Call for Papers
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Faculty of History
University of Lodz, Faculty of Philosophy and History
2nd Scientific Symposium “Egodocuments, Life-writing and Autobiographical Texts. Cultural Otherness and Estrangement in the Egodocumental Perspective Through the Ages”
Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń, Faculty of History
Bojarskiego 1, 87-100 Toruń, Poland
21-22 March 2024
Organisers: dr Hadrian Ciechanowski (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń), dr hab. Michaël Green, prof. UL (University of Lodz).
Scientific committee: prof. dr hab. Waldemar Chorążyczewski (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń), dr Rudolf Dekker (Institute for the Study of Egodocuments), prof. Jan Frode Hatlen (Norwegian University of Science and Technology), dr Joanna Orzeł (University of Lodz), dr hab. Wojciech Piasek, prof. NCU (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń), prof. dr hab. Radosław Żurawski vel Grajewski (University of Lodz)
Keynote speakers:
prof. dr Arianne Baggerman (University of Amsterdam)
prof. dr hab. Stanisław Roszak (Nicolaus Copernicus University in Toruń)
Observing contemporary socio-cultural trends, one can see that otherness is increasingly seen as a positive element in today’s society and culture. However, it is not always the case. Contemporary humanities have previously addressed this phenomenon, but mainly in the context of the relationship between the external world and the individual. Michel Foucault’s structural analyses can be considered the foundation for such approaches. The experience of subjective estrangement can be therefore placed within a cultural framework. The cultural conceptualisation of the experience of subjective estrangement implies the description, analysis and interpretation of its socio-cultural manifestations. One of the most important types of sources for the research of the experience of subjective estrangement are egodocuments and egodocumentary-based Selbstzeugnisse, because they reveal the sentiments of their author, directly and indirectly. The aim of this symposium is trace how the feeling of otherness and estrangement changed over time, potentially sheding light on societal and cultural changes.
We invite scholars from the humanities to join the discussion on how otherness and estrangement come forward in egodocuments and egodocumental sources. Through contextualisation and application of different research techniques relevant to the various disciplines, we aim at paving a way to create a better understanding of the individual experience by providing it with this additional valuable dimension.
Possible topics for discussion include:
- contact with a foreign culture during travel or emigration (including forced emigration and exile)
- changing state boundaries
- living the daily life as the “other”
- contact with the alien/new and imposed political system and the realities of functioning within it
- queer experiences of otherness
- situation at home and in the community
- religiously motivated otherness and estrangement
- privacy and private related issues of feeling “other”
The conference will be held in English.
A collective volume is aimed to be published based on a selection of papers presented at the conference with one of the leading academic publishers, such as Brill.
Please send your 150-word proposal and a short CV with a list of the most important publications to the organising committee, by the 1st of December 2023 via email: egodocuments@umk.pl
Registration cost: 300 PLN