[Commlist] CFP: Against the Grain: The Ethics, Poetics and Politics of Contrarian Speech

*Against the Grain: The Ethics, Poetics and Politics of Contrarian Speech*


Symposium at the University of Amsterdam, *5*^*th* *– 7*^*th* *June 2019*


Keynote speakers: Sarah Clancy, Jim Hicks, Frank Keizer


*Deadline for proposals: 15*^*th* *April 2019*


Dates: The event will commence in the late afternoon of 5^th June and 
end by early afternoon of 7^th June


A collaboration of ‘Contemporary Poetry and Politics’ (FFI2016-77584-P), 
The Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, The Amsterdam Center for 
Globalization Studies, and the Netherlands Institute for Cultural Analysis.


Organizers: Cornelia Gräbner (Lancaster University), Joost de Bloois 
(University of Amsterdam).


Contrarianism gains momentum whenever a hegemony consolidates itself to 
such an extent that there is no longer space for the possibility of 
alternatives. The aims and the character of contrarian movements show 
themselves through the interplay of ethics, politics and poetics in 
concrete examples of contrarian speech and contrarian practices. With 
the symposium ‘Against the Grain: The Ethics, Poetics and Politics of 
Contrarian Speech’ we open up a space for the analytical exploration of 
this interplay, and for a sharing of practices that oppose both the 
/status quo/ of corporatism and neoliberalization, and the contrarian 
movements appropriating ‘free speech’ from the populist right, the 
alt-right, and neo-fascism.


Contrarianism can be a mode of getting to know the opponent from a 
committed position or perspective and, through this analytical practice, 
can produce dissident knowledges. Contrarianism can be a form of 
expression; in the face of a stifling hegemony, its poetics can nurture 
desires and open up new horizons. Contrarian practice can take many 
forms, among them opposition, resistance, dissent, non-cooperation, 
contestation, subversion, or sabotage. It can be practiced from within a 
system, from its margins, or from an outsider position. Today, 
contrarianism is also weaponized as a rhetorical strategy by political 
movements that seek to consolidate or radicalize existing power 
structures (be it regarding class, gender or race), or obfuscate their 
ruthless pursuit of their economic interests. The contrarian defiance of 
supposed ‘political correctness’ and the left-liberal ‘elite’ in no 
small measure has contributed to the success of such movements. This 
symposium, a collaboration between the research project ‘Contemporary 
Poetry and Politics’ (FFI2016-77584-P) and the University of Amsterdam, 
approaches contrarian speech by bringing together the poetic and the 
analytical, ethics and politics.


We specifically (but not exclusively) invite attention to the interplay 
of poetic and political sensibilities with discourses and practices of 
contrarian speech in the discussion of five thematic areas:


  *

    *Dissent, Disobedience and Free Speech*: We invite contributions
    that explore the notion of ‘free speech’ in contexts where free
    speech is turned into a means of pacification, or where it is
    weaponized against minorities or by economic elites against imagined
    cultural elites. What does ‘contrarian speech’ mean in such
    contexts, how might its boundaries be defined and set?

  *

    *Austerity and Precarity*: In the wake of the 2008 economic crisis
    and the subsequent ‘austerity’ measures that have been rolled out
    all over Europe, class differences and socio-economic precarity have
    increased substantially. Tremendous social suffering has been
    inflicted, and structural violence against vulnerable populations
    has been escalated, and the TINA (There Is No Alternative) ideology
    has strangulated the political imagination. The emergence of
    movements such as ‘Occupy, the Indignados or Nuit Debout indicates
    increasing resistance to neoliberal TINA (There Is No Alternative)
    ideology. We invite explorations of social justice and opposition to
    class privilege, contrarianism and right-wing populism, and even the
    alt-right and extreme right.

  *

    *Crisis: *Hand-in-hand with the creation and perpetuation of social
    and political crisis comes the resurgence of discourses of security
    which appropriate and manipulate fear. We invite critical analyses
    of such discourses, and the role of contrarian speech in opposing
    these, whereby the analyses account for the consequences of social
    injustice, legal and political surveillance, and precarization.

  *

    *Ecocriticism and Infrastructure*: We invite engagements with the
    ideologies of progress and modernity, with the practice of corporate
    power and the ideology of corporatism, with the ways in which
    infrastructures embed habituation and complacency into everyday life
    and perception, and with the expressions, practices and ecocritical
    approaches that go contrarian to it.

  *

    *Creative Criticism*: This practice of knowledge and of writing goes
    contrarian to the ever more stringent, restrictive, constraining,
    disciplinarian and secretly ideological practices of academic
    writing that are being imposed on academics. Creative criticism gets
    to know its opponent progressively and, while opposing and
    subverting them, creates ‘Other’ writing practices that subvert the
    binary of creativity and criticism and create space for dissident
    knowledges.

  *

    *Anti-Fascism, the Alt-Right, and Right-Wing Populism: *Anti-fascist
    movements and anti-fascist artists and cultural organizers have
    always had to go against two opponents at the same time: the
    right-wing, populist and /or fascist movements and individuals that
    go contrarian to the status quo, /and/ to a status quo that is often
    marked by social injustice, that is usually hostile to anti-fascists
    and often, tolerant of fascist and right-wing populist movements. We
    invite explorations of such doubly contrarian practices and
    explorations, as well as of the ways in which fascist movements, the
    Alt-Right and right-wing populism pose as contrarian to the /status
    quo/.


Contributions may cover (but are not limited to):

  *

    Contemporary political movements/events

  *

    Contemporary political art (i.e. poetry, literature, visual art, 
cinema)

  *

    Media representations of contrarian speech

  *

    Cultural/artistic representations of crisis/precarity/austerity

  *

    Ecocritical dissidence

  *

    Contrarianism, hegemony and conjuncture

  *

    Far-right discourse on/as contrarianism

  *

    Free speech, sexism and heteronormativity (i.e. online sexism and
    heteronormativity)

  *

    Media representations of ‘free speech’

  *

    Free speech, contrarianism and the construction/limits of the public
    sphere

  *

    ‘Contrarian’ and ‘free speech’ as political trope

  *

    Contrarianism as Foucauldian parreisia

  *

    Contrarianism, dissent and social media

  *

    Contrarianism and/as privilege

  *

    Contrarianism as noise

  *

    Class and contrarianism (i.e. class analysis, class struggle as
    contrarianism)

  *

    Artistic and philosophical/theoretical responses to free speech
    controversies

  *

    Contrarianism/free speech and anti-terrorism (i.e. Erri de Luca’s
    work, the ‘Tarnac affair’)

  *

    Free speech and racialized exclusion

  *

    Contrarianism and sabotage

  *

    Free speech, surveillance and contemporary governmentality

  *

    Artistic and creative practices of ‘contrarianism’

  *

    Poetry and crisis

  *

    Assembly as contrarian practice (i.e. Nuit debout, Occupy)

  *

    Contrarianism as ethics

  *

    Contrarianism as crisis discourse (i.e. ecocritical voices,
    eco-politics, movements concerning climate change/extinction)

  *

    Contrarianism and gender formation (i.e. on social media forums)

  *

    Contrarianism and negativity

  *

    Contrarianism as ethics of refusal and inoperativity

  *

    Contrarianism as affirmative ethics/politics

  *

    Contrarianism as -ism


*To submit a proposal please send a title, an abstract of 250 words and 
a short biography of 100 words by **15*^*th* *April to 
(dinolipoe /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(dinolipoe /at/ gmail.com)> *



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