(Gordon Van Gelder forwards this item from the Literary Calls for Papers Mailing List.)
Call for Papers: Robert A. Heinlein
PCA/ACA Conference
April 7-10, 2004 (San Antonio)
This is a call for papers to be part of a panel that will present at the national PCA/ACA [Popular Culture Association / American Culture Association] conference in San Antonio in April 2004, under the auspices of the Science Fiction/Fantasy Area of the PCA. Papers from a variety of critical perspectives and disciplines are welcome and should be suitable for a 15-minute reading time limit.
Heinlein's short stories and novels are among the most compelling, polarizing, controversial and imaginative in the genre. His highly inventive and intricate Future History timeline and the characters who inhabit it (among them some of the most famous - and infamous - in science fiction, including Lazarus Long and Valentine Michael Smith) capture the imagination and the intellect.
Possible topics include (but are not limited to) the following:
-the Future History timeline
-the "juveniles" (Heinlein's young adult works)
-gender roles and sexuality
-feminist and misogynist themes
-engineered longevity/natural (and unnatural) selection
-animal imagery and symbolism
-nationalist and political themes
-religion and religious themes
Please send 250-word abstracts or questions via e-mail to Lisa Edmonds, panel chairperson, at imzadi1@cox.net. Deadline for submissions is October 15, 2003. Prospective panelists will be contacted by e-mail. All submissions will be acknowledged upon receipt. Thank you in
advance!
Lisa Edmonds
E-mail: imzadi1@cox.net or lnedmonds@wichita.edu
Wichita State University Department of English
1845 Fairmount Box 14
Wichita, KS 67260
WSU Office Phone: 316-978-6234
