On 26-28 April 2019, Trinity College Dublin will be hosting the annual Borderlines conference. The conference is in its 23rd year and attracts a large number of medievalists and early modernists from Europe and further afield.
This year’s theme is ‘Sound and Silence in the Medieval and Early Modern World’. While the concept of silence may seem antithetical to expression, a knowledge of the elements that serve to either silence narratives or aid in their articulation is integral to understanding any artistic or literary production and the culture from which it originates. In the medieval and early modern periods, silence was inextricably linked to prevailing ideas and ideologies – both religious and secular. The role of sound in the music, prose, and poetry of these periods is also crucial to the proliferation of ideas. Analyses of the roles that sound and silence play in literature and other forms of expression are thus vital to understanding the social, cultural, aesthetic, and political environments in the medieval and early modern world.
We invite abstracts of no more than 300 words for 20-minute papers focussing on one or both concepts. The deadline for abstracts is Monday 4th February 2019.
Abstracts should be submitted via the ‘Submit Your Abstracts’ link on our website borderlinesxxiii.wordpress.com
Any questions or queries can be addressed to borderlinesxxiii@gmail.com