Cultural Networks in the U.S.: Past and Present Challenges

The American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest

invites proposals for its annual student conference on the topic

Cultural Networks in the U.S.: Past and Present Challenges 

to be held at the Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission 

(2, Ing. Nicolae Costinescu St, Bucharest)

on Thursday, May 16, 2024.

We invite proposals for 15-minute presentations from undergraduate and graduate students whose research is relevant to the topic of the conference. Papers may come from the fields of literature, film, theater and performance arts, popular culture, visual culture and the media, history, politics, intercultural and interdisciplinary communication, transatlantic relations, as well as other academic areas that are relevant to the subject, and may address issues such as (but not necessarily limited to): cultural, economic and political networks in American history; the network as category of analysis in American studies and a model of conceptualizing America; media and popular culture as cultural networks in the U.S.; U.S. minorities, migration and the development of cultural networks of solidarity and empathy; American cultural networks as subversive discourses of the status quo; war, conflict, and network cultures in the U.S.; transnational relations and cultural networks; gender, sexuality, and the development of cultural networks in the U.S.; AI, deepfake and other network technologies and processes in American literary and cultural spaces. 

Submission Guidelines. Please submit the following:

1) a 250-word abstract attached as an MS Word file. Your abstract must include the title of your paper and the name of the academic coordinator who has agreed to supervise your paper. Please note that, considering that each presentation will be 15 minutes long, final papers should be approximately 5-6 pages long (Times New Roman, font 12, double-spaced). However, we strongly encourage participants to present and not simply read their papers.

2) 3-5 keywords from your essay;

3) Contact information (name, affiliation, phone number, and email address).

Please email your submissions to sabina.draga.alexandru@lls.unibuc.ro

Deadline for submissions: April 26, 2024.

Notifications of acceptance: April 30, 2024.

For any questions, please contact the conference organizer, Dr. Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru (sabina.draga.alexandru@lls.unibuc.ro). 

 Our partners: US Embassy | Fulbright Commission in Romania | English Department, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Bucharest

Opening of the 2023-2024 Academic Year

The opening of the 2023-2024 academic year for the American Studies Program is to be held in Martin Luther King Lecture Hall, The Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, 7-13 Pitar Moş St., Bucharest, on Tuesday, October 3, from 10 to 11am.

Our speakers for the day include Peter Brown (Public Affairs Officer, U.S. Embassy in Romania), Michael Dickerson (Deputy Chief of Mission, U.S. Embassy in Romania), Professor Mircea Dumitru (Executive Director, Fulbright Commission in Romania), Maria-Talida Izdrăilă (American Studies MA Student), Professor Emeritus Rodica Mihăilă (founder, American Studies Program), and Professor Alina Tigău (vice-dean, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures).

We look forward to welcoming all of our speakers, students, and faculty and wish everyone a great academic year.

The Seance of Reading. Uncanny Designs in Modernist Writing (Event)

You are kindly invited to join us in welcoming Professor Thomas J. Cousineau on April 5, from 10am, in Sala de Consiliu (1st floor of our 7-13, Pitar Mos building). Professor Cousineau will be presenting his latest book, The Seance of Reading. Uncanny Designs in Modernist Writing, whose second edition has recently come out from Editura Universitară. 

Thomas J. Cousineau is Professor of English (Emeritus) at Washington College, former visiting professor at the University of Paris-Sorbonne, and Fulbright Scholar at the University of Bucharest. He edited the newsletter of the Samuel Beckett Society for several years and co-directed the Presence de Samuel Beckett conference at Le Centre Culturel International de Cerisy-la-Salle in Normandy. He is the author of After the Final No: Samuel Beckett s Trilogy, Waiting for Godot: Form in Movement, Ritual Unbound: Reading Sacrifice in Modernist Fiction, Three-Part Inventions: The Novels of Thomas Bernhard and An Unwritten Novel: Fernando Pessoa’s The Book of Disquiet (recipient of an ”Outstanding Title” citation from the American Library Association). 

We look forward to seeing many of you there!

You can order the book and find out more details about it by clicking on the link below:

https://www.editurauniversitara.ro/…/the-s%C3%A9ance-of…

The Seance of Reading is part of a three-book project titled The Manole Trilogy. Please find more information about each title (both published and projected) below. 

Ritual Unbound: Reading Sacrifice in Modernist Writing. University of Delaware Press 2004.

[René Girard, Violence and The Sacred. Michigan State University Press, 2021]

Introduction: The Oedipus Complex [aka The Manole Complex I – ritual scapegoating]

Ch. 1 Occulted Rivalry in The Turn of the Screw

Ch. 2 Heart of Darkness: The Outsider Demystified

Ch. 3 Borrowed Desire in The Good Soldier

Ch. 4 The Great Gatsby: Romance or Holocaust?

Ch. 5 Ending Rituals in To The Lighthouse

The Séance of Reading: Uncanny Designs in Modernist Writing. Editura Universitara 2023.

[Mircea Eliade, Commentaires sur la légende de maître Manole. L’Herne 1994]

Introduction: The Manole Complex [aka The Manole Complex II – ritual building]

Ch. 1 Fixing Things in The Great Gatsby 

Ch. 2 Being Scrupulous in “The Sisters”

Ch.3 Rebuilding Lisbon in The Book of Disquiet

Ch. 4 Doing It in Waiting for Godot

Ch. 5 The Eliot Way: Turning Back in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”

Ch. 6 Playing It in Endgame

Ch. 7 Crafting Transfigurations in A Short History of Decay

Ch. 8 Being Misfits in “A Good Man is Hard to Find”

Ch. 9 Framing Things in Light in August

To Double-Business Bound: The Symmetrical Imperative of Writing (in progress)

[Cedric Whitman, Homer and The Heroic Tradition. W. W. Norton, 1965.]

Introduction: The Exekias Complex [aka The Manole Complex III – the doppelgänger effect]

Homer, The Iliad and Ezekias, Ajax and Achilles Playing a Board Game 

Ch 1: Setting It Right in Oedipus and Hamlet

Ch 2: Fixing Maimed Rites in Waiting for Godot and Endgame

Ch 3: Being Hamlet in The Book of Disquiet and A Short History of Decay

Ch 4: Forging Bonds in “Heart of Darkness” and “The Secret Sharer”

Ch 5: Blending Opposites in Murphy and Molloy

Ch 6: Longing for Another Country in “Eveline” and “The Dead”

Ch 7: Obtaining Relief in “Krapp’s Last Tape” and “Ohio Impromptu”

Ch 8 Balancing All in “An Irish Airman Foresees His Death” and “Sailing to Byzantium”

Ch 9: Vanquishing Them Again in “A Rose for Emily” and “Dry September”

Ch 10: Going Back and Forth in Woodcutters and Wittgenstein’s Nephew

New Book: Thomas J. Cousineau’s The Seance of Reading. Uncanny Designs in Modernist Writing

Thomas J. Cousineau, a former Fulbright professor with the American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest, has recently published the second edition of his book The Seance of Reading. Uncanny Designs in Modernist Writing. This is the second of a planned three-part trilogy. You can order the book and find out more information about the Table of Contents by clicking on the link below: https://www.editurauniversitara.ro/filologie-12/the-s%C3%A9ance-of-reading-uncanny-designs-in-modernist-writing.html.

America in the Global World (Student Conference)

The Center for American Studies at the University of Bucharest 

and the Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission

invite proposals for their annual student conference on the topic

America in the Global World 

to be held online and in person

at the Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission (2, Ing. Nicolae Costinescu St, Bucharest)

 on Wednesday, May 10, 2023

We invite proposals for 15-minute presentations from undergraduate and MA students whose research is relevant to the topic of the conference. Papers may come from the fields of literature, film, theater and performance arts, popular culture, visual culture and the media, history, politics, intercultural and interdisciplinary communication, and transatlantic relations and may address issues such as (but not necessarily limited to): the impact of U.S. culture, economy and politics on the rest of the world; American contributions to globalization; American perceptions of the post-pandemic global world; America, globalization and the environment; American democracy, U.S. minorities and global migration; America, gender roles and globalization; America, LGBTQ+ struggles for rights and globalization; the United States and global crises. The best presentation will be awarded the “Dan Grigorescu” prize (US$ 200). Doctoral students are welcome to present outside the competition for the “Dan Grigorescu” prize.

Submission Guidelines

Please submit the following: 

1. a 250-word abstract attached as an MS Word file. Your abstract must include the paper title and the name of the academic coordinator who has agreed to supervise your paper. Please note that, considering that each presentation will be 15 minutes long, final papers should be approximately 5-6 pages long/in length (Times New Roman, font 12, double-spaced). However, we strongly encourage participants to present and not simply read their papers. Please make sure you specify whether you will deliver your paper in person or online. 

2. 3-5 keywords from your essay;

3. Contact information (name, affiliation, phone number, and email address).

Please email your submissions to sabina.draga.alexandru@lls.unibuc.ro.

Deadline for submissions: Friday, April 26, 2023.

Notifications of proposal acceptance: Monday, May 2, 2023 (earlier notifications available upon request).

For any questions, please contact dr. Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru (sabina.draga.alexandru@lls.unibuc.ro). 

Our partners: US Embassy | Fulbright Commission in Romania | English Department, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Bucharest 

In Memoriam Octavian Roske

We are deeply saddened by the loss of our colleague and former head of the American Studies Program, Associate Professor Octavian Roske, who passed away earlier today, at the age of 67. A graduate of the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, where he majored in English and Romanian (1977-1981), Professor Roske started teaching in the English Department in 1993. He was an immensely popular teacher, rigorous but also encouraging and patient, with impressive knowledge of American history, the American political system, and the American constitution. Professor Roske’s research interests were vast and diverse, and they went beyond the scope of American studies. His work for the National Institute for the Study of Totalitarianism resulted in an impressive number of books and collections of documents that made an important contribution to the memory of the repressive totalitarian regime from Romania before 1989. During the communist regime, he co-wrote (with Daniel Barbu and Radu Ciuceanu) two clandestine studies that were sent to and broadcast by Radio Free Europe in 1981 and 1985, respectively. From 2000 to 2004, he was vice-dean of the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, and from 2008 to his retirement in 2021, he was head of the English Department of the Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures. From 2012 to 2021 he was also head of the American Studies Program. We miss his leadership and generosity, his resourcefulness and ingenuity. May he rest in peace. 

Professor Roske is survived by his wife, daughter, and grandson. Our thoughts are with them at this very difficult time. 

Reframing the Perpetrator in Contemporary Comics: On the Importance of the Strange

It is our great pleasure to announce Dr. Dragoș Manea’s new book, Reframing the Perpetrator in Contemporary Comics: On the Importance of the Strange.

“This book foregrounds the figure of the perpetrator in a selection of British, American, and Canadian comics and explores questions related to remembrance, justice, and historical debt. Its primary focus is on works that deliberately estrange the figure of the perpetrator—through fantasy, absurdism, formal ambiguity, or provocative rewriting—and thus allow readers to engage anew with the history of genocide, mass murder, and sexual violence. This book is particularly interested in the ethical space such an engagement calls into being: in its ability to allow us to ponder the privilege many of us now enjoy, the gross historical injustices that have secured it, and the debt we owe to people long dead” (https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-031-03853-2).

Sophisticated Ladies in Life and Literature: Selective Portraits

It is our great pleasure to announce Dr. Anca Peiu’s new book, Sophisticated Ladies in Life and Literature: Selective Portraits. The press presentation is available below.

Anca Peiu Sophisticated Ladies in Life and Literature: Selective Portraits 

To a certain extent, Dr. Anca Peiu’s newly published volume, Sophisticated Ladies in Life and Literature: Selective Portraits (C. H. Beck, Bucharest, 2022), is a continuation of her book, Romantic Renderings of Selfhood in Classic American Literature (C. H. Beck, 2017). Each one of the chapters originally dedicated to Emily Dickinson, (with eighteen of her poems analyzed at that time), and Kate Chopin, (the bold American pioneer of literary naturalism, also carefully analyzed in Peiu’s same former volume) are now dutifully completed by the corresponding four essays, added in the present volume, each one of these essays deepening and nuancing the first approach of the two 19th century American women writers. On the other hand, this new volume could bridge the gap between Romantic Renderings and a further book (as just a work in progress for now) about Old and New Southern feminine literature. The beginning is already accomplished in Sophisticated Ladies, by quite a number of Peiu’s academic essays focusing on such Southern lady writers as: Kate Chopin, Flannery O’Connor, Eudora Welty, Margaret Mitchell.

All in all, there are twenty-seven literary and cultural feminine personalities commented upon in this new book. Fifteen of them are American women writers and distinguished scholars, such as: Emily Dickinson, Kate Chopin, Edith Wharton, Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Gertrude Stein, Zelda Fitzgerald, Flannery O’Connor, Eudora Welty, Margaret Mitchell, Toni Morrison, Katherine Verdery, Anne F. Hyde, Therese Anne Fowler, Katie Henninger, Yaa Gyasi. Also here discussed then are two prominent Canadian feminine personalities of international prestige: writer Alice Munro, and literary theorist Linda Hutcheon. These are followed by three major women writers from the UK: Victorian novelist Anne Bronte; Virginia Woolf, the emblematic writer of British high modernism; and Angela Carter, a fine representative of British postmodernism, unfortunately also dead before her time now. Last but not least, no less than seven Romanian feminine cultural and literary personalities are presented within these pages, such as: Ana Blandiana, Lidia Vianu, Rodica Marian, Michaela Mudure, Luiza Pârvu, Olimpia Melinte, Amalia Precup. 

As anyone can see, two thirds of these authors are our contemporaries or at least were born during the 20th century. They are quite distinct from each other as creative personalities. What they share though is – beside the divine gift of a unique individual talent – an exceptional intellectual capacity, plus resilience, plus devoted hard work. This book is paying tribute to some exemplary women workaholics, therefore as such it is bound to remain inexhaustible.       

In Memoriam Irina Grigorescu Pana (1948-2022)

In Memoriam

Irina Grigorescu Pană (1948-2022)

We are deeply saddened by the loss of our colleague, Professor Emerita Irina Grigorescu Pană, who passed away yesterday. Professor Pană was born on February 25, 1948, in Bucharest, and taught at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia and at the University of Bucharest, in the English Department. She was the author of many academic publications that reflected her interest in English-language literatures, comparative literature, and literary theory. She excelled at teaching all of these and other related subjects, but she also wrote fiction and was a member of the Writers’ Union of Romania. She was also one of the founding members of the Romanian Association for American Studies. As a professor, she will always be remembered not only for her remarkable intelligence and finesse, but also for her kindness to her students. Her classes were friendly spaces where intellectual curiosity was greatly encouraged and where her patience and generosity created a warm atmosphere that allowed for dialogue and discovery. As a colleague, she was always supportive and resourceful, and her wit and laid-back sense of humor will be sorely missed.

Rest in peace, Professor Pană. Your memory is a blessing to your former students, colleagues, and to your loving family, who is also in our thoughts. Through us, your presence endures.

Programare susţinere licență Studii Americane, iunie 2022

PROGRAMARE SUSŢINERE LICENŢĂ STUDII AMERICANE IUNIE 2022
NumePrenumeTitluCoordonatorOră
BociuRăzvan-CristianLibertatea de disidență: Cum a influențat Curtea Supremă relațiile de putere dintre guvernul Statelor Unite și cetățenii americaniLect. dr. Raluca Andreescu08:00
BumbaruPetre-MihaiMasculinitate Italoamericana in Cinema si TVLect. dr. Dragos Manea08:15
DavidMihaelaReprezentări Asia-Americane ale alterității prin stereotipuri în “The Yellow Kid” a lui Richard F. Outcault și “American Born Chinese” a lui Gene Luen YangLect. dr. Dragoș Manea08:30
NetbaiMaria-AlexandraCodarea Sensului și a Perspectivei în Cinematografia Coreean-americană Contemporană: Imagini „Arse” ale Memoriei și Re-creăriiConf. dr. Dana Mihăilescu08:45
NeațuAndrei-CosminDe La Fantezie pana la Sci-Fi: Un Studiu de caz al ReprezentariiAsist. univ. dr. Andrei Nae09:00
RenchezMariaLupta pentru Visul American intr-o societate opresiva in trilogia distopica The Hunger Games de Suzanne Collins: dintr-o perspectiva feministaAsist. univ. dr. Andrei Nae09:15
GoranAna-RalucaSalvarea oamenilor, vânătoarea de creaturi, afacerea familiei: Trauma și Moralitatea în “Supernatural”Conf. dr. Mihaela Precup09:30
NeculaiAlexandra-FlorentinaTrauma și Expresia Artistică în Cruella și opera de la Black Veil BridesConf. dr. Mihaela Precup09:45
ȘtefănescuAndreea-CristianaNarațiuni ale Adolescenței în serialul HBO “Euphoria” (2019-) și serialul Netflix “Ginny și Georgia” (2021-)Conf. dr. Mihaela Precup10:00
UngureanuLaura Roxana LilianaRolurile Sexelor si Prestația Feminității în Born to Die: Paradise Edition și TropicoConf. dr. Mihaela Precup10:15

*Toţi candidaţii, cu excepţia primilor doi, sunt rugaţi să fie prezenţi la facultate cu 30 de minute înainte de programare.

Programare susţinere disertaţii Studii Americane, iunie 2022

PROGRAMARE SUSŢINERE DISERTAŢII STUDII AMERICANE IUNIE 2022
NumePrenumeTitluCoordonatorOră*
DrăganMihaelaPersonaje Captive ale Sudului American în Trei Povestiri Scurte de Flannery O’Connor: Greu de găsit un om bun, Negrul Artificial și Un cerc în focConf. dr. Anca Peiu10:00
CozmaGeorgiana-MirunaPunctul mort al muzicii Rap: O abordare feminista asupra reprezentarii femeilor Afro Americane in lumina Rapului comercial in AmericaLect. dr. Manea Dragos10:15
MetushevskayaOlgaProblema Terorismului în Timpul Președinției lui George W. Bush prin Prisma Excepționalismului AmericanProf. dr. Liviu Andreescu10:30
ZahiuAndreea-SimonaReprezentări culturale ale prostituției militare sud-coreene sub puterea hegemonică a Statelor Unite ale AmericiiLect. dr. Diana Benea10:45
MărgineanuAdriana ElenaFeminismul Finlandez în Statele UniteConf. dr. Maria-Sabina Draga Alexandru11:00
GeantăSeforaOdiseea Româno-Americană. O analiză transgenerațională a identităților româno-americaneConf. dr. Dana Mihăilescu11:15
MihaiCristina-MariaReprezentarea identității chinezilor americani în The Joy Luck Club (1993) și American Born Chinese (2006)Conf. dr. Dana Mihailescu11:30
MoraruAlexandra-Sorina„Comemorare sau Ignoranță?”: Desființarea Stereotipului „Jump Jim Crow” din Show-urile Menestrele Americane în filmele Minstrel Man (1977) și Bamboozled (2000)Conf. dr. Dana Mihăilescu11:45
POPASÂNZIANA-MIRUNAPortretizări ale comunității afro-americane în adaptări ale filmului Nașterea unei națiuni (1915)Conf. dr. Dana Mihăilescu12:00
COȘERUIRINA-ALEXANDRAReprezentarea Răufăcătorului în Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes (Netflix, 2019), Ted Bundy: Falling for a Killer (Amazon Prime, 2020), si The Phantom Prince: My Life with Ted Bundy (2020) de Elizabeth KendallConf. dr. Mihaela Precup12:15
DatcuDiandra-IoanaReprezentarea imaginii tatălui în benzi desenate autobiografice. Cazul Fun Home de Alison Bechdel și The Impostor’s Daughter de Laurie SandellConf. dr. Mihaela Precup12:30
FILOTEIULIA-ȘTEFANIAAntieroul Plăcut de Toți: Ambiguitate Morală în “Banda Celor Șase Ciori” de Leigh BardugoConf. dr. Mihaela Precup12:45
VoicanMaria AlexandraReconstructia Mitului Frontierei Americane in Red Dead Redemption IIConf. dr. Mihaela Precup13:00

*Toţi candidaţii, cu excepţia primilor doi, sunt rugaţi să fie prezenţi la facultate cu 30 de minute înainte de programare.

American Studies Student Conference Program (2022)

Transitions: Transience, Subversion, and (Im)permanence in Contemporary American Culture

An American Studies Online Student Conference

Friday, May 20, 2022

9:00-9:30 Opening (Chair: Assoc. Prof. Mihaela Precup, Conference Organizer, University of Bucharest)

Dragoș Manea (Assist. Prof., Director of the American Studies Center, University of Bucharest)

Mihai Moroiu (Program Director, Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission)

William O’Connor (Cultural Affairs Officer, United States Embassy, Bucharest)

9:30-10:15 Opening Talk by William O’Connor (Cultural Affairs Officer, United States Embassy, Bucharest) on Transitions: Transience, Subversion, and (Im)permanence in Contemporary American Culture (Chair: Assoc. Prof. Mihaela Precup)

10:15-10:30 Coffee Break

10:30-12:00 Panel 1. Chair: Prof. Roxana Oltean (American Studies Program, University of Bucharest)

Mihaela Tone (American Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest). “Female Perpetration and  Gender Treachery in Bruce Miller’s The Handmaid’s Tale

Ștefan Ionescu Ambrosie (Rijksuniversiteit Groningen). “Billingsgate, Bodily Fluids, and Millennial Socialism: The Dialogic Impasse of the Dirtbag Left”

Cristina Botîlcă (PhD student, The Doctoral School for Literary and Cultural Studies, University of Bucharest). “Transitioning from Tradition. Human Composting and Water Cremation in Contemporary America”

Andreea Moise (British Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest). “Death in the Making: Gendered Mourning in Sigrid Nunez’s What Are You Going Through

12:00-12:45 Lunch Break

12:45-14.15 Panel 2. Chair: Assoc. Prof. Mihaela Precup (American Studies Program, University of Bucharest)

Ionuț-Laurențiu Cazan (American Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest). “Theorizing Animal Exploitation in The Flintstones as a Question of Reform”

Cristina-Maria Mihai (American Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest). “Transition and Adaptation in Gene Luen Yang’s Graphic Novel American Born Chinese (2006)”

Raul Săran (PhD Student, Doctoral School of Humanities, West University of Timișoara). ”From Meaninglessness to Irrelevancy – Chris Fogle and the “New” Heroism in David Foster Wallace’s The Pale King

Andreea-Alexandra Călin (University of Bucharest (CESI), University of Leuven (Faculty of Arts). “Fragmentation and (Post)modern Society in Speedboat

14:15-14.30 Coffee Break

14.30-16.10 Panel 3. Chair: Assist. Prof. Diana Benea (American Studies Program, University of Bucharest)

Andrada Stănei (American Studies BA Program, “Ovidius” University, Constanța). “Subverting Dracula: The Transition from a European Myth to an American Pop Culture Icon”

Viorel Samuel Tajkuna Teleagă (Modern Languages and Literatures, Faculty of Letters, History and Theology,  University of the West, Timișoara). ”From Angel to Androgynous Vamp: Greta Garbo’s Challenging and Subversion of Stereotypes about Femininity in Early American Film”

Oana Condurache (American Studies MA Program, University of the West, Timișoara). ”Chicano Literature—A Subversive Approach to the American Studies Curriculum”

Sefora Geantă (American Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest).  “Romanian Migration to the United States: Analyzing Spaces of Transition”

Denisa Aron (American Studies MA Program, University of Bucharest). “The Movie Trial of the Chicago 7 as a Subversive Mirror of the Past”

16.10-16.40 Coffee break / Jury Deliberation

16.40-17.00 “Dan Grigorescu” prize award ceremony. Closing remarks.

Jury:

Dr. Bri Ard, Director, International Education & Study Abroad, University of South Alabama, Fulbright fellow, American Studies Program, University of Bucharest

Dr. Ruxandra Rădulescu, Educational adviser, The Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission

Organizers:

The American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest

The Romanian-U.S. Fulbright Commission

The organizers would like to thank the U.S.

Embassy for their support.

Conference poster:

Andreea Moise

2022 American Studies Student Conference [Extended Deadline]

The American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest

invites proposals for its annual student conference on the topic

Transitions: Transience, Subversion, and (Im)permanence in Contemporary American Culture

to be held online

 on May 20, 2022.

We invite proposals for 15-minute presentations from undergraduate and MA students whose research is relevant to the topic of the conference. PhD students are also welcome to submit proposals, but should note that their presentations cannot be assessed for the “Dan Grigorescu” prize (please see more information below). Papers may come from the fields of literature, film, theater and performance arts, popular culture, visual culture and the media, history, politics, intercultural and interdisciplinary communication, transatlantic relations, as well as other academic areas that are relevant to the subject, and may address issues such as (but not necessarily limited to): cultural, economic and political transitions in American history; representations of transience, subversion, and impermanence in American culture; gender, sexuality, and transition; subversions of the status quo; war, conflict, and transitional spaces; transnational relations and transitional geographies; democracy, autocracy, and transition; transitional episodes and processes in American literary and cultural spaces. The best presentation will be awarded the “Dan Grigorescu” Prize (US$ 200).

Submission Guidelines

Please submit the following:

1. a 250-word abstract attached as an MS Word file. Your abstract must include the title of your paper and the name of the academic coordinator who has agreed to supervise your paper. Please note that, considering that each presentation will be 15 minutes long, final papers should be approximately 5-6 pages long (Times New Roman, font 12, double-spaced). However, we strongly encourage participants to present and not simply read their papers.

2. 3-5 keywords from your essay;

3. Contact information (name, affiliation, phone number, and email address).

Please email your submissions to mihaela.precup@lls.unibuc.ro.

Deadline for submissions: May 8, 2022.

Notifications of acceptance: May 12, 2022.

For any questions, please contact Dr. Mihaela Precup (mihaela.precup@lls.unibuc.ro).

Our partners: US Embassy | Fulbright Commission in Romania | English Department, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures, University of Bucharest

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