Cultural Studies Association of Australasia annual conference 2012 Hosted by the Department of Gender & Cultural Studies, University of Sydney Dec 4th-6th (pre-fix pre-conference Dec 3rd) ‘Materialities: Economies, Empiricism, & Things’ Organising committee: Fiona Allon, Prudence Black, Catherine Driscoll, Elspeth Probyn, Kane Race& Guy Redden. Call for Papers Cultural studies has a long history of investigating material practices – indeed it was a founding tenet of British cultural studies – but recently a new turn or return to materialism seems to be emerging in the field. What this materiality now means is still open, but we suggest that it flags a renewed interest in questions of how to study cultural objects, institutions and practices (methods), what constitutes matter and materiality (empiricism), and how things (humans and non-humans) are being reworked at a time of global economic, environmental and cultural flux. Our keynotes haveall directed critical attention to these questions – to the more-than-human, to new philosophies of matter, to the gendered material and economic circuits of media, and to ‘the heavy materiality of language’. We have invited them to help us in reinvigorating what cultural studies can do today. They include: Ross Chambers (Michigan), Katherine Gibson (UWS), Lesley Head (UoW), Bev Skeggs (Goldsmiths, London), and Sarah Whatmore (Oxford). We encourage proposed panels and individual papers that engage with the wide spectrum of issues flagged by our title, including submissions that focus on: · the crossing of science studies and cultural studies; · questions of method; ·the relation between culture and economy; · cultural histories of objects and forms; · new ideas about empiricism; · placing sexuality, gender and race within the more-than-human; · the materiality of texts and genres; · the future and the past of material cultural studies; · environmental humanities and changing ecologies; · cultural studies within the anthropocene; ·cultural relations with/in primary and natural resources; · the new materiality of globalism Papers and panels not focusing on the theme are also welcome. Please send submissions to csaa.2012@gmail.com by August 24th and include your name and affiliation. Abstracts for papers should be 250-300 words. Panel submissions must include three individual abstracts, a panel title and 100-150 word rationale for the panel as a whole. We will advise all proposers of accepted papers within 4 weeks of this deadline. Please note that accepted presenters will need to register before their paper will be scheduled in the program. There will also be a separate event, “Pre-Fix”, geared to the needs of postgraduates and early career researchers, on December 3rd. Details of this and the main conference will be on a dedicated conference website soon. CSAA website: http://www.csaa.asn.au/ Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/CSAA2012 Twitter: csaa2012 Associate Professor Catherine Driscoll | School of Philosophical and Historical Inquiry Postgraduate Research Coordinator | Department of Gender and Cultural Studies The University of Sydney K4.07, Main Quadrangle A14 | The University of Sydney | NSW | 2006 T +61 2 9036 9503 | F +61 2 9351 5336 E catherine.driscoll@sydney.edu.au<mailto:catherine.driscoll@sydney.edu.au> W http://sydney.edu.au/arts/gender_cultural_studies/staff/profiles/cdriscoll.s... CRICOS 00026A This email plus any attachments to it are confidential. Any unauthorised use is strictly prohibited. If you receive this email in error, please delete it and any attachments.