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> Please forward the following call to individuals and lists where it may > be of interest. Thank you. Rick Coe > > Call for Papers > short notice > International Symposium on Genre > Vancouver, Canada: 16-17 January 1998 > > Note: This is a second coming of the highly successful international > symposium on genre held at Carleton University in 1992. For a sense of > that discussion, see two subsequently published collections, both edited > by Aviva Freedman and Peter Medway: Genre and the New Rhetoric (London, > UK: Taylor & Francis, 1994), and Learning and Teaching Genres. (NH: > Heinemann [Boynton/Cook], 1994). > > Dates: 16-17 January 1998 > Place: Vancouver, Canada > @ Simon Fraser University's downtown Harbour Centre campus > Attendance: Limited to 65. > Registration Fee: $65 (waived for graduate students and unemployed > researchers) > Send Proposals to Arrive By: noon, 10 October 1997 > Email: [log in to unmask] FAX: (604) 291-5737 > Mail/Courier: Prof. Rick Coe, Program Chair > English Department, Simon Fraser University > Burnaby, BC CANADA V5A 1S6 > > Program & Structure: > > We are inviting four primary presenters who represent a range of > disciplinary and geographic locations where particularly important work on > genre is ongoing. With this call, we invite 16-20 other theorists and > researchers to make 15-20 minute presentations and up to 40 other > participants. For the most part, the Symposium will be plenary in an > extended "roundtable" format. One set of concurrent sessions will provide > opportunities to discuss discipline-specific issues and applications.. > Total attendance will be limited to 65, including primary presenters, 40 > fee-paying participants, and 20 graduate students. Pre- and > post-symposium visit to SFU's radically innovative, genre-based writing > centre can be arranged. > > The 1992 Symposium on Genre included participants from Europe, > Canada, and the United States, who work in Education, English Composition > & Rhetoric, and Applied Linguistics (ESL/ESP). Presenters included > Charles Bazerman, Carolyn Miller, and John Swales. Our specific theme for > 1998 is "Literacy & Literature," but we wish to broaden the discussion in > other ways as well. We propose to add participants from Australia--and > also from Anthropology, Speech/Communications, and Literary Criticism, > including some whose research is in languages other than English. > > Proposal Format: > > By whatever means is quickest and most convenient, please send > your title and 150-250 word abstract, plus your phone numbers and > addresses (including Email). For those who wish to attend without > formally presenting, registration and reservation forms will be available > shortly. Meanwhile, email [log in to unmask] > > Concept: > > Theorists, researchers, and teachers on several continents, > working independently in distinct traditions, have seized upon the notion > of genre as focal to understanding social, functional, and pragmatic > dimensions of language use. In English/Education, the beginnings of this > movement in relation to non-literary writing can be marked by Michael > Halliday's Language as Social Semiotic (1978), Carolyn Miller's "Genre as > Social Action" (1984), and the publication in English translation of > Mikhail Bakhtin's Speech Genres and Other Late Essays (1986). Somewhat > parallel development of the concept of genre also occurred in other > disciplines, e.g., anthropology, literary criticism. > > The crux of the new genre theories is that genres are socially > standard strategies, embodied in typical forms of discourse, which have > evolved for responding to recurring types of rhetorical situation. Unlike > traditional theories of genre, which focused primarily on discursive form, > the new theories explain the discursive structures of a genre > functionally, not merely as a socially standard form, but as a socially > standard rhetorical strategy for addressing a type of situation and > attempting to evoke a desired type of response. > > What Freedman and Medway called the new rhetoric of genre helps us > understand discourse as socio-cultural process, which people both shape > and are shaped by, which directs and deflects attention, constitutes > subject positions, opportunities and constraints, community and hierarchy. > Like the New Rhetoric, with which it shares intellectual roots, the new > genre theories focus on discourse as as situated social/symbolic action. > Like other aspects of discourse, genres are neither value-free nor neutral > and often imply hierarchical social relationships, so our discussion of > genre will be critical as well as pragmatic. > > Organizing Committee: Charles Bazerman, Richard Coe (Program Chair), > Aviva Freedman, Janet Giltrow, Lorelei Lingard, Judy Segal, Wendy > Strachan, Tanya Teslenko. >