CEA 2010: Voices

March 25–27, 2010 San Antonio, Texas

“And in my voice most welcome shall you be.” As You Like It 2:4.87

Registration and travel information available here ~ there are still plenty of rooms available -- make sure you mention "CEA/College English Association"! Contact Charles Ernst, CEA Executive Director, with any problems.

All participants must be members of CEA - join here

San Antonio. Images of the River Walk merge with the memories of its most famous location, the Alamo. Remember it, the voices from the past call out, and we do.

Those voices on opposing sides of its walls, representing Santa Anna and Sam Houston, spoke for two distinctly diverse cultures. And within those cultures were voices and texts that influenced the actions during that struggle—significant cultural markers of time, place, and being.

Before and after the struggle there, writers everywhere have reflected and influenced the events of their day, and from their experience, the great writers have created texts that have become ageless connections to what is past , or passing, or to come.

Their voices also call for us to acknowledge or recognize beauty or to realize or remember significant lessons -- perhaps via a character like Professor Farber from Fahrenheit 451 or a place like a raft on a river in Huckleberry Finn—with an urgency no less than the Alamo's. This correspondence we find within ourselves is our human condition—but it is the capacity to listen for and to those whose message or memory is unlike our own that makes us scholars. Our voices blend with those we admire or abhor—creating a text, which (if it stands the test of taste and time) will blend with still other voices, like those of our students, newly discovering “a peak in Darien”—all wishing to be heard and remembered.

Invited speakers coming soon!

Saturday Excursion: Tour of the Missions

This year's conference excursion is a tour of the San Antonio Missions National Historical Park. The fee is $25.00 per person. Click here for downloadable details.

 

Important Information for Presenters

  • Presentation length: To preserve time for discussion, CEA limits all presentations to 15 minutes.
  • Presentation language: Papers must be presented in English.
  • No person may make more than one presentation at the conference.
  • Each presenter must make his or her own presentation; no proxies are allowed.
  • If you need audio-visual equipment, please specify your needs as clearly as possible. CEA can provide overhead projectors, DVD players, audio tape/CD players, and computer data projectors (presenters must bring their own laptop computers to run data projectors). CEA cannot provide internet access.
  • Notifications of proposal status will be sent around December 5th, 2009.
  • Membership deadline: All presenters must join CEA by January 2010 to appear on the program.
  • CEA does not sponsor or fund travel or underwrite participant costs.

CEA Awards

Conference presenters including graduate students may be eligible for awards.

Questions?

  • For CEA 2010 program questions, email Karen Madison, CEA First Vice President, at cea.english@gmail.com (please put "Program Chair” in the subject line).
  • For membership questions, contact Joseph Pestino, CEA Treasurer—Membership Center, Department of English, Nazareth College of Rochester, 4245 East Avenue, Rochester, NY 14618; phone (585-389-2645). Or email cea.english@gmail.com (please put “Treasurer” in the subject line).
  • For general conference questions, 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 technical questions, email Miles Kimball, CEA President, at cea.english@gmail.com (please put "Technical" in the subject line).

image from mag3737, Flickr, made available through Creative Commons