An opportunity for some of you

[vg_ford]

jbattis on Fangs, Fur and Fey is looking for essays on the following subjects (more info behind the cut):



Hey all,

I'm currently editing (or co-editing) three volumes of essays on 1) Tori Amos, 2) Teen Wizards and Superheroes, and 3) LGBT Grad Students. If you're interested in contributing an essay, or know someone who might be, please check the call for papers out at my website: http://www.sfu,ca/~jbattis, or read the cfps:


Update


A Dragon Wrecked My Prom: Wizards, Mutants, and Other Teen Heroes


"She saved the world. A lot."


- Epitaph, Buffy Summers


Teens save the world. A lot. This volume will collect a series of
critical essays on the role of teens (and tweens) as world-savers, wizards,
superheroes, and wielders of occult or technological power. Just as magic
can allow an eleven-year-old to save the galaxy (Diane Duane, "High
Wizardry"), technological augmentation can allow kids to take on dark lords,
super-villains, and even death itself. Buffy, Joss Whedon's "Runaways,"
Harry Potter, The Neverending Story, and The Black Cauldron all present us
with teens and tweens who have the power to save the world. Whether this
power derives from magic, genetics, technology, or some mysterious
dimension (ala Cloak and Dagger's light/shadow powers), I am interested in
exploring what magic and mutation have to do with adolescence. How do
these empowered teens manage to save the world while still acting like kids?


Although this volume originally focused on the role of the teen wizard, I
have broadened it to encompass a whole array of empowered teens, from
Sabriel to Alanna the Lioness to Vanyel Ashkevron. How are teens uniquely
equipped (or ill-equipped) to save the world, and is supernatural
teenlit--including paranormal teen romance, urban fantasy, and other forms
of kidslit--supportive and encouraging towards ALL kinds of teens? Who
gets left out? Who is ultimately disempowered in these narratives, and how
does magic act as both an equalizing and an exclusionary force? I am
particularly interested in examining the role of at-risk and marginalized
youth in a variety of supernatural texts, including LGBT youth, mixed-race
teens, disabled teens, poor teens, and teen subalterns who find inventive
ways to negotiate their own heroic narratives. This also includes teen
super-villains!


Abstract Deadline: Sept 30, 2007.


Please send abstracts with recent CVs and bios to:


jbattis_AT_gmail.com


Or, you can contact me via snailmail at:


Dr. Jes Battis
Dept of Film and Media Studies
Hunter College, 695 Park Avenue
Room 433 Hunter North
New York, NY 10021

---


Update


Blood Roses: Reading Tori Amos


This volume will assemble a variety of critical essays on the cultural work
of Tori Amos--including her lyrics, musicality and arrangement, artwork and
album covers, interviews, charity work (RAINN), and her evolving status as
both a feminist and queer icon. I am updating the CFP in order to explain
with more precision what types of essays we are looking for. I also have a
new co-editor, Matthew Rohweder, a SSHRC-sponsored doctoral student at the
University of Toronto (and a Toriphile like me). The abstract deadline has
also been extended to Oct 30/07


Tori has always been cryptic. Unlike Madonna, who maintains her staunch
feminism while also embracing a shock-aesthetic of free sexuality and other
political arguments, Tori has always remained a bit of a cryptogram. Her
songs tackle everything from gay-bashing and murder ("Taxi Ride") to sexual
abuse ("Me And A Gun") to playful BDSM ("Leather.") Although albums like
Scarlet's Walk position Amos as strictly anti-imperialist and anti-racist,
her texts--when taken as a whole--are much broader than their political
fragments. They are cryptograms, spells, myths, stories, and maps, all
ideas that Amos herself has engaged with over her 20-year career (if we
include Y Kant Tori Read as her 'original' effort, also her rejected and
disavowed text that has nonetheless become a camp artifact for many of her
most devoted fans).


Essays should be critical, with coherent, sophisticated arguments about
some aspect of Tori's work. Grad student submissions are welcome.
Potential topics could include:


- gay and lesbian politics
- camp, iconic status, diva-ness
- comparisons to Madonna, Cher, Sarah Slean, Kate Bush, et al.
- magic and the supernatural
- mapping, imperialism, postcolonialism
- bondage, BDSM cultures
- sexual abuse, suicide, murder
- music videos (production, imagery, reception)
- fairy tales, intertextuality, Neil Gaiman, Sandman
- the place of Tori Amos within Queer Theory
- advertising and marketing of albums
- Tori's 'indecipherable' interviews, linguistics, semantics


Abstract Deadline: Oct 30, 2007.


Please send abstracts with recent CVs and bios to:


jbattis_AT_gmail.com AND mrohweder_at_gmail.com


Or, you can contact me via snailmail at:


Dr. Jes Battis
Dept of Film and Media Studies
Hunter College, 695 Park Avenue
Room 433 Hunter North
New York, NY 10021


---


Update

Graduating Gender: Queer Grad Students Reading Culture


I am still looking for a variety of essays written by/for queer graduate
students, both in North America and beyond. I am particularly interested
in global perspectives on race and sexuality, as well as essays that treat
fantasy cultures, science fiction, popular film and television, and
children's literature. I already have interest from a university press,
and will submit a project-proposal based on the abstracts by early November
of 2007.


These submissions need not be creative or autobiographical, but I would
like you to incorporate what you feel are your own unique experiences as a
queer grad student into your scholarly arguments. If you originally wrote
this for a course, or even a grad-level presentation, how was it received?
Try to update and revise your work to be as self-reflexive as
possible--in short, make it powerful and subjective while still carrying an
argument about a particular queer text, be it print-based, visual, or digital.


Central concerns to keep in mind are:


1) What does it mean to you, personally, to be a "queer grad?"


2) How does your sexuality inform your graduate work?


3) How is being a queer grad different from being a queer professor?


4) Did you always intend to pursue doctoral studies, or are you still
uncertain about your position as an academic? Are you more interested in
creative projects?


I am interested in any and all types of essays that you may have
written/are still writing as a graduate student, including M.A. project
essays, possibly even B.A. honors essays, dissertation chapters, conference
presentations, and comp/field exams (with a coherent narrative/argument).


Abstract Deadline: Oct 30, 2007.


Please send abstracts with recent CVs and bios to:


jbattis_AT_gmail.com


Or, you can contact me via snailmail at:


Dr. Jes Battis
Dept of Film and Media Studies
Hunter College, 695 Park Avenue
Room 433 Hunter North
New York, NY 10021

Please post far and wide! Thanks!

Comments

[dduane.livejournal.com]

Um, not "High Magic": "High Wizardry". :)

[vg-ford.livejournal.com]

*doh!* Fixed! Sorry - I just copied the entry from the original and my eyes totally skipped over that.

Teach me to NOT turn off the editing eyes when I post stuff for others!

[dduane.livejournal.com]

No sweat. :)