Subject: SPOON-ANN: CFP: History in Words and Images
Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2002 10:14:20 +0200


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c a l l   f o r   p a p e r s


HISTORY IN WORDS AND IMAGES
Conference on Historical Re/Presentation


September 26-28, 2002
University of Turku, Finland


Since 1997, the Department of History and the Department of Political
History at the University of Turku have organized conferences on the
theory and methodology of history. These conferences have dealt with the
themes of memory, time, space and change and have aimed at drawing
together methodological debates. The 2002 conference "History in Words
and Images" focuses on the debate over historical representation in
recent decades. As historians have investigated the problems involved
with the narrativization of the past, questions concerning non-literary
means of representation in the production of historical knowledge and
conceptions of the past have also come increasingly to the fore.

The first day of the conference is dedicated to "the past as text," the
second to "images of history" and the third to historical consciousness,
to the question of how conceptions of the past ultimately form on the
basis of cultural products and cultural practices not involved directly
in historical representation.

Confirmed speakers so far are:

Professor Gabrielle M. Spiegel (Johns Hopkins University), a medievalist
with a strong interest in the theory and practice of writing history,
both in the Middle Ages and in the modern era. Professor Spiegel is best
known for her books Romancing the Past: The Rise of Vernacular
Historiography in Thirteenth-Century France (1993) and The Past as Text.
The Theory and Practice of Medieval Historiography (1997).

Professor Stephen Bann (University of Bristol), an art historian and
philosopher of history whose publications include The Inventions of
History. Essays on the Representation of the Past (1990). Professor
Bann's areas of specialization include museum history and theory,
historical representation in painting and other visual media,
post-modern media and installation art, as well as land art and
landscape theory.

Professor Christopher Frayling (Royal College of Art, London), a
cultural historian whose books include Napoleon Wrote Fiction (1972),
Spaghetti Westerns (1981), Vampires: Lord Byron to Count Dracula (1992)
and Nightmare: the Birth of Horror (1996). Professor Frayling has also
written several TV series for the BBC (incl. The Birth of Horror, 1996).

The conference will also include workshops in which papers are
discussed. In addition to proposals for papers, proposals for workshops
are invited. Both should be sent to the organizers by January 31, 2002.
At this stage we require paper titles and abstracts of approximately 200
words. The deadline for completed papers -- lasting no more than twenty
minutes -- will be announced later. The conference language is English.

Papers might explore the following themes and questions: What is the
relation of historical representation to words and images? How is
history present in artifacts, media or texts? What is involved in the
presentation of the past through textual -- or, say, audiovisual --
means? Can the past be approached performatively as well as narratively?
Because we can claim that the past is present to us in textual form, as
a text, the question of the relation of words and images pertains to
more than narration or performance. The past is often also thought of
visually. This visuality may be metaphorical, in which case the textual
level refers to visual sensations, the gaze -- or images may be
harnessed as vehicles for historical narration. A question in its own
right is the way the past -- at least in our present history-culture --
is present not only in words but also in images whose meaning is
constantly reinterpreted. Another interesting question is the way in
which the past as a whole can take on visual metaphors: in addition to
the "great book of history" we speak of the past as a fresco, a
panorama, a picture book, a cavalcade... The aim of the "History in
Words and Images" conference is to investigate these themes across a
broad spectrum and with an open mind. Welcome!

Further Information: Prof. Hannu Salmi, Cultural History, University of
Turku, 20014 Turku, Finland email hannu.salmi-AT-utu.fi
http://www.utu.fi/hum/historia/2002/