accessories, trivia, toys
creativity (in participation culture) and material culture
objects and fandom
“popular” bricolage
the effort/ labour of collecting and the question of “friction”
collecting and serialization
history objects (objects as synecdoches of history in popular contexts; historical authenticity)
 
Proposals for presentations, papers and full panels (of approx. 500 words) followed by a short bio note should be submitted to popularlifeofthings@gmail.com
by 30 March 2014.
All proposals will be peer reviewed. The cost of the conference is 250 PLN (£50 / €63) and 150 PLN (£30 / €38) for graduate students. Registration details will be announced soon. For further queries, please contact Dr Karolina Lebek (karolina.lebek@us.edu.pl) or Dr Ania Malinowska (anna.malinowska@us.edu.pl).
 
The conference’s key note address will be provided by
 Prof. John Storey (University of Sunderland, UK)

The 3rd Annual MMU Football Conference
 
“Football and Communities of Resistance”
 
The 3rd annual Centre for the Study of Football and its Communities (CSFC) conference “Football and Communities of Resistance” will be held at Manchester Metropolitan University on Thursday 12th June 2014. There will be an associated event ‘Out of Play’ hosted by the National Football Museum on Friday 13th June 2014.
 
Call for Papers
 
Football continues to be a site of protest with fan campaigns aimed at the commercialization and the governance of the game a regular feature of league and cup competitions at national and international levels. As a result, football has become a site for communities of resistance to emerge in opposition to dominant forces within the game’s institutions and the general political institutions that govern society as a whole. In this World Cup year, CSFC invites paper and PechaKucha proposals from academics and practitioners addressing the key conference theme including, but not limited to, papers that intersect and/or interconnect with the following:
•             Fan cultures and identities
•             Football communities
•             Against Modern Football campaigns
•             World Cup and mega events
•             Football, civil unrest and disorder
•             Football clubs as sites of resistance
•             Technology and football
 
To open the conference, the keynote speech will address the issues of resistance and contestation in football today.
 
The morning panel sessions will consist of a mix of academic/research papers and presentations from football industry practitioners. If you are a practitioner and interested in participating in any of the sessions, we request a 15 minute presentation of your work, or an issue you are dealing with, related to the session theme.
 
The afternoon is dedicated to PechaKucha interactions – short 20×20 sessions: 20 images/slides, 20 seconds per slide!! This session is intended to be informal and interactive to generate both heat and light through broad ranging dialogue and discussion. We would ask therefore that with your initial expression of interest you provide a brief abstract/preview of what you intend to cover in your talk. If you need more information on PechaKucha, you can find it here: http://www.pechakucha.org/faq
 
There will be a head to head debate on football and communities of resistance to close the conference.
 
If you would like to organise a panel discussion or present a paper on an alternative theme, or if you have any other questions regarding the conference, please email csfc@mmu.ac.uk.
 
Key Dates:
Please send paper abstracts (250 words max) and PechaKucha titles (100 word max) by 5pm 28th March 2014 to csfc@mmu.ac.uk
We aim to provide notification of acceptance by the 11th April 2014.
 
National Football Museum events
12th June Evening programme
The night of the 12th June sees the opening game of the FIFA World Cup – Brazil Vs Croatia (kick-off 9pm). The match will be shown in The National Football Museum for conference delegates. Drinks and nibbles will be provided.
‘Out of Play’ 13th June 2014 (National Football Museum)
On the 13th June, our partner the National Football Museum will host an ‘Out of Play’ event at which artists will be creating space for dialogue, debate and critical reflection on their relationship with football.

2014 AX Anime and Manga Studies Symposium

July 3 – July 6

Anime Expo 2014
Los Angeles Convention Center (Los Angeles, CA)

http://www.anime-expo.org

Keynote Speaker: Prof. Marc  Steinberg (Concordia University, Montreal, Canada)

Submission Deadline: May 1, 2014

Japanese animation (anime) and comics (manga) represent one of the major contributions that Japan has made to global visual and popular culture. The academic area of anime and manga studies is young, only about 30 year old, but extraordinarily vibrant. It welcomes a wide range of interpretations and approaches, draws on different disciplines and methodologies, and can involve both academics, industry professionals, independent scholars, and fans/enthusiasts.

The Anime and Manga Studies Symposium is a unique opportunity for scholars to look at all aspects of anime and comics – the works themselves, their creators, producers, and audiences, their history, and their global impact. It is an opportunity to present cutting-edge work, to explore a diversity of topics, and to receive constructive feedback. A major goal of the Symposium is to bring together speakers from diverse backgrounds, fields and areas to exchange ideas, chart new directions, and contribute to building a community of anime and manga studies.

Uniquely, it is an integral part of the schedule of Anime Expo, the largest gathering of fans of Japanese popular culture in the U.S. This will give speakers an opportunity to present their research and scholarship directly to public audiences, to interact with fans of anime and manga from around the world, and to become participants in a celebration and appreciation of Japanese popular culture. In turn, the Symposium also introduces the convention’s attendees to the practices and ideas of formal scholarship of Japanese visual culture.

The Symposium invites submissions for papers on a wide range of topics dealing with anime and manga. Possible areas to explore can include—but are not limited to:

• Critical studies of individual creators, directors and animators, especially in larger contexts such as anime/manga as a whole, animation, comics, Japanese literature/film, science fiction, war literature, etc.
• Close readings of particular works, with a focus on genre conventions and subversions and relationships to previous works in anime/manga and other media.
• Gender and Sexuality: Fan service and objectification, the male and female gaze, the interplay of male and female creators, producers, and audiences
• Age, class, race, ethnicity/nationality and other social differences
• Reflections on current social, political and ecological issues
• Responses to the world and to Japanese history: The 3.11 Tohoku Disaster, World War II, interactions between Japan and other countries

• The impact of new technologies (wireless communication, augmented reality, mobile computing) on storytelling in anime/manga
• The use of remix culture: Adaptation and interpretation of Eastern, Western and other literatures and visual media in Japanese popular culture
• Copyright, obscenity, and other legal issues
• Anime and manga as tools of globalization and agents of promoting Japanese culture
• The history and evolution of anime/manga fandom outside Japan: Fan practices and experiences—clubs, conventions, cosplay, fansites, fansubbing, anime music videos
• The future of anime/manga consumption – streaming, online comics, crowdsourcing, etc.
• Potentials for anime/manga as platforms for social change and anime/manga fans as actors of social change
• The ethics and challenges of presenting Japanese popular culture products around the world

The Symposium particularly invites papers focusing on newer works and emerging creators.

Speakers are also welcome to submit proposals for roundtable discussions on these and related topics.

Potential roundtables can include:

• Differences in theoretical approaches to anime and manga
• Anime/manga fan practices and activities in different countries, cultures and regions
• New directions, new opportunities, and new challenges in thinking, writing, and teaching about anime/manga

The AX Anime and Manga Studies Symposium will be open to all AX attendees. Speakers are urged to consider subjects that will be of interest to general non-specialist audiences and do not require significant backgrounds in Asian Studies, media theory, literature, etc, and to tailor their presentations accordingly.

For consideration, please submit the title of your paper or panel, an abstract (300 words maximum) and a CV to mkoulikov@gmail.com

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: May 1, 2014

All submissions will be peer-reviewed.

All invited participants will be offered free admission to Anime Expo.

Subverting Fashion is an interdisciplinary one-day conference to be held on Friday 11th July 2014 at St Mary’s University, Strawberry Hill, Twickenham, London.
 
Abstract deadline: 20th March, 2014
 
 
Fashion is a paradox. On the one hand, fashion can represent consumerism, conformity and repression. But it can also be recognised as a means to communicate individuality, cultural and subcultural affiliations, personality and tastes, and expressions of identity. Subverting Fashion aims to explore appropriations of fashion and style as creativity, self-expression, collective identity and rebelliousness in media and culture, as well as questioning these approaches both within and outside the fashion industry.
 
We invite 250-word proposals for 20-minute papers on topics related to alternative fashion, style and performative identity in popular culture and the media. Papers from all disciplines and areas of research are invited, and we are particular looking for contributions in the areas of:
·      Analysis of subcultural styles and identities, including body modification and tattooing, and various forms of anti-fashion
·      Explorations of DIY fashion, including handicrafting, fibre and textile arts
·      Studies of cosplay, fan costuming and live action role play
·      Accounts of costuming in film, television and theatre
·      Approaches to fashion and style in reality TV
·      Research into fashion and commodification of gender in the print media
·      Studies of fashion in relation to size, physical appearance and difference (particularly gender and ethnicity, but also class, sexuality, disability, age and religion), including the relation of fashion, cosmetics and cosmetic surgery to notions of beauty
 
Proposals and enquiries should be sent to:
Maria Mellins (maria.mellins@smuc.ac.uk)
Brigid Cherry (brigid.cherry@smuc.ac.uk)