Storytelling, Self, Society:

An Interdisciplinary Conference and Journal of Storytelling Studies

 

Conference: Friday and Saturday, March 5 & 6, 2004

Kick-off event for South Florida Storytelling Project: Thursday evening, March 4

 

The South Florida Storytelling Project at Florida Atlantic University invites you to participate in an interdisciplinary academic conference that will both present current scholarship on storytelling and launch the discipline’s first peer-reviewed academic journal, Storytelling, Self, Society: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Storytelling Studies. Like the journal, the conference is presented in conjunction with the National Storytelling Network and its affiliate special interest groups, including Storytelling in Higher Education, the Healing Story Alliance, and Storytelling in Organizations.

 

The conference will feature papers, panels and workshops on themes related to storytelling as private or public discourse. It will also showcase storytelling performances, as well as provide a forum for the journal’s editorial and advisory boards to meet and discuss editorial policy issues. The proceedings of the conference will comprise the journal’s first issue, and the proceeds will help underwrite its first year (two issues). Presenters and participants will represent disciplines including storytelling, communication, English, education, library science, environmental science, nursing, medicine, business, peace studies, psychology, theatre and performance studies.

 

The conference takes place  at Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida. The campus lies between the Fort Lauderdale and West Palm Beach airports. Reduced hotel accommodations and private housing are available. The registration fee of $125 may be waived under certain circumstances for presenters and performers. Detailed registration information will be available shortly.

 

Please e-mail or send a 250-word abstract that will serve as a proposal both for the conference and for your journal submission to:

 

John S. Gentile, Ph.D., Chair

Theatre and Performance Studies

Kennesaw State University

1000 Chastain Road Box #3103

Kennesaw, GA  30144

jgentile@kennesaw.edu

 

Indicate audio-visual or other special needs. Deadline for submissions: Monday, December 22, 2003.

 

Campus contact:

Caren S. Neile, Ph. D., Director

South Florida Storytelling Project

cneile@fau.edu

561-297-0042

 

For updates, check http://courses.unt.edu/efiga/SSS/SSS_Journal.htm.

 

About the journal:

 

STORYTELLING, SELF, SOCIETY:

An Interdisciplinary Journal of Storytelling Studies

 

EDITORIAL POLICY

 

STORYTELLING, SELF, SOCIETY is an interdisciplinary journal that invites

scholarship addressing any topic related to Storytelling--from its role

as performing art to contemporary applications in a variety of

professional fields. We welcome manuscripts from scholars in humanities

and social science disciplines, (including psychology, library science, literary studies, folklore, anthropology, sociology, communication, rhetoric, performance studies, theater, history, feminist and queer studies, and ethnography) as well as from storytelling artists and practitioners, including those applying storytelling in the fields of education, health care, social

 work, business, law, peace-building and environmental education.

 

Storytelling is a hyperlink discipline, which stands at the headwaters

of all disciplinarity in education and cultural transmission. In the

course of telling a story one is able to yoke together issues of

history, sociology, anthropology, literature, music, theatre,

psychology, religion, law, medicine, communication, and more, all

through the natural linkages of the narrative mode. The contemporary

revival of storytelling has grown through the fit between narrative

thinking and the contrapuntal knowledge organization born of the

evolution from linear to hyperlink technology, a correspondence which

has only minimally emerged from the cultural unconscious, especially in

domains such as the academy which are still beholden to the paradigm of

print.

 

STORYTELLING, SELF, SOCIETY intends to gather the building blocks of new

disciplinary roles, structures and methodologies for Storytelling in the

21st century. We seek articles that reflect the highest standards of the

various disciplines on which we draw, and to which we intend to

contribute. In addition to standard monographs, STORYTELLING, SELF,

SOCIETY seeks to extend the critical vocabulary of contemporary

Storytelling, and so solicits reviews of Storytelling performances and

individual texts, as well as essays that review several performances and

texts. We also recognize that Storytelling is a longstanding discipline

in itself--an integral mode of understanding and illuminating the world.

Thus we welcome personal ethnography and reflection, as well as stories

that have evolved from the oral tradition and reflect upon the endurance

and evolution of oral traditions in the present day. We recognize the

profound and often contested influences of Storytelling and cultural

narratives on the health of the individual, the community, and the

planet. We seek ways to evaluate, measure, and focus those influences to

impact our scholarship, our disciplines, our society, and ourselves.

 

In keeping with an interdisciplinary journal, monographs and review

essays in STORYTELLING, SELF, SOCIETY are written in prose that is

appropriate for a wide range of scholars and educated readers rather

than the specialized jargon of a specific discipline.