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“The Letter of the Law” Law Matters in Language and Literature

“The Letter of the Law” Law Matters in Language and Literature

Hellenic Association for the Study of English (HASE)

8th International Conference

The Letter of the Law

Law Matters in Language and Literature

Call for Papers

In the last few decades, the intersections of literature, language and law constitute an expanding field of study across the disciplines of legal studies and the humanities. The study of how literary modes figure in legal texts coincided with the study of literary texts that are concerned with law and justice, while the cultural and social spaces where law and language overlap have become increasingly important in attempts to forge new judicial tools. As the contemporary global culture poses the imperative to address and redress the coarticulation of law and justice; as the authority and legitimacy of the law are bound up with questions of ethics, often at odds with the judicial contexts of its application and interpretation, this conference seeks to consider the formulation and the violation of laws and reassess the intersections between the lexis and the lex.

The conference is interested in exploring literature as a juridically-defined commodity and reassessing the impact of law on literary history, as the emergence of the modern concept of literature was determined by copyright laws and censorship. We are also interested in the pragmatics of rhetoric and legal discourse, as well as in new research in the field of forensic linguistics, manifested in both written (e.g., judgements used in juridical settings, legislation, contracts) and spoken forms of discourse (e.g., lawyer client consultation, counsel-witness examination, interview techniques).

The conference welcomes panel and paper proposals from across the field of literary studies, critical theory, and linguistics, exploring and rethinking the complex mediations between law, language, and literature. Possible lines of inquiry may focus on (but not be limited to) a variety of themes, perspectives and approaches:

· consent and dissent

· conformity, subversion, transgression

· authority, integrity and responsibility

· lawlessness

· legal and literary constitutions of identity in colonial and postcolonial contexts

· witnesses, victims, perpetrators, judges, lawyers and legislators

· the trial as performance and the court as performance space

· interrogations and depositions

· evidence and pronouncing sentences

· human rights

· application of phonetics in forensics

· reconstructing mobile phone text conversations

· creativity vs. rigidity of legal discourse

· authorship identification

· identifying cases of plagiarism

· trademark and other intellectual property disputes

Plenary Speakers: Malcolm Coulthard (Aston University, co-author with Alison Johnson of An Introduction to Forensic Linguistics: Language in Evidence, and The Routledge Handbook of Forensic Linguistics), Costas Douzinas (Birkbeck College, University of London, author of Postmodern Jurisprudence and Human Rights and Empire: The Political Philosophy of Cosmopolitanism), Lorna Hutson (University of St Andrews, author of The Invention of Suspicion: Law and Mimesis in Shakespeare and Renaissance Drama)

The conference will be held at the Main Building of the University of Athens from 5th to 8th May 2011.

The deadline for the submission of proposals for panel sessions (no longer than 500 words) and proposals for individual 20-minute papers (200-250 words) is October 3, 2010. Please send a short biographical note together with your proposal. Prospective panel organisers should send together with their proposal and bio note, the panelists' names, paper titles, as well as a short bio note for each panelist and their contact details. Panel organisers are exempted from registration fees.

Panel and paper proposals should be sent to Mata Dimakopoulou (sdimakop@enl.uoa.gr)

Notification of acceptance: November 15, 2010

Conference Registration Fee: €100

Early Registration (by March, 1 2011): €80

HASE Members: €90

Early Registration (by March, 1 2011): €70

Students: €40

Conference registration includes reception, coffee, refreshment breaks and lunch.

Conference Organisers:

Mata Dimakopoulou (University of Athens) sdimakop@enl.uoa.gr

Christina Dokou (University of Athens) cdokou@enl.uoa.gr

Elly Ifantidou (University of Athens) ifelly@enl.uoa.gr

Efterpi Mitsi (University of Athens, HASE Chair) emitsi@enl.uoa.gr

Angeliki Tzanne (University of Athens) atzanne@enl.uoa.gr

Scientific Committee:

Bessie Dendrinos (University of Athens) vdendrin@enl.uoa.gr

Maria Germanou (University of Athens) margerma@enl.uoa.gr

Aspasia Velissariou (University of Athens) abelis@enl.uoa.gr

Faculty of English Studies

School of Philosophy

The National and Kapodistrian University of Athens

Zographou University Campus

157 84 Athens, Greece

http://www.enl.uoa.gr/swf/en_indexloader.html