CALL FOR PAPERS
Out of Bounds: Mobility, Movement and Use of Manuscripts and Printed Books, 1350-1550 Twelfth Biennial Conference of the Early Book Society
in collaboration with the Twelfth York Manuscripts Conference in honour of Professor Toshiyuki Takamiya
3-7 July 2011
Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York

The Early Book Society will hold its twelfth biennial conference in collaboration with the York Manuscripts Conference, at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of York, from the 3rd to the 7th of July 2011.  The theme of this year’s conference will be Out of Bounds: Mobility, Movement and Use of Manuscripts and Printed Books, 1350-1550. This theme may be interpreted literally or figuratively: papers might consider unbound or rebound MSS and books, or MSS and books without bindings (rolls), or marginalia beyond the boundaries of the text, or the ways in which such boundaries might be created, or even MSS and books that travel from their place of origin. Secondary threads running through the conference will be related to Prof. Takamiya’s manuscripts or Nicholas Love (the conference includes a visit to Mount Grace Priory).  Please submit proposals for 20-minute papers relating to the conference themes either to Martha Driver or Linne Mooney by 1 December 2010.  Proposals sent via email should be copied to both (LRM3@york.ac.uk and MDriver@pace.edu) or by post to Martha:

Prof Martha Driver
English Department
Pace University
41 Park Row, 15th floor
New York, NY  10038
USA

Please include your name, title and affiliation, the proposed title of your paper, a brief abstract of your paper, and indication of any electronic aids requested (data projector, overhead, and/or slide projector).

Linne R. Mooney
Professor in Medieval English Palaeography
University of York
King’s Manor
York  YO1 7EP
U.K.

telephone (UK)  01904 433909
telephone (from USA)  011 44 1904 433909
lrm3@york.ac.uk

Book Destruction: Call for Papers for a Conference at Senate House, University of London, 16 April 2011

Much attention has been given in recent years to the book as a material, historical object and its possible technological obsolescence in the era of digitization. Such reflections have tended to concentrate on the production and cultural circulation of books, their significance and their power to shape knowledge and subjectivities. But there is another aspect to our interactions with the book which remains relatively unexplored: the history of book destruction. In certain circumstances books are treated not with reverence but instead with violence or disregard. This conference invites reflections on this alternative history of the book, and we welcome papers from a range of historical periods and disciplinary backgrounds. We welcome proposals from postgraduate students, as well as from more established academics.

Why do people destroy books? What are the mechanics of book destruction: the burning, pulping, defacing, tearing, drowning, cutting, burying, eating? What are the cultural meanings that have been attached to book destruction, and what do they reveal about our investments in this over-familiar object? Why should the burning of books have such symbolic potency? Book destruction is often invoked as a symbol of oppressive, despotic regimes; what is our ethical position, now, in relation to such acts? What is the relationship between book destruction and other forms of cutting up (quotation; collage)? When do acts of destruction become moments of creativity? How does destruction relate to recycling and reuse? Do transitions in media (manuscript to print; print to digital) threaten those older forms? How might the current phase of digitization and the gradual disappearance of library stock relate to prior moments of destruction? In the internet age, is it still possible to destroy (that is, completely erase) a text? What does materiality mean in a digital age?

Please send 300-word proposals (for a 20 minute paper) and a brief CV, to Dr Gill Partington (g.partington@bbk.ac.uk) and Dr Adam Smyth (adam.smyth@bbk.ac.uk), by 10 January 2011.