A Call for Papers for the 49th NeMLA Annual Conference, April 12th-15th, Pittsburgh, PA
contact email: david.pecan@ncc.eduSexy Beast: Amorous Monsters, Incest, and Bestiality in Medieval Celtic, Anglo-Saxon, and Scandinavian Literature, a panel featured at the 49th NeMLA Annual Conference, April 12th-15th, 2018, Pittsburgh, PA.
The realistic and fantastic narratives of the early medieval world contain no shortage of encounters that stretch, challenge, and break accepted social guidelines. The theoretical analysis of non-traditional modes of desire, other-worldly wish fulfilment, and human-animal relations in the literatures of medieval Northern Europe offers opportunities for the provocative consideration of mythopoetic ritual, social syncretism, source study, literary innovation, authorial or cultural fetish, and the iconography or design features of the material culture of early Ireland, Wales, Scotland, England, and Scandinavia. Eco-criticism, psychoanalytic and gender theory, and linguistic and cultural poetics provide a lens for the discussion of sexualized monster combat, romantic encounters with otherworldly or mythic entities, cross-species or magical seduction, angelic ravishments, the sexualized negotiation of clan or family structure, and the totemic representation of monstrous or animalistic couplings. Interested presenters are asked to submit 200 word abstracts for papers prior to the September 30th 2017 deadline through the NeMLA website,
https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/cfp, using panel ID # 17004. This panel is hosted by David Pecan of the Department of English, SUNY Nassau.
