Hosted by the Chair in Mennonite Studies and the Journal of Mennonite Studies, October 2017 (exact dates TBA)
This international, interdisciplinary conference will focus on personal narratives in the context of Mennonite writing in Canada, the United States, Russia and around the world. Participants are encouraged to explore the historical and literary significance of personal narratives – including biography, autobiography, diary and memoir – in relation to the conference’s theme of „place and displacement“.
In particular, the conference focuses on texts arising from: 1) dislocation resulting from war-driven and violent forced migration; 2) dislocation from familiar local space resulting from social and cultural upheaval in peacetime. Other ideas regarding dislocation are welcomed.
Questions to be considered:
- How have writers of Mennonite descent recorded their experiences of war and forced migration, or, alternatively, of resisting the assimilatory pressures of modern society?
- How have they imaginatively grappled with their local community’s place in „the world“?
- What role have personal narratives played in connecting, sustaining, or challenging Mennonite communities and institutions?
- What future spaces are opened by attending more closely to personal narratives within the context of Mennonite writing?
Please submit a 100 word proposal, complete with a short CV to either Royden Loewen or Robert Zacharias by November 1, 2016.