Symposium: Writing, Reading, Rioting
Writing, Reading, Rioting
Political Violence, Revolution and Reaction from the Eighteenth Century to the Present
FREE EVENT - REGISTRATION NOW OPEN
2019 marks two hundred years since the ‘Peterloo massacre’, when cavalry charged a peaceful pro-democracy rally at St Peter’s Field in Manchester. This anniversary offers us an opportunity to look back on the interchanges between text, protest, and repression in the Revolutionary Age, and to bring this historical period into dialogue with the present, where forces of revolution, reaction and resistance continue to be mediated through text: pamphlet warriors have their twenty-first-century counterparts in the media and Twittersphere; rhetorical violence spills over into the streets. Indeed, in the past and present, violence may be used to smother ideas, but it can also promote them; swords, like pens, can be harnessed as a means of communication, with diverse, often horrific, results. Violence of expression, violence against expression, violence as expression: this symposium concerns itself with the porous boundaries between figurative and literal violence – with writing, reading, and rioting the riot.
KEYNOTE SPEAKER: PROFESSOR STEPHEN BYGRAVE, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON
As well as a keynote address from Professor Bygrave, this one-day symposium will feature papers on such topics as:
REVOLUTIONARY VIOLENCE AND REVOLUTIONARY WRITING
THE ‘MOB’
RHETORICAL USES OF VIOLENCE FROM THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY TO TODAY
LITERARY RESPONSES TO VIOLENT EVENTS
TRAUMA, FRAGILITY, AFFECT, MEMORY
Ideally this will be an occasion for discussion, and we particularly want to welcome and encourage those interested in the theme but not wishing to give papers to come along. Attendance is free - however, please RSVP to ER-CC@unimelb.edu.au with your dietary requirements for catering purposes.