The IFTR Historiography Working Group will be meeting during the IFTR conference in Stockholm, Sweden, 13-17 June 2016.
The working group welcomes papers dealing with any possible period or topic in theatre history, but as the group is dedicated to theatre historiography, authors are asked to focus on methodological and epistemological problems related to the history of theatre and performance. Historiographical questions discussed by participants may be illustrated through specific case examples, and there are no restrictions on the historical time or place a proposal might involve or on the kind of historiographical approach explored.
The general theme of the upcoming conference, “Presenting the Theatrical Past. Interplays of Artefacts, Discourses and Practices” is closely related to the focus of the Historiography Working Group. The conference will highlight critical perspectives of theatre history and the material accessibility of the past through artifacts and archives, as well as through activities in present performances. See the conference website for a full elaboration of the topics: http://www.iftr.org/conference
As the conference theme of “Historiography” brings the activity of our working group to the forefront, we will also curate a panel for the general conference. We encourage participants interested in presenting on a HWG general panel to contact the working group conveners (information below) before submitting your abstract.
The Historiography Working Group works by circulating papers to members in advance of the conference. Those who have circulated papers are invited to speak for not more than ten minutes about the context in which they have written their pieces, and about points where they would particularly welcome a response. (Participants take care to read all the papers carefully, so an oral summary of the paper is discouraged.) Submissions are normally linked to a research project that the author currently has in progress. The group spends about 20 minutes discussing each paper, and the emphasis of the discussion is upon historiographical method rather than the detail of the content. The aim of the discussion is always to be constructive. It is a way of working that has been found helpful by young scholars inexperienced in presentation, and by scholars whose first language is not English, but it has evolved because it suits the needs of those who are working on a larger project, which is often seen to be growing from year to year. We shall particularly welcome proposals from new scholars and from scholars outside Europe.
Abstracts of no more than 300 words should be submitted by 15 January 2016 by following instructions on the conference website: www.iftr.org/conference, indicating that you are submitting to the Historiography Working Group. Please be aware that the deadline for applications for bursaries is 1 December 2015. The application form is available at www.iftr.org.
The Working Group conveners will select proposals that best fit the historiographical theme of our group. We will respond to proposals received by 15 February 2016. If we cannot
accommodate your paper, we will refer it to the conference organizers for possible placement on a general panel.
The full text of the selected papers (no more than 5000 words) should be emailed to the conveners by 8 May 2016, for uploading onto the group’s website. For further information please do not hesitate to contact one of the conveners.
Information about the group can be found on http://www.firt-iftr.org/working- groups/methodologies/historiography and http://theaterhistoriography.wordpress.com/
Please share this call for papers with any colleagues or research students whom you think may be interested. The current conveners of the Historiography Working Group are
Magnus Thor Thorbergsson (magnusthor@lhi.is) University of Iceland Mechele Leon (mleon@ku.edu) University of Kansas
Nora Probst (nora.probst@uni-koeln.de) University of Cologne
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