The 38th Annual College English Association Conference
New Orleans, Louisiana, April 12-14, 2007
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*CALL FOR PAPERS*
Empathy and Ethics
DEADLINE EXTENDED: NOVEMBER 30, 2006
Click here for a downloadable version of the CFP
How do we respond to difficult circumstances? Do we always act in right ways—according to some ethical imperative or ideal? Do we care if we do? Do we feel helpless or rely on some higher power (whether God or governments) for solutions? If we aren't the sufferers, are we simply grateful to have avoided suffering?
For our 2007 meeting, CEA invites papers and panels that consider how we construct and understand empathy or ethical responsibilities and how those understandings inform what we write, read, and teach.
We invite papers or panels on all areas of literature, languages, film, composition, pedagogy, creative writing, and business/technical writing by experienced academics, as well as from young scholars and graduate students, that explore aspects of the conference theme.
Proposals may interpret the CEA theme broadly, including—but not limited to—the following possible areas:
- Natural disasters—hurricanes, floods, fires, epidemics, earthquakes, drought
- Man-made tragedies—war, genocide, ecological accidents
- Personal struggles—disfigurement, disability, poverty, refugee status, discrimination, job loss, divorce
- Corporate choices—bankruptcy, excess profit, layoffs, off-shore companies, tax policy, union demands, outsourcing, work ethics
- Departmental circumstances—spousal accommodations, adjunct employment, merit evaluations, tenure and promotion policies
- Teaching issues—cheating, plagiarism, collaborative or service learning, diversity, difference
We encourage consideration of these and other questions related to the conference theme:
- How are empathy and/or ethics portrayed in literature and film?
- How do works of fiction, poetry, film, and memoir discuss values and build empathy?
- What are the connections between empathy, ethics, and eloquence?
- Does human response to matters of suffering differ historically and regionally? How is that response depicted in literature, film, and other media?
- How are matters of empathy, ethics, revenge, and self-service addressed in the English classroom, in what we read, write, research, teach, and practice as professionals?
- How are our students challenged to consider these matters? What is the role of difference in the classroom: differences in culture, in ethnicity, in gender, in sexual preference?
- Can we teach students to care about and empathize with one another and with people outside the classroom and in other countries?
- How can teachers help students to think critically and ethically so that they can question and write about their assumptions regarding the universality of their own values and ideas?
- What cultural conflicts and ethical issues should we discuss in college classrooms?
- How political should classrooms be?
- Which topics work well for research papers and other assignments?
- How does the collaborative classroom handle these issues?
- What problems of ethics and empathy do we face within the classroom and the deparment, and between the English department and other college departments?
- What choices do we face with new technology and online classes?
- How concerned with global issues should our classrooms be?
New submissions policies apply this year. No longer will proposals in special panel areas be submitted directly to special panels chairs. Instead, CEA prefers to receive all submissions, including those for special panels, electronically through our conference management database:
http://english.ttu.edu/CEA/conftool/index.php
Electronic submissions open September 15 and close on November 30
Abstracts for proposals should be between 200 and 500 words in length and should include a title
Submitting electronically is a two-step process: (1) setting up a user ID, then (2) using that ID to log in—this time to a welcome page which provides a link for submitting proposals to the conference. If submitting a panel, panel organizers should create user IDs for all proposed participants.
Though CEA prefers to receive proposals through the conference database, we will accept hard copy proposals, postmarked no later than November 20, via regular mail. Hard copy proposals should include:
- Name
- Institutional affiliation, if applicable
- Mailing address
- Phone number
- E-mail address
- Title for the proposed presentation
- Abstract of 200-500 words
- A-V equipment needs, if any
- Special needs, if any
If you are willing to serve as a session chair or respondent, please indicate this in your cover letter.
Address hard copy submissions and all other conference correspondence to the Program Chair: Ed Demerly, English Division, Henry Ford Community College, 5101 Evergreen Road, Dearborn, MI 48128-1495, 313-645-9659, edemerly@aol.com
CEA Membership is required for all presenters. Conference registration material will arrive in January and will indicate registration fee payment deadlines. CEA membership dues must be paid by January 1, 2007 for presenters' names to appear on the program.
As with conference-theme proposals, new submissions policies apply this year to special topic panel proposals . No longer will proposals in special panel areas be submitted directly to special panel chairs. Instead, CEA prefers to receive all such submissions electronically through our conference management database housed at http://english.ttu.edu/CEA/conftool/index.php
Special panels will be organized in the following areas. If your proposal addresses one of these areas, submit your proposal to the database by November 30 . Note : Hard copy proposals will also be accepted, but must be sent through U.S. mail by November 20 to Ed Demerly.
Early American Lit 19th-Century American Lit 20th-Century American Lit Medieval British Lit Renaissance Lit 17th-Century British Lit Restoration/18th-Century British Lit 19-Century British Lit 20th-Century British Lit African American Lit Afro-Caribbean Lit Children's and Adolescents' Lit Hispanic, Latino, Chicano Lit Film and Lit Religion and Lit Anglophone Lit World Lit Native American Lit
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Book History and Textual Criticism Composition and Rhetoric: Theory Composition and Rhetoric: Grammar and Style *Creative Writing: Fiction and Poetry *Creative Writing: Non-Fiction Teacher Education and Pedagogy Reading, Writing, and Teaching English on the Web Peace Panel Developmental Education English as a Second Language Linguistics Pedagogy Women's Connection Technical Communication Food and Literary Imagination SEA at CEA Pop Culture Short Stories
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*Note: Creative writing submissions should consist of the work itself, NOT abstracts.
New Special Sessions
Self and Other: Defining and Constructing and Representing Relationships through Empathy and Ethics
Neil Gaiman: Comic Book Novelist
Literary Theory and Future Undergraduates”
Academic Leadership: So You Think You Want to Be an Administrator?
Academic Leadership: Mentoring New Faculty
The following special panels are being offered through the New York CEA affiliate.
Like all other proposals, proposals for these panels should be submitted through the database <http://english.ttu.edu/CEA/conftool/index.php>.
Literature and Law
Literature and the Healing Arts
Literature and Criminal Justice
Anatomy of Violence: Examining Conflict
Interdisciplinary Approaches to Writing and Literature
Crepuscular Consciousness: Literature and the Obscure
Representing the Struggle for Human Rights in Literature
The "I" of the Beholder: Vision, Imagination, and Reaction in/to LiteratureWe also welcome papers on those areas that influence our lives as academics: student demographics, student/instructor accountability and assessment; student advising, chairing the department, the place of the English department in the university, etc.
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THE DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS HAS BEEN EXTENDED:
NOVEMBER 30, 2006
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Click here for a downloadable version of the CFP
The registration fee, which includes all panel/plenary sessions and the president's reception, is $70.00.
The Sheraton New Orleans is offering CEA conference-goers a special rate of $129.00 for singles and doubles until Monday, March 19, 2007.
Contact information for the Sheraton New Orleans: 500 Canal Street, New Orleans, LA 70130; 504-525-2500
Website: http://www.sheratonneworleans.com
Click here for the French Quarter Guide to attractions within the vicinity of the conference hotel.
Important Information:
• To preserve time for discussion, CEA limits presentations to 15 minutes .
• Notifications of proposal status will be sent around December 5, 2006.
• All presenters must join CEA by January 1, 2007 to appear on the program.
• No one may read more than one paper at the conference.
• CEA does not sponsor or fund travel or underwrite participant costs.
Note to Graduate Students:
Graduate Students may submit their conference presentation for the CEA Best Graduate Student Paper Award, which carries a small prize. Information on how to submit a paper will be sent to accepted panelists after the membership deadline. Graduate students are asked to identify themselves in their proposals so that information may be sent.
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For program scheduling questions, contact Ed Demerly—Vice President and Program Chair, English Division, Henry Ford Community College, 5101 Evergreen Road, Dearborn, MI 48128-1495 (313-645-9659), edemerly@aol.com.
For general conference information , contact Charles A. S. Ernst, Executive Director—CEA Headquarters, Department of Arts and Sciences, Hilbert College, 5200 South Park Avenue, Hamburg, NY 14075 (716-649-7900, ext. 315), cernst@hilbert.edu .
For CEA membership , contact Joseph Pestino, CEA Treasurer—Membership Center, Department of English, Nazareth College of Rochester, 4245 East Avenue, Rochester, NY 14618; phone (585-389-2645), jpestin5@naz.edu .