CFP: Text – Image – Music: Crossing the Borders IALS Symposium

International Association of Literary Semantics
2018 IALS Symposium

Institute of English Studies
The Jagiellonian University in Krakow
18th-20th OCTOBER, 2018
http://www.uj.edu.pl/web/ials2018/

In 2006 the Institute of English Philology at the Jagiellonian University had the honour and pleasure of hosting the 4th International IALS Conference. This time we are cordially inviting all interested researchers to a thematic Symposium. The Symposium motto – not without reason – is a travesty of the title Image Music Text given to a selection of essays written by Roland Barthes and translated into English by Stephen Heath (1977).

In his essay “Rhetoric of the Image” (published originally in 1964) Barthes says the following: Today, at the level of mass communications, it appears that the linguistic message is indeed present in every image: as title, caption, accompanying press article, film dialogue, comic strip balloon. Which shows that it is not very accurate to talk of a civilization of the image – we are still, and more than ever, a civilization of writing, writing and speech continuing to be the full terms of the informational structure (Heath 1977: 38).

Half a century later, with our perspective modified by an increasing influence of the mass media, heavily dominated by the pictorial, acoustic or mixed modes of information transmission, indeed in the midst of the “visual turn”, it is worth asking whether Barthes’ claim is still valid or whether it should be reformulated.

Is the verbal text still central or has it been decentralized from its traditional focal point among semiotic systems?

Motivated by an increasing consciousness of the transmedial and multimodal aspects of human transaction with the world, IALS – the Society that over the last three decades has formed a platform for a fruitful exchange of ideas between linguists and literary theorists – invites academicians from these and other disciplines to join our discussion under a broad semiotic approach to artistic texts produced in different media and modes of expression.

Plenary speakers confirmed as of January 1, 2018:
Paul B. Armstrong, Brown University, Providence, RI, USA
Bo Pettersson, University of Helsinki, Finland
Michael Toolan, University of Birmingham, UK

Topics suggested are as follows:
– Multimodality and Intermediality of Aesthetically Marked Texts
– Text-Worlds Construal as a Semiotic Enterprise
– Ekphrasis – Transposition, Completion, Distortion?
– Cognitive Semiotics Facing Artistic Texts
– Phenomenology of the Work of Art
– Semiosphere – a Space of Unbounded Creativity
– Neuroaesthetics as a Provider of Interpretative Tools
– Multimodality/Intermediality as a Challenge for Translators

Thematic Sessions:
Liberature – multimodal literature bound to the book

Katarzyna Bazarnik will convene a theme session on liberature, a kind of literary writing which combines the linguistic and non-verbal codes in the space of the book. Defined as “hybrid transgenre,” it refers to multimodal literature in which semantically charged typography, page layout, images or other non-verbal elements, format, and the architecture of the book are all intentionally shaped by the author. While writers deliberately utilize the material book structure as a sign of its own, liberature testifies that literature may be an embodied art, in parallel with the installation, the happening and the theatre, that is other transmedial arts, engaging the reader in an aesthetic, intellectual and physical way.

Other suggestions, especially for thematic sessions, are most welcome.

Submission Guidelines:
1) Thematic sessions (deadline 30th April, 2018)
Proposals should contain: the session title, the name and affiliation of the convener(s), a short description of the session’s theme (200 words),and all full-length abstracts in the proposed order. A session should consist of at least 3 presentations (one Symposium slot).

2) Individual abstracts (deadline 15th May, 2018)
Proposals of 20-minute-long individual Symposium presentations should contain:
– the title, a 200-word abstract,
– three most important bibliographical references,
– a list of 5 keywords,
– a short bionote (ca 200 words),
– and contact details (academic title, affiliation and e-mail).

Proposals of thematic sessions should be sent to
Michał Choiński (michal.choinski@uj.edu.pl) and
Elżbieta Chrzanowska-Kluczewska (elzbieta.chrzanowska-kluczewska@uj.edu.pl)

Individual abstracts with the required information should be sent to Ryszard Kurpiel (kurpielryszard@gmail.com) and Grzegorz Szpila (gszpila@gmail.com).
Notifications of acceptance will be sent by 15th June, 2018.

Conference fee: 150 Euro (650 PLN)
Doctoral students are eligible for a reduced fee of 100 euro (400 PLN).

Conference website: http://www.uj.edu.pl/web/ials2018/

The Organizing Committee:

Prof. Elżbieta Chrzanowska-Kluczewska, PhD
Prof. Andrzej Pawelec, PhD
Prof. Grzegorz Szpila, PhD
Prof. Anna Walczuk, PhD
Prof. Katarzyna Bazarnik, PhD
Dr Władysław Chłopicki
Dr Michał Choiński (Conference Secretary)
Dr Agata Hołobut
Ryszard Kurpiel, MA