"The Ear & the Aural in Early Modern French Poetry" (MLA 2009 proposed Special Session)

Modern Language Association of America

Annual Convention, Philadelphia, PA, 27-30 December 2009

SPECIAL SESSION PROPOSAL AND CALL FOR PAPERS

The Ear & the Aural in Early Modern French Poetry

In Early Modern Europe, the printing press, the revered “ut pictura poiesis,” the Paragone, the vogue of emblems, and Neoplatonic thought – among other things – appear to have fostered a dominance of the eye, if not the supremacy of sight as the superior sense. Yet poetry remembers its formerly sung and mythically oracular nature, and struggles with its affinities with oratory. What role, then, do the ear and hearing play as a polysemous motif in French poetry? What about the oral and aural channels as a valued medium for the cognitive, rhetorical, political, aesthetic and philosophical workings of poetry, in the 15^th through 17^th centuries?

Please send 500-word abstracts (for a 15- to 20-minute paper) in French or English to: Corinne Noirot-Maguire, cnoirot@vt.edu, by March 1, 2008.

(Notice of acceptance or rejection will be sent in April)