Symposium in Glasgow, September 2009

NEW IMPULSES IN PICTUREBOOK RESEARCH
‘Beyond Borders: Art, narrative and culture in picturebooks’
18-20 September 2009

The 2nd Symposium in Glasgow will include presentations that provide a new focus for research and scholarship through questions of what it means to go beyond borders in art, narrative and culture in picturebooks. This will act as a unifying theme for the two strands that were developed in Barcelona: the literary/artistic approach and the audience/child response approach. It also reflects the intercultural ethos of the symposium.

As well as presentations by most of the expert scholars who attended the 1st Symposium, we will be welcoming a number of new speakers whom we are sure will significantly contribute to the ongoing discussions. Among the list of 25 speakers are: Sandra Beckett, Teresa Duran, Barbara Kiefer, Bettina Kummerling-Meibauer, Maria Nikolajeva, Perry Nodelman, Martin Salisbury, Morag Styles, Sophie Van der Linden and Jean Webb.

This year, the Symposium will also provide a forum for the dissemination of the research by the teams participating in the Visual Journeys Project. This international project involves children from different parts of the world responding to the same wordless picturebooks which deal with the themes of journeys, migration and the power of the visual image itself. Speakers from the USA, Spain and Australia will be participating in this panel.

We are also proud to announce that the renowned Scottish artist, Mairi Hedderwick, author of the famous Katie Morag picturebooks will be talking about her work during the Symposium.
There will be an opportunity to see an exhibition of Scottish picturebooks and children’s literature in the University Library, as well as of some of the books that will be discussed in the Symposium. Several publishers will be bringing their books to the event.

In addition, there will also be a space provided for postgraduate students to meet and form their own research network.

Given that the aim is for participants to be able to attend most presentations, numbers will have to be limited, so please send your registration form as soon as you receive it.

The venue will be the Faculty of Education which is situated in the West End of Glasgow, an area famous for its shops and restaurants. It is within walking distance of the Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum (which houses one of the finest collections in Europe), the Charles Rennie McIntosh House, the Huntingdon Museum and Art Gallery and the main buildings of the University of Glasgow itself. It is also within easy access of the town centre and shopping areas.

Participants will be invited to a drinks reception at the Glasgow City Chambers, kindly hosted by the Lord Provost of Glasgow.

We will be sending out details of registration and moderately priced hotels and B&Bs not far from the Faculty and you will be able to make a booking for these through the registration form.
The main language of the symposium will be English. We are sorry but we will not be able to provide interpretation services.

We would ask you to please forward this information to other colleagues who might be interested in attending.

For information or questions, please contact:

Dr Evelyn Arizpe
Department of Curriculum Studies
Faculty of Education
St Andrew’s Building
11 Eldon Street, Glasgow G3 6NH
Tel: 0141 330 1920 Fax: 0141 330 3012
Email: e.arizpe@educ.gla.ac.uk