[Commlist] CFP: Playfulness - Interdisciplinary Approaches to Cultural Literacy

*Call for Papers for 5-minute presentations*

PLAYFULNESS Interdisciplinary Approaches to Cultural Literacy

A Virtual Symposium

Thursday 13th – Friday 14th May 2021

Ask busy children what they’re doing and they’ll say ‘I’m playing’. Ask 
an adult and they will be playing the piano, the fool, or a video game. 
While playfulness forms an integral part of cultural expression and 
communication, its interpretation often depends on cultural expectations 
and limited interdisciplinary research can be found on the aesthetics of 
playfulness, or its role in intercultural communication. For D W 
Winnicott, playfulness takes place in the area between inside (self) and 
the outside (other/wider cultural experiences) in an intermediate, 
transitional area. Melanie Klein and Anna Freud both pioneered their own 
ways of utilizing children’s playfulness within the psychotherapeutic 
setting as a way of accessing unconscious processes.

Kant’s definition of art as ‘purposeless purposiveness’ sites it at 
exactly the point where play & seriousness meet. The reification of play 
occurs when ambiguity, humour & laughter, irony or satire, are deployed 
in music, literary or visual culture to achieve specific aims (eg. to 
critique or lampoon extreme or repressive regimes) - for example 
Molière’s play Le bourgeois gentilhomme, or Buñuel’s film Cet obscur 
objet du désir), or in postmodern resistance as formulated in Jacques 
Derrida’s concept of “play” and Jean Baudrillard’s “simulacra”, or to 
counteract the rigidity of institutions and systems —see for example 
Pippa Hale’s recent work “Play Rebellion” (2018). The search for meaning 
in a chaotic world is eschewed, often playfully, and the postmodern 
medium becomes a parody of this quest. ‘Play’ then also becomes a 
powerful form of political resistance—of displacing hegemonic narratives 
not for the purpose of creating something new, but to destroy and reveal 
the constructed nature of what previously existed.

The act of ‘objectless’, or intransitive playfulness, and its 
experiential dimension, however, remain largely unexplored. One example 
of such ‘play’ can be found in Zen Buddhism, as expressed in the arts of 
the Japanese Edo period and in the visual culture of the Japanese Design 
Movement of the late 1970s and ‘80s. Another example is the acting 
method developed by Oleksandr Tokarchuk at his school of creative acting 
in Kyiv, summed up by the phrase “conducting your self” (written as two 
separate words). Playfulness, then, becomes part of the artistic 
personality, when the real world is understood as a theatre stage and 
its decor.

In a world of increasingly transcultural and transmedial forms of 
expression, exploring notions of playfulness in their socio-cultural 
context offers an approach to cultural literacy which can arguably 
foster intercultural understanding in a manner less readily accessible 
than through purely experiential means. At the same time, experimenting 
with the process and aesthetics of playfulness, facilitated by instant 
communication technologies, which cross-fertilise between ages, cultures 
and media with remarkable resilience (eg. surrealism), can also offer 
valuable insights in fostering intercultural literacy. The aim of this 
conference, therefore, is to invite scholars from a wide range of 
backgrounds and interests to engage in thoughtful and critical 
discussion around the multiple manifestations of playfulness and their 
contributions to cultural literacy.

PROPOSALS ON ANY OF THE FOLLOWING – OR ALLIED – TOPICS ARE WELCOME:

  * The aesthetics and/or philosophy of playfulness
  * Diversity or inclusivity and intersectionality of playfulness
  * The role of playfulness in interdisciplinary collaboration or education
  * Playfulness and experimental translation
  * The role of playfulness in stimulating new ways of thinking in
    cultural literacy
  * Playfulness in and out of the psychoanalytic consulting room
  * Playfulness in media, literature, the visual and performing
    artspage2image25036864

This two-day online Symposium is designed to generate active discussion, 
focusing on thinking and talking rather than formal presentations, using 
simple online platforms and apps to foster a virtual experience. If your 
proposal is accepted, it will be included in a digital ‘book of 
presentations’ that all participants will be asked to read in advance of 
the Symposium. The contributions will be grouped together into parallel 
break-out sessions of 90 minutes during which each presenter will 
briefly summarise their points in a presentation of max 5 minutes & 
three slides, and the subsequent discussion will aim to explore the key 
theme of the panel.

You are invited to submit a proposal in English for a 5-minute 
presentation. It should consist of your name, affiliation, email 
address, title, a 300-word statement on any area of the symposium topic 
and a mini-biography (max. 300 words).

Please submit your abstract and bio by filling in the form using the 
link provided below by the *deadline of noon GMT on Sunday 6 December 
2020*. Proposals that arrive after this date will not be considered.

https://forms.gle/e9Kr6agRiPEUvoFy5Submit your propos 
<https://forms.gle/e9Kr6agRiPEUvoFy5>al here

page2image25047424
A number of bursaries will be available to support attendance at the 
2021 symposium. The competition for these bursaries will be announced in 
mid-December 2020, with a closing-date in early January 
2021.page2image25079232

Prior membership of CLE is required; become a 
member:https://cleurope.eu/membership/sign-up-for-membership/ 
<https://cleurope.eu/membership/sign-up-for-membership/>

CONFERENCE FEES

Standard £50 Students (+ ID)/ Unwaged £20

Registration will open on 18 December 2020 & close on 26 March 2021

For more info on CLE see the website: www.cle.world <https://cleurope.eu>


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