CALL FOR PAPERS

Canadian Society for the Study of Rhetoric [CSSR]

CALL FOR PAPERS/ APPEL DE PROPOSITIONS DE COMMUNICATION

Canadian Society for the Study of Rhetoric [CSSR] (Société Canadienne pour l'Étude de la Rhétorique) [SCÉR] McGill University, Montréal, Québec.

July 21 - 22 (du 21 au 22 juillet) 2009.

(Voyez la version française plus loin.)

The CSSR/SCÉR invites you to submit proposals for papers at its annual conference to be held at McGill University in Montréal. These proposals should be sent by October 31, 2008. The meeting will include a special session entitled The Embodiment of Rhetoric / The Rhetoric of Embodiment. Other open topics are listed below.

Please note that this conference will be held in conjunction with the conference of the International Society for the History of Rhetoric [ISHR], July 22 - 26 (du 22 au 26 juillet) 2009. Information on fees for the 2-day CSSR conference and the 6-day joint CSSR/ISHR conference will be posted on the ISHR website (http://ishr.cua.edu/ ).

            Special Session: The Embodiment of Rhetoric / The Rhetoric of Embodiment

            Session Chair: Pierre Zoberman, Université Paris 13

            A contested term in contemporary thought, "embodiment" signifies in various ways the experience of our own flesh, the intimate fit of social space around bodies, physiological presence and the habitus, perceptive experiences of our own physiologies: it might be seen to describe phenomenological processes that appear in language, that occasion description and redescription, that question individual agency and its social exigencies.  Philosophers, theorists, and historians have explored questions of embodiment in the past, but frequently neglect the rhetorical elements of embodied selves, the ways in which bodies appear and function in discourse, and the multiple and variegated meanings of 'the body'   historically.  

            The Canadian Society for the Study of Rhetoric invites proposals for a special session entitled "The Embodiment of Rhetoric / The Rhetoric of Embodiment" at its annual conference. Papers for this session should engage questions of  embodiment, broadly defined, and rhetoric. Possible topics might include, but are not limited to, the following:

            - bodies and souls
            - bodies and gender
            - bodies and identity 
            - the rhetoric of gesture
            - the rhetoric of sickness and health
            - medical discourse
            - bodies politic
            - having/being a body: rhetorical perspectives

            - bodies and the history of rhetoric
            - rhetoric and the history of bodies
            - the body and argument

Open topics:  As always, papers concerning more general aspects of rhetoric are welcome:

- rhetorical theory
- rhetorical criticism
- history of rhetoric
- rhetoric in popular culture
- media communication
- discourse analysis
- rhetoric of political and social discourse
- pedagogy of communication
- rhetoric and the media
- sociolinguistics and pedagogy
- semiotics
- professional and technical communication

How to submit a proposal:

- Your proposal may be submitted in either English or French.
- It may be up to 300 words in length and it will be printed in the program if your project is accepted.  The presentation should be no more than 20 minutes.
- Please include the title of your paper.
- Please indicate clearly methodology, the texts or phenomena under scrutiny (a complete bibliography is not necessary), and the central importance of rhetoric to the inquiry. Work from various disciplines and from across all historical periods is welcome.
- If you need electronic equipment for your presentation, please send a request along with your proposal. Please note that you may be asked to repeat this information when you register for ISHR online.
- Preferably, please send your proposal by e-mail to s.purvessmith@rogers.com            

- In addition, proposals will be accepted by mail to the following address:

Shannon Purves-Smith
31 Arthur St. N.
Elmira, Ontario
N3B 1Z6
CANADA

- Proposals must arrive or be post-dated no later than October 31, 2008

Inquiries may be made by telephone to: (519) 669 - 1327

- In order to present a paper, you must be a member of the CSSR/SCÉR. Membership fees should be paid before the presentation of the paper (at the conference is fine).

- Presenters are strongly encouraged to take part in discussions that follow the papers. Our members thoroughly enjoy the fruitful discussion that often arises. Please make every effort to attend the papers in your session.

Please visit our web site, http://www.cssr-scer.ca/ for more information on the Canadian Society for the Study of Rhetoric.