Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 news EASLCE letter A Biannual Publication of the European Association for the Study of Literature, Culture and Environment

Dear fellow EASLCEans: and patterns of construction, other artistic and scientific representations of urban and rural chaos I’m writing this Winter Newsletter with the echoes and wildness; exchanges and transmutations of of the tragic events that took place in Paris still energies, seen as forceful opportunities to revision resounding in my ears, and the consequent reach and revive our way of living and thinking the world of the “Alert” level in Brussels, making the city a we inhabit; and global/local/glocal views of both solitary and vulnerable place during a few days in the material milieu and the spiritual realm of the November. Let therefore my first words become a tangible and the elusive (nation, individual, salutation to Franca Bellarsi and the organizing species, order…), among other possible multiple committee of our next conference with the hope of targets. getting back to normal in the hospitable and bohemian capital of Belgium. Quoting Bellarsi’s This unique opportunity to meet again in the final words in one of her last messages to the administrative capital of Europe will take place in board: “And yes, EASLCE 2016 is more vital than ten months from now, that is, from October 27 t0 ever to bring campus life back to normal: we need 30, 2016, starting Thursday and finishing Sunday. international gatherings where people feel free to May I hope that this conference, more than any talk, converse, laugh, etc. in resilience to the other held previously in our Association, serve as a forces of darkness!! So let's make October 2016 meeting point for heterodoxy, environmental as celebratory as possible!! To the Brussels concerns and political posture in front of the resurgence!!” I second fervently this cry for action dilemma of brutality vs civilization; one year ago I and reaction in these dark times of intolerance and had the opportunity to enjoy personally the refined savagery. and bon-vivant city of Brussels, a place for conviviality and cohabitation: a locus vivendi. The call for papers for our seventh biennial conference is precisely, and ironically, “‘Wildness (to be continued on page 3) without Wilderness’: The Poiesis of Energy and Instability.” It summons the ‘impermanence and indeterminacy’ of the actual nowadays crisis by catching an eye on the turmoil of the explosion/ On the Inside: implosion of energies of all sorts: dynamic, kinetic, material, spiritual, creative, destructive… In other words, the opposite forces that are acting in the International Conferences / CfP 3 past decades prove to be a powerful object/subject for discussion and deconstruction, to find the Conference Reports 7 ultimate entropic order in this chaotic (but revolutionary) atmosphere. Thus, the frame of analysis is extended to variegated and enriching Publications by Members 9 themes, such as new theoretical imprints of eco- oriented wisdoms; descriptions of other systems

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16

EASLCE Newsletter DR. HANNES BERGTHALLER International Affiliates Vol.EASLCE 6.2 (Winter Newsletter 2011/ 12) Associate Professor, Department of Vol. 10.2. (Winter 2015/16) Foreign Languages & Literatures A Biannual Publication of the National Chung-Hsing University, ASLE (USA) http://www.asle.org EUROPEANA Biannual Publication ASSOCIATION of the Taichung, TAIWAN FOREUROPEAN THE STUDYASSOCIATION OF FOR THE LITERATURE, CULTURE AND ASLEC-ANZ (AUSTRALIA and NEW STUDY OF LITERATURE, CULTURE DR. CARMEN FLYS-JUNQUERA ZEALAND) ENVIRONMENTAND ENVIRONMENT Associate Professor of American http://www.aslec-anz.asn.au Literature, Dept. Filologia Moderna EASLCEEASLCE Homepage: Homepage: Universidad de Alcalá de Henares Madrid, SPAIN ALECC-CANADA http://www.easlce.euhttp://www.easlce.eu http://www.alecc.ca

PROF. DR. CATRIN GERSDORF ASLE-INDIA Chair of American Studies http://www.asleindia.webs.com Officers Julius-Maximilians-Universität

Würzburg, GERMANY ASLE-JAPAN Executive Committee http://www.asle-japan.org/ DR. ISABEL HOVING PRESIDENT Dr. Isabel Hoving ASLE-KOREA Dr. Juan Ignacio Oliva Lecturer, Department of Literature http://www.aslekorea.org Professor of English Philology, Leiden University Leiden, NETHERLANDS Depto. Filología Inglesa y Alemana ASLE-UKI Universidad de La Laguna http://www.asle.org.uk Tenerife, SPAIN PROF. DR. IMELDA MARTIN- JUNQUERA OSLE-INDIA American Studies and Chicano Studies http://www.osle-india.org VICE PRESIDENT University of Leon Prof. Dr. Serpil Oppermann León, SPAIN Department of English Language and Literature Hacettepe University DR. PETER MORTENSEN Ankara, TURKEY Institute of Language, Literature and Culture How to become a member of

Aarhus University EASLCE TREASURER Aarhus, DENMARK Dr. Alexa Weik von Mossner Please, visit our web site at: Assistant Professor of American Studies PROF. DR. ULRIKE PLATH http://www.easlce.eu Department of English and American Professor of History Studies University of Tallinn For further information contact: University of Klagenfurt Tallinn, ESTONIA Klagenfurt, AUSTRIA Alexa Weik von Mossner

DR. KAREN SALT [email protected] Caribbean Studies Advisory Board University of Aberdeen Old Aberdeen, SCOTLAND, UK DR. ISABEL FERNANDES ALVES Assistant Professor, Centro DR. HEATHER I. SULLIVAN de Estudos em Letras Professor of German University of Trás-os-Montes Trinity University e Alto Douro San Antonio, USA Please note the editorial Lisboa, PORTUGAL deadline for the next issue:

DR. DIANA VILLANUEVA June 15, 2016 DR. FRANCA BELLARSI Profesor colaborador, Professor of English Literature Departamento de Filología Inglesa Contact: Sylvia Mayer at Department of Languages and Literatures Universidad de Extremadura sylvia.mayer(at)uni-bayreuth.de Université Libre de Bruxelles Extremadura, SPAIN Bruxelles, BELGIUM

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 2 No doubt, Brussels will offer us sweet I hope to see you all and share there; delicatessen, open doors, freedom of speech meanwhile, receive my fondest wishes for the and floor for discussion. L’Université Libre de New Year 2016 in the hope that it will be more Bruxelles is another symbol for the achievements decent and safer than this one has proved to be, of democracy in Europe: a temple of knowledge and that the clouds on the horizon will slowly without barriers, and the best venue for evaporate under the sun of sageness. improvement and progress. Juan Ignacio Oliva

International Conferences / Call for Papers

“Wildness without Wilderness”: The Poiesis of Energy and Instability” 7th Biennial EASLCE Conference Brussels, Belgium, 27-30 October 2016

The 7th biennial conference of the European and design. With the relational activity leading Association for the Study of Literature, to transformation that underlies the Culture and Environment (EASLCE) is spontaneous self-organization and patterning of hosted by the Université Libre de Bruxelles many systems (Fritjof Capra, Herbert Maturana (ULB) and its Department of Languages and & Francisco Varela), poetic travail is in fact Literatures, in association with the Benelux what links the wild artistry and skilful means of Association for the Study of Art, Culture and nature to those of human production (Jonathan the Environment (BASCE). Skinner; Harriet Tarlo). What the various narratives respectively explored by particle As Gary Snyder reminds us in "The Etiquette physics, material ecocriticism, the energy of Freedom" (1990), wilderness—i.e. the humanities, experimental ecopoetics, or expanse of the physical natural world untamed ecospiritualities tell us is that the universe is by humans—may have considerably shrunk; by teeming with (eco)compositional forces and contrast, however, wildness—i.e. the instability responses, with experiential space opening of the material world and of its agencies that itself up to forms of joint making and unmaking, elude human regulation and control—very much with temporary montage and collage artistry remains a constant in the existence of beings blending chance and intention through physical enmeshed with their environments. and/or mental assemblage, dissipation, and re- Contributing to this ineradicable and enduring arrangement. wildness and instability, other constants such The 7th Biennial Meeting of EASLCE, in as energy and creativity inform both the non- association with BASCE, will be held in the human and human worlds of impermanence fluctuating, multilingual urban space of and indeterminacy (Serpil Opperman & Brussels, a city that has proved home as much Serenella Iovino, Hubert Zapf, Sidney Dobrin). to the "ordered wildness" of physics uncovered Indeed, not only do energy flows and their by Nobel Prize-winning scientists like Ilya disruptions remain inseparable from life and Prigogine and François Englert as to the one of living organisms; moreover, energy also proves the mindscapes revelled in by the Symbolist inseparable from poiesis, understood as a and Surrealist avant-gardes. potential for making that combines randomness

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 3 Therefore, from all environmental fields of inquiry urban eco-design; the city as ecological and endeavour, from the humanities and natural palimpsest and travail. sciences to the creative arts and public policy/ • Transmutations of energies in the interlocking activist spheres, the Organizing Committee invites of mental and physical ecologies; ecospiritual papers probing into the poiesis of non-human and and ecopsychological readings of the poiesis human systems, and into their interrelated of matter and consciousness in interaction. narratives of energy, wildness and travail. • Energy exchange and instability in the travail Spanning the spectrum from natural to textual between physical and social ecologies; the energies, possible perspectives may include—but dynamics of channeling and dissipating are not necessarily limited to—some of the psychic and social energy around ecological following approaches: crises; the travail of mapping out the • The impact of concepts such as energy and (geo)politics of energy. poiesis, instability and creativity on current • Energetic labour and travail: the poiesis of the ecocritical thinking/theorizing, on ecoliteracy, elements and natural forces (water, the ecolinguistics, eco-narratology, ecosophy, and weather, tectonics, etc.); the formation of eco-ethics. "counter-imaginaries" to energetic • Patterns of assemblage, proliferation and mischanneling and depletion; the poiesis of travail in both non-human and human texts, decomposition, recycling and composting. procedures and organisms; systemic readings • Embodied "wildness without wilderness": of energetic patterns of dissipation and randomness, design and energy exchange in collapse. animals and plants; shifting energies and • Representations of chaos, wildness, relationalities between human and non- autopoiesis, and complexity in literature, film, human bodies/forms of "creatureliness"; the the arts, linguistics, philosophy, science, and poiesis of the feral; zoopoetics. digital environments. • Randomness and design in nature as sources • Ecopoetics and the poiesis of energy and of ecophobia and ecophilia; the gaps between instability: entropy and "ordered wildness" in the artistry of nature and human creativity as textual environments and texts-as- fuel for ecophobic and ecophilic narratives environments; elusive energies, assemblage and texts. and fragmentation in recombinant and • The poiesis of energy and instability at work procedural eco-aesthetics; humans as in human and non-human environments as ecocompositional and eco-aesthetic animals. fuel for "Une écopoétique francophone?", • Energetic travails under and above ground: "Eine deutschsprachige Ökopoetik?", etc.? the poiesis of fuel and fuel extraction; the The primary conference languages will be English, chaos, wildness and complexity informing French, German, and Dutch/Flemish. petrocultures; cultural and literary responses to the environmental practices and addictions We welcome both scholarly and creative of "Homo Energeticus." proposals. The submission formats are either for • "Wildness without wilderness" in cities: urban individual scholarly papers of 20 mins/individual collapse, mutation and apocalypse vs. urban creative contributions/performances of 20 minutes, renaturing, sustainability and ecological or for pre-made panels of 3 twenty-minute resilience; cities as "living eco-labs," urban scholarly papers/creative contributions. entanglements in the web of the bioeconomy; The format for submissions is as follows:

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 4 • individual proposals: title + 300-500 word supplemented by individual 300 word abstract + biosketch of 5-10 lines + IT abstracts for each contribution on the panel. requirement + full contact details. On behalf of the organizing committee, all • preformed panels: 500 word abstract for the proposals should please be submitted to Dr. panel comprising general topic and format Franca Bellarsi < [email protected] > outline + participants’ biosketches and full by 15 March 2016. contact details + IT requirements,

Figuring Animals - Images and Imaginaries in Anglophone Literary and Media Texts 4th Workshop, Postgraduate Forum Environment, Literature, Culture Mid-Sweden University, Campus Sundsvall, Sweden, 15 - 16 August 2016

With the formation of the interdisciplinary field theoretical approaches that are interested in ‘Animal Studies,’ animals are increasingly conceptualizing nonhuman forms of subjectivity, moving into the purview of literary and cultural as posthumanist scholar Cary Wolfe points out in studies. In the environmental humanities, an his seminal monograph Animal Rites (18). animal oriented perspective is beginning to In this tradition, the ways in which humans establish itself as a dynamic and productive sub- relate to animals are predominantly shaped by a field. Greg Garrard devotes an entire chapter to presumed hierarchy in which animals rank below animals in Ecocriticism (2012) and contends that humans. From the prevalent utilitarian the way humans read animals shapes culture perspective, animals are regarded primarily as a just as much as culture shapes the way we read resource for human use, which finds expression animals (153). This mutually constitutive in cultural practices like animal husbandry (esp. relationship makes ‘animal’ a central trope in raising animals for human consumption) or the environmental thinking and discourse. In this display of animals in zoos but also in the ways workshop, we want to take a closer look at how humans relate to animals through language. Ecocriticism and the theoretical and During this workshop, the linguistic, textual, and methodological concerns of Animal Studies can visual expressions of animal imaginaries that interact productively with each other. illustrate and comment on, and at the same time What links Ecocriticism and Animal Studies is influence and shape, human-animal- the concern with the politics of representation relationships are at the center of our concern. that shape human interactions, material and We invite master and doctoral students with discursive, with animals. The conceptual projects in the environmental humanities or separation of the human animal from non-human Animal Studies to contribute to our workshop. animals is at the center of most mainstream Questions, texts, and projects might address but environmental and philosophical thinking. In are not limited to the following: continental European thought, human exceptionalism is based on a variety of • representations of human-animal- concepts, such as that of an immortal soul, relationships in cultural artifacts existential freedom, or symbolic language. With its roots in the Enlightenment tradition, human • representation of animals in visual culture; exceptionalism still informs most scholarly e.g. animal bodies as spectacles practice in the humanities and underwrites even

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 5 • representations of animals in environmentalist English at Cologne University, Germany) with texts; e.g. endangered species the title “Creatural Fictions and Aesthetic Relationalities: Making Kin in a More-than- • philosophical, conceptual and structural Human World.” We will then have time to bases that underwrite human-animal- discuss five texts. The first day concludes with a relationships small reception during which we will have a • specific discursive formations of “the human” poster session. Posters may present PhD and its delineation against nonhuman research projects, individual dissertation animals (e.g. ‘discourse of species’ (C. chapters, or other current research projects. Wolfe), but also e.g. ‘dehumanizing’ Afterwards, there is an optional dinner (paid for discourses, such as colonial discourse) by the participants). On the second day, we will discuss three texts and then offer participants a • functions of metaphor and metonymy coaching session during which they can learn involving animals in specific discourses and/ more about questions pertaining to an academic or texts career. The coaching is provided by Mid Sweden University’s Innovation Office Fyrklövern. • textual instances involving animals that resist allegorical interpretation The texts for discussion will be made available beforehand and need to be read by all • specific instances of anthropomorphism, participants in advance. Students who suggest a zoomorphism, and possible alternatives text will briefly introduce it in a short input Students can participate by submitting an presentation before the discussion. Please bear excerpt of their dissertation or MA thesis, a in mind that we do not want to discuss thesis research poster presenting their PhD project, or projects in their early stages during the text a theoretical text that interests and/or challenges sessions (if you are interested in presenting your them for discussion. We will be able to invite a whole project, please apply for the poster maximum of 10 participants. The workshop session). Chapters or excerpts of your thesis language is English. and theoretical secondary texts pertaining to the workshop’s topic that you find challenging or If you are interested in participating, please useful are welcome for the discussion sessions. send an email to [email protected] by May 15th, 2016 and let us know in which form We might be able to offer travel grants for you would like to contribute (excerpt of own participants without university or third-party work/poster/secondary text). Please state your funding - please state if you would need funding current project topic and include a short in your application email. biographical note (150 words).

Workshop Format and Program Organizers: The workshop is organized by the Postgraduate Michaela Castellanos, Mid Sweden University Forum Environment, Literature, Culture, which Sundsvall, Sweden brings together young researchers from the EASLCE membership countries to share and Hanna Straß, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität discuss their research with other young scholars München, Germany in the environmental humanities.

“Figuring Animals” will open with a keynote speech by Dr. Roman Bartosch (Lecturer in EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 6 Conference Reports

Ecocriticism and Ecospeak: what reciprocity between Humanity and the Planet? Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, Milan, Italy October 16 and 17, 2015

On 16th and 17th October 2015 the Department The several presentations of the Conference of Foreign Languages and Literatures organised covered the most different fields of study: from the Conference: Ecocriticism and Ecospeak: what Medieval English literature to Northamerican reciprocity between Humanity and the Planet? It writers, from an ecological study of the Ancient was one of the first international conferences on Classics to the ecological lexicon in Science and ecocritical issues held in Italy, garthering studies Fashion Weblogs; both German and French both of literary criticism and linguistics and it was literature, together with Latin American writers included in the cultural events promoted by were topics of analysis in these two-day Catholic University for Expo Milano 2015. conference.

Presentations included three keynote speakers The Conference also hosted some photographies with varied critical approaches and coming from from the project Green Attitude, three different countries. Serenella Iovino’s www.greenattitude.it, by the photographer Raoul (University of Turin) opening keynote address, La Iacometti, who presented his work through some responsabilità ambientale e la vita delle cose: videos. ecocritica, etica e un’idea di trascendenza;, The proceedings will be published in a Thematic illustrated the ethical implications of environmental Issue of “L’analisi Linguistica e Letteraria”, materiality, also pointing at the theological forthcoming in 2016. disclosures of ecological responsibility; Anne Simon (École des Hautes Études en Sciences The Conference was organised by Elisa Bolchi Sociales, Paris) presented French Animal studies, and Davide Vago, under the supervision of Prof. lecturing the audience on P l a c e a u x Marisa Verna. More infos on the website http:// bêtes : oïkos et animalité en littérature de langue www.analisilinguisticaeletteraria.eu/ecocritica/ française; Elena Margarita Past (Wayne State University, Detroit) presented an interesting study on volcanos in Italian literature and movies: Elisa Bolchi and Davide Vago Volcanic Matters: Magmatic Narratives, Ecocriticism and Sicily.

Environmental Utopias and Dystopias as Forms of Resistance, Oppression and Liberation 3rd Workshop of the Postgraduate Forum Environment, Literature, Culture KTH, Stockholm, December 11-12, 2015

The 2015 workshop of the Postgraduate Forum “Environmental Utopias and Dystopias as Environment, Literature, Culture was hosted Forms of Resistance, Oppression and 11–12 Dec. by the Environmental Humanities Liberation.” Before the official start of the Laboratory, based in the Division of History of workshop participants had the opportunity to Science, Technology and the Environment, at visit the Stockholm Royal Seaport development KTH, Royal Institute of Technology in (Norra Djurgårdsstaden). The excursion was Stockholm, Sweden. This year’s theme was not just a great opportunity for participants to EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 7 meet informally, but also sparked interesting Finally, on behalf of the participants, I would conversation about the planning, implementation like to thank Isabel Pérez and the rest of the and marketing of ‘sustainable’ projects. organising committee for a productive two days!

The workshop itself kicked off with the welcome speech of the EHL director Marco Armiero and Marinette Grimbeek the key note address by Adeline Johns-Putra, English Reader at the University of Surrey and former ASLE-UKI president, on “Climate Change Fiction and the Problem of Posterity.” Adeline’s 14 participants attended the ELC workshop this presentation surveyed recently-published climate December (we had a full workshop, unfortunately change fiction, and specifically considered the one participant had to cancel her attendance last idea that literature provides an ethical space for minute due to personal circumstances). the exploration of affective dilemmas. She Participants to the workshop are currently based concentrated on the representation of the child in in: Denmark, Italy, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. climate change fiction as a metonym for the future. Sverker Sörlin, professor of environmental The organising committee was formed by history at the Division, then responded to her Marco Armiero (EHL Director), Anna Svensson presentation, before the floor was opened for (PhD candidate), Kati Lindström (postdoctoral comments and questions. fellow), Susanna Lidström (postdoctoral fellow) and myself (Isabel Pérez―PhD candidate). During the next sessions feedback was given on ten drafts submitted by participants, and four I would like to thank EASLCE for their posters were also presented. The topics spanned academic and economic support (which covered quite a wide variety of disciplines, approached the key-note travel and accommodation from a broadly-speaking environmental expenses). I would also like to thank Nina Worms humanities angle: some participants analysed and the Division of History of Science, historical environmental practices and issues Technology and the Environment at KTH, and such as the legal status of the commons, while Marco Armiero, and the Environmental others looked at the representation of Humanities Laboratory, for accepting to host the environmental utopias (and dystopias) in workshop in the premises of the Division, and for literature, film, visual and performance arts, or providing us with generous funding (which considered utopian practices such as botanical allowed us to cover the travel expenses of those collection, activism, and environmental justice. participants without university or third-party The workshop concluded with a presentation by funding, as well as the light lunches, some Kati Lindström on publication strategies (based refreshments and the poster-printing costs). I on her experience as editor of the journal Sign would also like to thank Adeline Johns-Putra for System Studies). kindly accepting our invitation to give the key note address, and Sverker Sörlin for his response. Although English was the working language of the workshop, I feel that the variety of contexts Finally, I would like to thank my colleagues and presented in the papers (and represented by co-organizers, who helped make this workshop participants) somewhat challenged Anglophone happen: Marco, Anna, Kati and Susanna. hegemony in a positive way. Inspiring discussion carried over to breaks and lunches, and I truly Mª Isabel Pérez-Ramos appreciate ending 2015 in this way.

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 8 Publications by Members

Gabriele Dürbeck & Urte Stobbe, Eds. Ecocriticism. Eine Einführung. Köln: Böhlau, 2015.

Serenella Iovino, Ecocriticism and Italy: Ecology, Resistance, and Liberation. London and New York: Bloomsbury. (First title of the series "Environmental Cultures", ed. G. Garrard and R. Kerridge).

New Monograph Series, Studies in Literature, Culture, and the Environment / Studien zu Literatur, Kultur und Umwelt

Edited by

Hannes Bergthaller (National Chung-Hsing University, Taichung, Taiwan), Gabriele Dürbeck (University of Vechta, Germany), Robert Emmett (Rachel Carson Center for Environment and Society, University of Munich, Germany), Serenella Iovino (University of Torino, Italy) and Ulrike Plath (Tallinn University, Estonia)

This interdisciplinary and international book series aims to bring together current approaches in the environmental humanities (particularly in the fields of ecocriticism, environmental history, and environmental justice), with a focus on European contexts. It comprises thematic and theoretical studies which engage ecological issues, climate change, and the discourse of the Anthropocene, seeking to understand the forms of their representation across different media, cultures, and historical periods. Studies in Literature, Culture, and the Environment aim to connect the environmental humanities to the social and natural sciences and thus to contribute to the remediation of ecological problems. The series comprises monographs and edited volumes in both German and English. Book proposals are welcome and may be submitted to the editors. All publications will be peer reviewed.

Please send your manuscript or project outline either to the series editors or to Michael Rücker, Senior Acquisitions Editor: [email protected].

EASLCE Newsletter Vol. 10.2. Winter 2015/16 9