SASS 2023 will take place on the campus of the University of Texas at Austin from April 20 to April 22. The theme of this SASS meeting is everyday life, in the sense that the French theorist Michel de Certeau used the term in his 1980 study, L’invention du quotidien/The Practice of Everyday Life. In this work, which grew out of research originally funded as a study of consumer behavior, de Certeau argues that consumers, as well as people in pre-capitalist cultures, have the potential to react creatively to commodities, religious doctrines, and other cultural systems. Like canny shoppers at the supermarket, people may strive to combine what’s available to them to make the best possible meal. Colonized people sometimes appropriate aspects of the colonizers’ culture that subvert its oppressive potential. Workers in unrewarding jobs may surf the internet while appearing to conform to bureaucratic routines. What are we to make of de Certeau’s emphasis on the positive role of creative bricolage or tinkering? What is its relationship to more explicit forms of resistance or more confrontational strategies to improve conditions for individuals or groups? Does de Certeau’s work allow for more room to maneuver than that of other theorists, such as Michel Foucault? To what extent does Michel de Certeau’s work offers a useful framework for understanding Nordic literatures, cultures, histories, and societies? The organizing committee encourages submissions that explore the roles of everyday life in Nordic literature, culture, and film, but other topics and approaches are also welcome.
Please submit paper proposals either to the general SASS pool or to the thematic streams below by December 9, 2022, via this link.
2023 Thematic Streams:
– Ibsen and the everyday
– Nationalism in Scandinavia
– Everyday Bodies: bricolage, assemblage, and body language in the Scandinavian Middle Ages – Please note: this stream will take the form of a workshop with pre-circulated papers and roundtable discussions
– Everyday Life in the Danish Golden Age
– Scandinavians in the Texas Borderlands
– Nordic Art Music and the Modern Age: A Series of Lectures/Recitals
Australian Early Medieval Association Gazette 