CFP Issue #67 of The Velvet Light Trap: Seeing Race: Our Enduring Dilemma
"You lie!" Rep. Joe Wilson shouted during President Barack Obama's
speech on health care reform in the halls of Congress. Media pundits
were quick to point out that the 19th century was the last occasion
of such an egregious breach of protocol took place in Congress.
Members of both Houses urged the Republican congressman from South
Carolina to apologize for his misconduct--and he did. Soon after,
though, the discourse shifted to the reasons for Wilson's outburst.
The factor of
race became one major point in attributing blame, but that fire was
never allowed to flame because of the overwhelmingly hegemonic
ideology of colorblindness that currently saturates our culture.
This same story could be told in relation to the nomination of
Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the pop culture firestorm
that singed Isaiah Washington and the cast of Grey's Anatomy, or the
discourses surrounding First Lady Michelle Obama's hair. The notion
that we cannot talk about race unless it is specifically and clearly
identified as such in media and culture-at-large is as implicitly
understood as is the notion of "one nation under God"--and it is
just as powerful. And yet, although we claim to be blind to the
markers of external and cultural difference, we always "see" race.
Issue #67 of The Velvet Light Trap will explore all the varied ways
that we "see" race in television, film and new media. While the
editors maintain a broad definition of "seeing race," special
consideration will be given toward articles that interrogate the
nexus of racial visibility as a sociocultural fact and/or color
blindness as an ideological practice. Whether papers approach seeing
race as a discursive category, a commercial commodity, and/or an
object of consumption, the editors anticipate submissions that
connect these strategies to the historical, industrial, political,
and cultural factors that underpin a society's values.
Possible Topics include, but are not limited to:
Seeing Race in War
Spectacle
Production Cultures
Race and Genre
Race in Political Media
Race and Gender Intersectionality in Media
Papers should be between 6,000 and 7,500 words (approximately 20-25
pages double-spaced), in MLA style with a cover page including the
writer's name and contact information.
Please send one copy of the paper (including a one-page abstract
with each copy) and one electronic copy saved as a
Word .doc file in a format suitable to be sent to a reader
anonymously. The journal's Editorial Advisory Board will referee all
submissions.
For
more information or questions, contact Andrew Scahill at
adscahill_at_mail.utexas.edu. Hard copy submissions are due January
30, 2010, and should be sent to:
The Velvet Light Trap, c/o The Department of Radio-Television-Film,
University of Texas at Austin, CMA 6.118, Mail Code A0800, Austin, TX, 78712
The electronic copy submission is also due on January 30, 2010 and
should be sent to Andrew Scahill at (adscahill /at/ mail.utexas.edu).
The Velvet Light Trap is an academic, peer-reviewed journal of film
and television studies. Graduate students at the University of
Wisconsin-Madison and the University of Texas-Austin alternately
coordinate issues. The Editorial Advisory Board includes such
notable scholars as Charlie Keil, Dan Marcus, David Desser, David
Foster, Michele Malach, Joe McElhaney, Beretta Smith-Shomade, Jason
Mittell, Malcolm Turvey, James Morrison, Tara McPherson, Steve
Neale, Aswin Punathambekar, Peter
Bloom, Sean Griffin, and Michael Williams.
