HI ALL, IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR AN EXCUSE TO VISIT THE SOUTH OF FRANCE, HERE
YOU GO:
COMPANION SPECIES IN NORTH AMERICAN CULTURAL PRODUCTIONS

*International Symposium at Université de Toulouse Jean Jaurès, France*

June 17, 2016

Organizers: Claire Cazajous and Wendy Harding
SEND titles and 150 word abstracts by *September 5, 2015* to
[log in to unmask] and [log in to unmask]

American culture, like all cultures, is not of exclusively human making;
other species play an essential role in its development. It is difficult to
imagine what  stories would be told of America without horses, buffalo,
dogs, corn, or apple trees, to mention just a few of the species that have
shared the land with humans. Such mutual co-evolutions might be compared to
Deleuze and Guattari’s example of the assemblage constituted by the orchid
and the wasp. Contact with other species (as pets, beasts of burden, food,
ornaments etc.) modifies human culture and reciprocally alters the species
concerned. Rather than falling into neat divisions this encounter creates
contested territories and complicated lines of suture between species.
Instead of drawing boundaries between nature and culture, the human and the
animal, contemporary theorists (Haraway, Latour, Barad) have drawn
attention to their inseparability and their multiple forms of
co-dependence. Donna Haraway goes so far as to use the portmanteau word
“naturecultures” to draw attention to the intimate, mutating associations
of different species.
We invite participants to consider whether and how the arts can make a
place for other species, rather than affirming the separation of nature and
culture. How do cultural productions represent inter-species contact? Does
the homocentricity of language confine them to anthropomorphic projection?
Do artists and writers necessarily affirm man’s superiority? Do they
replicate the biblical schema, making man the steward? Can other kinds of
relation be imagined that take into account reciprocity and foster respect?
In what ways is it possible to attend to what Haraway calls the
“significant otherness” of non-humans? Is there such a thing as otherness
and difference if we are caught in meshworks of relationships? What ethical
stand can we think of when self and other have become “molecular”? What new
meanings can we infuse into the word compassion when the other-self
division has been discarded?
For more details see the Companion Species Symposium website
https://companionspeciestoulouse.wordpress.com/2015/05/06/bonjour-tout-le-monde/



---
Tom Lynch
Professor
Chair, Undergraduate Studies
Editor, *Western American Literature*
Department of English
202 Andrews Hall
P.O. Box 880333
University of Nebraska, Lincoln
Lincoln, NE  68588-0333 <[log in to unmask]>
<<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>><<<>>>
* Our lives are frittered away by e-mail * - H. D. Thoreau

*New Books:*
*The Bioregional Imagination: Literature, Ecology, Place
<http://www.ugapress.org/index.php/books/the_bioregional_imagination>*
*Artifacts & Illuminations: Critical Essays on Loren Eiseley
<http://www.nebraskapress.unl.edu/product/Artifacts-and-Illuminations,674965.aspx>*

Homepage <http://english.unl.edu/tlynch2/>
Faculty Page <http://english.unl.edu/faculty/profs/tlynch.html>