The Department of Critical Studies at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences 2013, at the University of Victoria — June 1-8, 2013.
Jodey Castricano and Anderson Araujo posing with “The Copper Cowgirl, BA” at the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences conference, Victoria BC
This was a banner year for Critical Studies scholars at the 2013 Congress at the University of Victoria during the first week of June.
The 2013 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences included about 70 associations representing 8,000 to 10,000 delegates and guests. Including leading academics, internationally recognized researchers, policy makers, and practitioners, the assembly shared findings, refined ideas and built partnerships that will help shape the Canada of tomorrow.
Many Critical Studies faculty members and a number of graduate students participated in this year’s Congress.
Professor Anderson Araujo gave a talk entitled “Modernist Spectacles in the Mostra della Rivoluzione Fascista.” Araujo’s talk concerned the Mostra della Rivoluzione Fascista (Exhibition of the Fascist Revolution) in Rome from 1932 to 1934, commissioned by Benito Mussolini to showcase the art and cultural politics of Italian Fascism. The talk showed that the fusion of fascist culture, politics, and spectacle promoted in the Mostra informed much of the modernist fascination with Fascism in the 1930s.
At the Canadian Comparative Literature Association, the panel “Compare and Contrast: Teaching Literature at the Edges of Critical and Cultural Studies” was presented by graduate students Natasha Rebry, Lindsay Balfour, and Jannik Eikenaar. They discussed their experiences teaching upper-level courses cross-listed between English and Cultural Studies, focusing on the challenges of defining and working in interdisciplinary frames.
FCCS masters student Max Dickeson presented his first paper at ACCUTE, a conference organized by the Association of Canadian College and University Teachers of English. His paper entitled “ ‘The Living Dead Aren’t Reducible At All’: The Spectral Humanity of the Zombie in Daryl Gregory’s Raising Stony Mayhall” was well received.
Jessica Carey and Jodey Castricano presented a co-authored paper at Congress in the Joint Session with ACCUTE/International Gothic Association. The paper, “A Strange Harvest: Organ Transplants and The Monstrous Lives of the Not-Quite-Human,” explored xenotransplantation and human cloning from The Island of Dr Moreau to Never Let Me Go.
Constance Crompton presented a paper with Lorraine Janzen Kooistra from Ryerson University’s department of English, entitled “Critical Making for a Public Readership: Digital Pedagogy in the NINES Classroom.” It was about how to empower students to think of themselves as legitimate producers of knowledge, by using digital publishing tools to show them there is an audience for their scholarship.
Denise Kenney spoke on a panel called Eco-Criticism on the Edge. The presentation, “Performance Practice and the More-Than-Human World,” was co-presented with Dr. Karen Bamford of Ount Allison University and Dr. Theresa J. May of University of Oregon. They discussed body-based work in relationship to place and to the notion of belonging. This SSHRC funded Eco-Art Incubator project explores arts at the intersection of human activity (the sensory body) and a fragile dryland region undergoing radical urban and agricultural development.
Bernard Schulz-Cruz presented a paper at the Canadian Association of Hispanic Studies, entitled ” ‘La otra familia’: Intentos de normalización en el cine mexicano con imágenes gay. ¿Valen la pena?” (“The Other Family: Attempts of Normalization in Mexican Cinema with Gay Images: Are They Worth It?”).
Margaret Reeves presented a paper on “Political Sovereignty in Mary Wroth’s The Countess of Montgomeries Urania” to the annual meeting of the Canadian Society for Renaissance Studies, a meeting she helped to organize as a member of the CSRS Executive.
The conference is not only a productive learning experience for faculty but a place to reunite with colleagues from across Canada.