September
2008
Call for papers – Women in French 2009 – Aston University0
Call for Papers
Women in French One-Day Conference
‘Women at play / Les femmes s’amusent’
Aston University, Birmingham, UK
9 May 2009
Whereas issues concerning women at work, both professional and domestic, have been widely studied and documented in recent years, the question of women’s free or in particular leisure time has not been explored to the same extent.
Leisure is understood as social time which is used for individual or collective self-expression, and is commonly perceived as playing an increasing role in women’s lives since the introduction of the 35-hour week in France in 2000. The aim of this interdisciplinary one-day conference is to generate discussion on
how French and Francophone women express themselves when ‘at play’ in the broadest sense of the term. What role is played by leisure in the lives of women today? What types of leisure activities are women choosing to experience, ordinary or extraordinary, conventional or transgressive? How are such
experiences represented in a variety of media?
This one-day conference aims to bring together female scholars with an interest in any area of French and Francophone studies. Papers are sought from areas including literature, cultural studies, film/media studies, history, sociology, politics and economics. Issues that papers at this conference might address
include:
• women and cultural activities
• women and the creative arts / hobbies
• performing women (e.g. theatre, music, dance, comedy)
• women and consumption / new technologies (e.g. shopping, gambling, cyberspace)
• women and holidays / tourism
• women and sport
• women and socialising
• women and community life
Papers should be no longer than 20 minutes in length and can be delivered in English or French. Abstracts for individual papers (300 words) should be sent to the organisers, Dr. Kathryn Jones and Dr. Nathalie Morello, at k.n.jones@swan.ac.uk and n.morello@swan.ac.uk by December 15 2008.
