Posts
April 3-6, 2014
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Host: Susquehanna
University
The nineteenth century was
an era that changed the way people experienced time on both sides of the
Atlantic. New modes of transportation such as the railroad and the steam engine
shortened the time spent traveling across long distances, while new forms of
communication such as the telephone and the transatlantic cable promoted faster
and more reliable transatlantic exchange. As time speeds up, distances shrink—enabling
new opportunities and disabling old ones for both men and women. The fast tempo
of factory work and groups such as the “Ten Hours Movement” fixed new
importance on the relation between a man’s work and his time, while debates
about “redundant women” were based on the threat posed by a large number of
women who, according to Florence Nightingale, had nothing to do with their
time. On the other hand, the scientific theories of Charles Darwin, Charles
Lyell, Herbert Spencer, and John Fiske complicated the understanding of
temporality by emphasizing the experience of “deep” geological time and “natural”
evolutionary patterns.
This panel questions how
changes in temporal experience influenced the perception of race, gender and
class in 19th-cent. British and American contexts, especially with
regard to theories of transnationalism and cosmopolitanism, and the genres of
realism and naturalism. We are interested in papers that open the geography of
transatlantic studies to a discussion of time across literary, political, and
scientific contexts.
Please send a 300-word abstract
and a bio to Jacob Jewusiak (jmjewusiak@valdosta.edu) and Myrto Drizou (mdrizou@gmail.com).
Deadline: September 30, 2013
Please include with your
abstract:
Name and
Affiliation
Email address
Postal address
Telephone number
A/V requirements
(if any; $10 handling fee with registration)
