INTERDISCIPLINARY GRADUATE STUDENT CONFERENCE

(UW-Madison, Feburary 27- March 1, 2003)

(In)formation: Identity, Community,

Performance and Visual Cultures

This conference is designed to express a growing need to bring together graduate students of all disciplines who recognize the increasingly more fluid relationship between theoretical investigation and creative activity on the UW campus. We believe the topics forming the title for this conference, Identity, Community, Performance and Visual Cultures, serve a twofold purpose:

1) foster a sense of unity among graduate students from a variety of fields, and, 2) reflect the more active involvement of university students in the social debates and cultural developments of the 21st century.

 

These are guiding questions.  Projects addressing any of these questions or facets of these questions are relevant to this conference:


How do you define (your) identity(ies)?

political position; ethnic, racial or cultural heritage;
geographic setting; social roles; sexual orientation; etc.

How do communities form?
religious association; socio-political
affiliation (local, international, global);
generational relation; artistic collaboration;
cultural-ideological connection; etc.

What is the role of performance
in shaping identity and community?
critical presentation; creative expression;
social interaction; multisensorial experience;
intertextuality and visuality, etc.

What is visual culture?
How is it developing?

learning through seeing; non-conventional
ways of looking; polysemous, multidiscursive
spaces; meaning through production-reception;
challenging social and cultural notions; etc.

SUBMISSIONS: Please submit an abstract of no more than 250-300 words for written papers by December 7th, 2002; photographs or videos must be submitted along with the verbal abstract for performances and visual works. Presentations must be no more than 20 minutes in length.

(Address inquiries to: candacescott@wisc.edu or brettonwhite@wisc.edu)