Skepsi call for papers: ‘Time to Remember’

The editors of Skepsi, a postgraduate-run journal within the School of European Culture and Languages (SECL), are organising an interdisciplinary conference entitled Time to Remember: Anniversaries, Celebration and Commemoration, to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the journal, scheduled for 26 May 2016, and are looking for 300-word abstracts for 10 minute presentations.

In keeping with the celebration the conference that has as its focus on memory, or more particularly the phenomenon of the anniversary with its dual attributes of celebration and commemoration, depending on the nature of the event which is being remembered. In either case, it sometimes seems that the manner in which the occasion is marked has become a ritual, an opportunity to contemplate how things have changed in the intervening years, how we travel and come to terms with and reflect on past events. At the same time, however, we also wonder why and for how long we need to remember.

Why do we feel compelled to remember once a year events from the past, not only those from our own lives but those which we may never have personally experienced? What are we remembering? Does the act of remembering gradually metamorphose into a ritual the significance of which become hazy) These and other questions can be debated at our interdisciplinary conference.

Abstracts should be submitted as word documents, with the covering email including the name of the author, institutional affiliation and brief autobiographical detail, as well as any audio-visual requirements. Please send to the conference organising committee at: skepsi@kent.ac.uk by 17 March 2017.

Further details and suggested topics can be found at http://blogs.kent.ac.uk/skepsi/