CFP: EUPOP 2018 (24-26th July)

CFP: EUPOP 2018

Charles University, Prague, July 24th – 26th, 2018

Extended deadline: April 12th 2018

Individual paper and panel contributions are welcomed for the seventh annual international conference of the European Popular Culture Association (EPCA), to be held at the Charles University, Prague (Celetná 20), July 24th – 26th, 2018.

EUPOP 2018 will explore European popular culture in all its various forms. This includes, but is by no means limited to, the following topics: European Film (past and present), Television, Music, Costume and Performance, Celebrity, The Body, Fashion, New Media, Popular Literature and Graphic Novels, Queer Studies, Sport, Curation, and Digital Culture. A special emphasis this year will be on the idea of European Identity in all its diversity.

More details here.

New to the Wiki: Romance in Africa, Spain and India; Pen-names; Genre; Cover Art

Laura Vivanco

Achieng’, Okang’a Nancy, 2017. 

"A Cosmopolitan National Romance: A Study of In Dependence by Sarah Ladipo Manyika." MA thesis, Faculty of Humanities, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg. Pdf available. [About an African novel which it seems might or might not be a romance, depending on how one defines "African romance" (since the author argues that African romance is more expansive than the US definition).]

González Cruz, Maria Isabel, 2017. 

'Exploring the dynamics of English/Spanish codeswitching in a written corpus', Alicante Journal of English Studies / Revista Alicantina de Estudios Ingleses 30: 331-355. Abstract and link to pdf

Lessard, Victoria, 2017. 

'Marketing Desire: The "Normative/Other" Male Body and the "Pure" White Female Body on the Cover Art of Cassie Edwards' Savage Dream (1990), Savage Persuasion (1991), and Savage Mists (1992)', MA thesis, McGill University. Pdf available

 

Neville, Lucy, 2018. 

Girls Who Like Boys Who Like Boys: Women and Gay Male Pornography and Erotica. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan. Excerpt

 

Pérez Casal, Inmaculada, 2016. 

“Love in Times of Crisis: An Approach to Contemporary Romance Novels in Spain.” Journal of Artistic Creation and Literary Research 4.2: 62-70. Pdf available

Pérez Casal, Inmaculada, 2018. 

“Mass-market romance and the question of genre: N. Sparks, E. L. James and D. Gabaldon.” Oceánide 10. Pdf available

Rudisill, Kristen, 2018. 

“Full-Blooded Desi Romance: Contemporary English-Language Romance Novels in India.” Journal of Popular Culture. Online First. Excerpt

 

Taylor, Jessica, 2018. 

'Animating Creative Selves: Pen Names as Property in the Careers of Canadian and American Romance Writers', American Ethnologist 45.1: 112-123. Abstract

2018 RWA Academic Research Grant Winner

The RWA have just tweeted

Congratulations to Professor Margo Hendricks of UC Santa Cruz who has been awarded the 2018 RWA Academic Research Grant for her project, “Heliodorus’ Daughters: Women of Color and the Romance Industry.” https://t.co/beSwo8yKPI

— RWA (@romancewriters) 14 March 2018

Further details of the project are provided on their website:

Margo Hendricks, UC Santa Cruz
Heliodorus' Daughters: Women of Color and the Romance Industry

RWA awarded funding to Professor Emerita Margo Hendricks to carry out field research for her book project titled Heliodorus’ Daughters: Women of Color and the Romance Industry on the relationship between women of color and the romance genre.

In case anyone's wondering about the title of the project, I'm pretty sure it refers to an ancient Greek romance:

The Romance novel didn't begin with Kathleen Woodiwiss or even with the Bronte sisters. By the time Heliodorus wrote his Aethiopica—or Ethiopian Romance—in the third century, the genre was already impressively developed. Heliodorus launches his tale of love and the quirks of fate with a bizarre scene of blood, bodies, and booty on an Egyptian beach viewed through the eyes of a band of mystified pirates. The central love-struck characters are Charicles, the beautiful daughter of the Ethiopian queen, and Theagenes, a Thessalian aristocrat. The story unfolds with all the twists and devices any writer would employ today, with the added attractions of dreams, oracles, and exotic locales in the ancient Mediterranean and Africa. (University of Pennsylvania Press)