GSA Seminar CfA: Poetry Doing Things (2/23/2024; German Studies Association; 9/26-29/2024)

Please consider applying to participate in the seminar "Poetry Doing Things" at the annual German Studies Association conference (Forty-Eighth Annual Conference, Sept. 26-29 2024, Atlanta, Georgia).

Conveners:

●     May Mergenthaler, Ohio State University, mergenthaler.4@osu.edu

●     Lea Pao, Stanford University, lpao@stanford.edu

Abstract: Poems can mourn, love, or celebrate; commemorate a friend, an event, or a hero; call for resistance or political action; formulate ideas; express emotions; and test or expand the possibilities of language. This seminar will explore questions of how poetry is doing these, and other, things, and examine how poetry’s capacity to act and do shapes our demands on the genre, by discussing selected theoretical and lyric texts from the 17th century to the present. We will approach poetry’s commitment to doing things from three angles: 1) as the poet’s task or impulse, 2) as the work of poetic form and language, and 3) as an imagined future or outcome. The seminar’s most relevant conceptualizations of poetic action will be proposed for publication in Konturen, followed by a panel series at the 2025 GSA expanding on those concepts, and an edited volume/special issue on Poetry Doing Things in 2026.

Format: Participants will be assigned three theoretical texts (60 pages) and ten poems, and write two 5-page position papers (1,250 words each) on one theoretical text and one poem, respectively (due August 15). Seminar discussions will be based on pre-circulated position papers alongside the primary sources.

Submission: Please refer to the GSA guidelines for details about the seminar formats and submission process. To submit your application to this seminar, please send an abstract describing the nature of your contribution to the seminar (500 words max), as well as a short biography (300 words max) to both of us. 

As a reminder, the deadline for applications to participate in a seminar is Friday, February 23 at 11:59 p.m. PST.  We will send our notifications to applicants by March 4.

For the selection of poems we will discuss in our seminar, we are hoping for a mix of pre-determined readings and suggestions by participants, so if you like please include a suggestion for one poem in your abstract. We look forward to reading your application, and please email us if you have any questions!