Between Present and Past: Nostalgia in Francophone Literature

Call for Papers:
Between Present and Past: Nostalgia in Francophone Literature
41st Anniversary Convention, Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)
April 7-11, 2010
Montreal, Quebec - Hilton Bonaventure

“Nostalgia tells it like it wasn’t,” according to David Lowenthal’s 1989 article, yet many are compelled to cling to their longing for the past. This is especially true for many French and Francophone authors who lived through the end of colonialism. While they may overtly deny their nostalgia, it is difficult to escape the compulsion to recreate the time before their exile. Authors such as Albert Camus, Marguerite Duras, and Marie Cardinal, among many others, cannot help but recreate their colonial homes even when they write from a postcolonial position. Rewriting the past can be therapeutic and obsessive. As Judith Butler explains in “The Pleasure of Repetition” (1990), repeating the past is a vain effort “to inhabit that past within the terms of the present and effect its fantasized reconstruction.” In an attempt to understand how nostalgia affects memory writing and how writing sustains nostalgia, this panel will examine the recreation of the past in French and Francophone postcolonial literature. Email Amy L. Hubbell (ahubbell@ksu.edu) with proposed abstracts of 300 words by September 30, 2009.

Please include with your abstract:
Name and Affiliation
Email address
Postal address
Telephone number
A/V requirements (if any; $10 handling fee)

Additional Conference Information:
The 41st Annual Convention will feature approximately 350 sessions, as well as dynamic speakers and cultural events. Details and the complete Call for Papers for the 2010 Convention will be posted in June: www.nemla.org.

Interested participants may submit abstracts to more than one NeMLA session; however panelists can only present one paper (panel or seminar). Convention participants may present a paper at a panel and also present at a creative session or participate in a roundtable.

Travel to Canada now requires a passport for U.S. citizens. Please get your passport application in early.

Leïla Sebbar: Entre exil et enracinement

"Pour moi, la question de l'exil continue à se poser. Elle se posera jusqu'à ce que je cesse d'écrire. J'écris dans l'exil, j'écris à partir de l'exil. Ce qui m'intéresse, ce sont tous ceux qui sont ou frappés par l'exil, ou qui ont fait le choix de l'exil. C'est ce que je traite dans tous mes livres."

- Leïla Sebbar, interview with Boniface Mongo-Mboussa

"Entre Exil Et Enracinement: Entretien Avec Leïla Sebbar." Notre Librairie: Revue des Littératures du Sud 165 (2007). p. 127.

In a 1987 interview with Ysabel Saïah, Marie Cardinal stated, “J’écris toujours le même livre dont l’empreinte est là-bas. La vie d’une femme vivant sur une terre ravagée par le conflit des humains.”

Is this repetition indicative of a psychological trauma, or is it just a typical impetus for writing?