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The Work in Progress (W.I.P) Conference of the School of English, Media Studies and Art History, the University of Queensland, is an annual inter-disciplinary conference for post-graduate students in the Humanities and Social Sciences. This year submissions for papers are also invited from recent graduates and post-doctoral fellows. The conference is now in its seventh year and in the past it has hosted speakers from all fields of the Humanities and Social Sciences including literature, cultural studies, history, philosophy, Australian studies, sociology, psychology, education, religious studies, media studies, art history, politics, and so on. WIP is open to all post-graduate students and has in recent years attracted presenters from all over Australia. The aim of WIP is to provide a forum for post-graduate researchers to deliver professional presentations in a supportive and stimulating environment. This Year's ThemeThe theme for this year's WIP is progress itself. Progress not only implies a future, it assumes a past. If we are going somewhere, it is because we have already been somewhere else, and caught between the origin and the telos, we must not only look to what is to come, but make sense of what is behind. As postgraduates and researchers, much of what we do can be called a "work in progress": whether it is the unfinished thesis, the multiplying research interests, or the increasingly distant jobs to which we aspire. The acquisition of knowledge is not a short apprenticeship, characterised by something called "research training" but a process that lasts for a lifetime, leading in directions that can be unexpected at the outset. And it is not only in our academic work, but also in our social lives, our relationships, and our recreation, that we want to make progress. So we talk about "progressive politics," "progressive taxation systems," "progressive rock music," and so on. We want to progress the cause, and not stand in the way of progress. Small towns have "Progressive Associations," and the police lament their inability to progress the investigation. Then of course there are the myths of progress: social Darwinism and excelsior evolution; technophilic triumphantism; and the imperative of economic growth. And let's not forget what we tell our supervisors in our annual progress reports. We invite submissions that deal in any way with one or more of the themes that are raised by the term "progress." Papers should be of 20 minutes duration, and we are happy to consider panels of two or three presenters. Abstracts (200 words maximum) should reach the organisers by 30 June 2002, preferrably in electronic form. All presenters should consult the guidelines for presentation. Print this Call-for-Papers: MS Word Format [21Kb] or Rich Text Format [6Kb]. |
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Contact details for abstracts and other information:
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