Comparative Literature & Environmental Humanities Colloquium in London

A one-day series of roundtables organised by LINKS celebrating the British Comparative Literature Association at 50

By British Comparative Literature Association

The celebration is part of a series of events celebrating the 50 years anniversary of the British Comparative Literature Association leading up to the main conference exploring comparative literature and decoloniality.

The BCLA@50 Colloquium on Comparative Literature and Environmental Humanities is a one-day series of roundtables. The colloquium is co-organised by Rosa Mucignat (King’s College) and Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen (UCL) with BCLA, ILCS, and LINKS (London Intercollegiate Network for Comparative Studies). We would like to thank the Departmental Research Initiatives Fund at King’s College Department of Languages, Literatures and Cultures for its generous contribution towards this colloquium.

Programme 

Download panel descriptions and bios (pdf)

10:00 Introductions and welcome: Celebrating BCLA@50 and LINKS.

10.15 – 11.30 Panel 1: Scarcity
Chair: Alicia Kent, King’s College London

Speakers 
Online: Helena Miguélez-Carballeira (Bangor University): ‘Scarcity Nostalgia and the rural turn in Spanish contemporary literature’.
Alicia Kent (King’s College London): ‘Virgin, fertile, barren: gendered economies in Ursula K. Le Guin’s Sur’.
Gefan Wang (King’s College London): ‘Island Trauma and Scarcity in Post-War Japanese Literature: A Comparative Reading of the Works by Ōe Kenzaburō and Ōba Minako’.

11.30 – 11.45 Coffee in the Auditorium

11.45 – 13.00 Panel 2: Climate and Comparison 
Chair: Kasia Mika-Bresolin, Queen Mary University of London

Speakers:
Florian Mussgnug (UCL): ‘A Space Between Two Futures’.
Daniel A. Finch-Race (University of Bologna): ‘Repositioning the climate crisis through comparative vegetacriticism’.
Online: Tünde Varga (The Hungarian University of Fine Art, Budapest) & Daniela Jáuregui (Artist, curator, and cultural activist): ‘Contemporary Indigenous decolonial Artivism and Ecological justice’.

13.00 – 14.00: Sandwich Lunch in the Auditorium 

14.00 – 15.15 Panel 3: Genres of the Anthropocene 
Chair: Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen, UCL

Speakers:
Francesca Balestro (UCL): ‘Everyday Anthropocene in Daisy Hildyard’s Emergency: Repairing the Environment Through Form’.
Amrita Dasgupta (SOAS), ‘Women, Folklore and Climate Crisis in a Submerging Bengal Delta: Reading Amitav Ghosh's The Hungry Tide’.
Xiaofan Amy Li (UCL): ‘Fragmentary Literary Form and East Asian Ecocritical Writings’.
Silvia Vittonatto (UCL): ‘Personal Narratives, Planetary Futures: Life Writing in the Climate Crisis’.
Hans Demeyer (UCL): 'Complaining in the Anthropocene'.

15.15 – 15.30 Coffee in the Auditorium

15.30 – 17.00 Conference debate: Sustainable LINKS: The present and future of comparative literature in London.

17:00 The End and Reception in the Auditorium

Download Programme (pdf)

Download Panel descriptions and bios (pdf)

Organisers: Jakob Stougaard-Nielsen (UCL, [email protected]) in collaboration with Francesca Balestro, Silvia Vittonatto, and Hans Demeyer (UCL)

This Hybrid event is free to attend. Registration required for in-person and online attendance.Please go to https://www.eventbrite.com/e/comparative-literature-environmental-humanities-colloquium-in-london-tickets-1320079867419?aff=oddtdtcreator to register.