Call for Papers: Renaissance In-Betweenness

Pacific Northwest Renaissance Society
Annual Conference
Vancouver, BC
3-5 April 2008

The Annual Conference of the Pacific Northwest Renaissance Society (PNRS) will be held from April 3-5, 2008 in downtown Vancouver at the Hyatt Regency (room rates: $141.00 CDN per night, single or double). The theme for this year's conference is Renaissance In-Betweenness, and our plenary speakers will be Fran Dolan (University of California, Davis) and Elizabeth Harvey (University of Toronto).

We invite papers, panels, discussion groups, and workshops that examine Renaissance engagements with various transitional figures and cultural artifacts. The PNRS program coincides with the annual convention of the Medieval Academy at the Hyatt Regency, and both organizations hope that conference participants will engage in fruitful conversation across a range of historical fields and disciplines.

We invite proposals in the following areas for the 2008 conference:

Liminal Spaces: urban liberties, walls, doors, thresholds, docks, rivers and hedges

Figures of the In-Between: stage devils, panders, bawds, pages, hermaphrodites, messengers, angels, scribes, the noble savage, typesetters, publishers, usurers, translators and children

Religious *via media*

Generic Conventions and Hybrid Genres: *in medias res*, interludes, scene changes (jigs and dumbshows) and tragicomedy

Species Boundaries: integuments (skin, bark, pelt) and hybrid creatures

Mixed governments and *interregna*

Arcane Knowledge: zodiacal cusps, equinoxes and alchemy

Suspended States: sleep, trances and exorcisms

Objects of Exchange: letters, coins, gifts, rings, jewelry, potions, clothes and fabric

Places of Exchange: The Royal Exchange and pawnshops

Periodization and Historiography

Please email individual abstracts (250-words) or panel / workshop proposals to Tiffany Alkan (talkan@sfu.ca) and Vin Nardizzi (nardizzi@interchange.ubc.ca) by September 1, 2007.