Royal Geographical Society (with IBG) Annual Conference 2015 Wednesday 2 to Friday 4 September 2015, Exeter, UK Historical and cultural geographies of story and storytelling (sponsored by the Historical Geography Research Group) Convenors: James Ryan, University of Exeter (Penryn Campus) and Nicola Thomas, University of Exeter (Exeter Campus) Abstract: In recent years there has been a renewed interest in the concept of story and practices of storytelling in geography (see, for example, Barnes 2001; Braun 2008; DeSilvey 2006; Cameron 2012; Lorimer 2003; MacDonald 2013; Price 2010; Wylie 2005). Historical and cultural geographers in particular have show enthusiasm for engaging with new kinds of stories and storytelling in their varied attempts to chart how personal experience and expression intersect with broader social and political changes and circumstances, in both the past and present. Appeals to narrative and storytelling are not new in geography, as is apparent from narrative traditions of humanistic geography from the 1970s or ‘cultural turn’-inspired work of the 1990s. However, earlier concerns with tales of humanistic encounters with place or with deconstructing stories as spaces of power and constructions of difference have been much critiqued and largely replaced today with new questions such as those around materiality, affect and embodiment. One significant body of more recent work, for example, argues for the importance of attending to ‘small stories’ of the local, personal and particular (Lorimer 2003). Another focuses on the performative and political place of storytelling as a means by which individuals or social groups resist dominant narratives (Cameron 2012). Others too have engaged with various forms of storytelling as a stylistic as well as analytic strategy to convey the experiential, personal and affective, and to weave together narratives and places in the present and the past (Wylie 2005; MacDonald 2013). While the concept of ‘story’ has gained greater currency in geography, it is used in a variety of ways. As Cameron (2012) has noted: ‘For some story is an object of knowledge, for others a form of practice, and for others it is a mode of academic expression’ (p575). This increased but varied interest raises a number of questions, particularly for historical and cultural geographers. What opportunities and challenges do concepts of story and storytelling present for geographers’ engagements with archives and the past? How can the concept of story be best used to articulate the interwoven nature of personal and the political as well as the particular and the general? Inspired by such questions this session seeks to bring together scholars interested in historical-geographical aspects of story and storytelling, in order to promote new dialogue around the changing understandings of these concepts (see, for example, Cameron 2012; Mills 2013; Ward 2014). We invite proposals for papers on any aspect of story and storytelling, as objects of knowledge or forms of practice suitable for historical-geographical enquiry. We also welcome proposals of papers on conceptual and methodological aspects of storytelling in historical and cultural geography. Potential contributors might respond to the following themes: Story and storytelling in other times and places Stories, memory and place Biography, autobiography and ‘life geographies’ Telling ‘small stories’ and microhistory Stories and journeys Stories of things Stories of the human and non-human Creative storytelling Narrative, discourse and rhetoric Telling facts and fiction Changing technologies of storytelling If you are interested in participating in this session please submit your presentation abstract / proposal by Thursday 12th February to both James Ryan and Nicola Thomas. If you would like to develop an alternative format for your presentation please get in touch by email. [email protected] and [email protected] Please include the following information: Title (maximum 15 words) Abstract (200 words) Author(s) Name, affiliation, email address If you have joint authors please indicate who will present for scheduling purposes. If you have non-standard AV requirements please let us know. Information about the conference can be found at: rgs.org/WhatsOn/ConferencesAndSeminars/Annual+International+Conference/Annual+international+conference.htm
Posted on: Fri, 16 Jan 2015 10:39:29 +0000
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