Spectres of Class conference Call for papers

[Matt Davies]

Dear colleagues

Please note the second call for papers for the interdisciplinary
‘Spectres of Class’ conference at the University of Chester, UK,
on Friday 15- Saturday 16 July 2011 organised by the University of
Chester English department in association with CADAAD (Critical
Approaches to Discourse Analysis Across Disciplines).

We welcome abstracts of no more than 300 words by Friday 25 March 2011.


Abstracts should be emailed (attached as a word document) to
matt.davies at chester.ac.uk  and please include the sender’s name,
position and contact details (including email).

For further information please visit the conference website:
http://www.chester.ac.uk/departments/english/conf 
Registration and accommodation details will be announced shortly.

Keynote speakers:

●	Professor Paul Kerswill, University of Lancaster, UK. Paul is an
expert on the relationship between social class, language and identity.

●	Dr Ruth Livesey, Reader in Nineteenth Century Literature and
Thought, Royal Holloway, University of London. Ruth’s publications
include  Socialism, Sex and the Culture of Aestheticism in Britain,
1880-1914.

●	Dr Colin Coulter, National University of Ireland, Maynooth.
Colin recently co-edited the first academic book on the rock band The
Smiths, called Why Pamper Life’s Complexities. 



Call for Papers:
SPECTRES OF CLASS: Representing Social Class from the French Revolution
to the Present

University of Chester, UK, 15 - 16 July 2011
This interdisciplinary conference seeks to give a name to one of many
spectres haunting the West: the spectre of class (manifested as
movements, protests, identities, and inequalities). The gap between the
rich and poor in the UK is currently the widest since the Second World
War, according to a 2010 report by the National Equality Panel and, as
the consequences of global recession deepen, the cuts imposed by
governments in the West are likely to exacerbate social inequalities. In
response to these forces, the Spectres of Class conference will consider
the ways in which class is represented in language, literature and other
cultural formations since the French Revolution, seeking to understand
the historical basis of class identities and their manifestations today.
Class was a central preoccupation of academic discourse in the twentieth
century. In the last twenty years, however, the emphasis on class
identity has become less pronounced as academics explore the power
imbalances associated with gender, ethnicity, sexuality, disability
status and nationality. Many important studies have emerged from these
investigations. However, class issues cut across all these areas and, in
the current climate of economic uncertainty, the material basis of class
identities may come to challenge poststructuralist notions of identity
as a lifestyle ‘choice’. 
We welcome papers on all aspects of the representation of class.
Possible topics may include:

●	Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) studies of class, ideology,
hegemony etc.
●	Protest movements (e.g. Chartists, anti-Poll Tax Unions, trade
union action)
●	Material and cultural influences on class identities
●	Rereading Marx
●	Class as performative
●	Social mobility/stasis
●	Class cultures: bourgeois, aristocratic, gentry, working class
●	Performances of class (art, music, theatre, photography, film
and television)
●	Corpus linguistic studies of ‘class’ in news media and other
genres
●	Representations of revolution and reform
●	Humorous/satirical representations of class


Conference committee:  Professor Deborah Wynne, Dr Matt Davies, Anna
Mackenzie, Ali Hutchinson (University of Chester English Department).

For further information contact Dr Matt Davies at
matt.davies at chester.ac.uk 



Dr Matt Davies
Senior Lecturer and Programme Leader
Department of English
University of Chester
Parkgate Road
Chester
CH1 4BJ
Tel: 01244 511835
matt.davies at chester.ac.uk