An international conference hosted by the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Porto, Portugal and organised by CETAPS: 12-14 October 2023

Confirmed keynote speakers:

• Carol Chillington Rutter (University of Warwick)
• Glenn Patterson (Seamus Heaney Centre, Queen’s Univ. Belfast)
• Linda Troost (Washington & Jefferson College) and
• Sayre Greenfield (Univ. Pittsburgh-Greensburg)

This conference will focus on how perceptions and representations of intimacy have impacted imaginative production, especially literature and the visual / performative arts, since the 1960s. It derives its pretext from the sixty years that have passed since the date (dubiously) celebrated in Philip Larkin’s poem ‘Annus Mirabilis’, with its sardonic opening: ‘Sexual intercourse began / In nineteen sixty-three’.

Taking its cue from these memorable lines, our programme will privilege the non-linear and often perplexing ways in which love and sex have been addressed, troped and narrated by writers and artists over the past six decades, and the aesthetic, ethical and political challenges posed by their representations.

As indicated by the number in its title, this conference is the eighth in a series of academic events that reflect the ongoing concerns of the eponymous research group (Relational Forms), based at CETAPS (the Centre for English, Translation and Anglo-Portuguese Studies). The group’s rationale and remit entail that our conferences centrally address the cultures of Ireland and Britain – but we warmly welcome contributions bearing on other literary and artistic cultures.

The organisers will welcome proposals for 20-minute papers in English responding to the above.

Suggested (merely indicative) topics include:

• love and sex in literature and/or the arts – release and celebration;
• love and sex in literature and/or the arts – oppression and pathos;
• intimacy, creativity and repression: censorship;
• the ethics and politics of intimacy: private and public in literature and/or the arts;
• intimacy and the theatre: stage business;
• intimacy on screen: evolving ethics and aesthetics;
• intimacy and the politics of translation;
• intimacy and the politics of adaptation;
• intimacy and life writing;
• love, sex and museum cultures: the ethics and politics of exposure;
• love, sex and the evolving media: from print to digital platforms;

Submissions should be sent by email to relational@letras.up.pt

Please include RF8 in the subject line of your email and organise your proposal into two separate files:

• a file containing the full title and a 250-300 word description of your paper;
• a file containing the author’s data: name, affiliation, contact address, paper title and author’s bio-note (150 words).

Please name these two documents as follows:

• Surname_Name_Abstract_RF8
• Surname_Name_AuthorInfo_RF8

Deadline for proposals: 4 June 2023
Notification of acceptance: 15 June 2023
Deadline for registration: 20 September 2023
Registration Fee: 90 Euros
Student fee: 70 Euros
Registration details will be posted online in July 2023

All delegates are responsible for their own travel arrangements and accommodation.

More information available later at https://cetaps.wixsite.com/relationalforms8

Organised by the Relational Forms research area

Executive Committee:

• Rui Carvalho Homem (coord.)
• Jorge Bastos da Silva
• Miguel Ramalhete Gomes
• Jorge Almeida e Pinho
• Márcia Lemos
• Katarzyna Pisarska
• Mark Wakefield

For further queries please contact:

CETAPS – Centre for English, Translation and Anglo-Portuguese Studies – Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto – Via Panorâmica, s/n

4150-564 PORTO – PORTUGAL
relational@letras.up.pt

Supported by FCT through national funds on UIDB/04097/2020 project.