Panels at Other Conferences
ASLE has formal relationships with a number of other organizations and as such sponsors panels at their annual conferences. Below is some information on current activities with some of these groups.
International Association for Environmental Philosophy
Thinking Through Nature: Philosophy for an Endangered World
University of Oregon, 19-22 June, 2008
The following panel is sponsored by ASLE:
Ecocriticism: Mimesis, Materiality, Life
Moderator: Scott Knickerbocker, English & Environmental Studies, The College of Idaho
"Ecocriticism, Mimesis, and Aristotle," Robert Wess, English, Oregon State University
"A Dirty Material Turn: Ecocriticism, Science Studies, and the Case of Michael Heizer's Nine Nevada Depressions," Nicole Merola, English, Rhode Island School of Design
"The Pine Island Paradox as Equipment for Living: Thinking through complex social-environmental decisions with the help of contemporary environmental literature," Brett Werner, Rhetoric and Scientific and Technical Communication, University of Minnesota Twin Cities
Modern Language Association (MLA)
2007 MLA Annual Convention Report
As an affiliate organization of the Modern Language Association, ASLE arranges two panels for each annual convention. 2007 Panels and papers are listed below. MLA Liaison: Sarah McFarland, Northwestern State University
“When Nature Strikes Back”
This panel explored how various texts depict a so-called natural response to human attempts to control, change, or harm the land.
Nicole Seymour, Vanderbilt University, “‘More Poison in Thy Nature’: Ecocriticism, Abolitionism, and the Revenge of ‘the Natural’ in ‘Rappaccini’s Daughter.’”
Rocky Colavito, Northwestern State University, “Mutant Grasshoppers are Attacking Chicago! Mad Science, Nature Amok, and the B-Movie
Tradition,”
“Animals and Agency”
This panel discussed representations of animal subjectivity, exploring the construction of animality and humanity and the ways certain representations of animals can undermine or complicate the boundary that supposedly differentiates animals from humans.
Mary Sanders Pollock, Stetson University, “The Storytelling Ape: The Rhetoric of Autobiographical Field Narratives.”
Alice Ann Kuzniar, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, “The Agency of Pit’s Letter: On Sue Coe and Derrida,”
Ryan Hediger, University of Colorado at Boulder, “Crossing Over: Death, Genre, and Species.”
Norma J. Tilden, Georgetown University, “Zoographia: A Poetics of Interanimal Exchange,”
ASLE will be sponsoring two panels at the MLA conference in San Francisco in December 2008: one that theorizes various methods of ecocritical practice and another that addresses the connections between environmentalism and religion. Hopefully, similarly provocative conversations will emerge.