Call for Papers: 2017 IBBY UK/NCRCL Conference

24th ANNUAL IBBY UK/NCRCL CONFERENCE

SATURDAY 11 NOVEMBER 2017

Centre for Literacy in Primary Education, London SE1 8QW.

Call for Papers

‘Happily Ever After: The Evolution of Fairy Tales Across Time and Cultures

The same fairy tales often appear across different cultures. How and why does this happen?

Should fairy tales be updated – or even subverted – to appeal to modern audiences?

How have fairy tales evolved as they’ve been retold across the centuries?

The conference will include keynote presentations by writers, publishers and academics. Proposals are welcomed for parallel sessions (lasting about 20 minutes) on any relevant issues from any period in the history of international children’s literature. These might include:

• variations in fairy tales across cultures
• campfires to apps – how fairy tales have been shared across time
• how fairy tales are viewed through a feminist lens
• whether fairy tales are inclusive for readers of all backgrounds
• the challenges that modern tellers of fairy tales face
• how fairy tales can challenge established storytelling tropes
• how to make an old story feel new

The deadline for proposals is July 31^st 2017. Please email an abstract of approximately 200 words (for a 20-minute paper), along with a short biography and affiliation to Ann Lazim of IBBY UK at annlazim@googlemail.com.

Please note that only six papers can be selected due to the smaller size of this year’s venue.

Details of past conferences can be found on the IBBY UK website at http://www.ibby.org.uk/ncrcl-conference.php

 

 

NCRCL Blog

This is the home of the NCRCL blog, where you will find news, updates and posts from members of the staff, students and alumni at the National Centre for Research in Children’s Literature (NCRCL) at Roehampton University in west London.  You can read more about our popular MA in Children’s Literature which is run on-site and through distance learning, as well as undergraduate teaching in children’s literature in both our English and the Creative Writing departments. Please feel free to comment with questions or thoughts.

NCRCL Open Day 2017

The annual NCRCL Open Day was held on Saturday 13th May 2017 at Digby Stuart College, University of Roehampton.

As usual, the Open Day was an exciting opportunity to meet new, current, and past students and staff over cupcakes, Danish pastries, cookies, tea, juice, and coffee. Apart from marvelling at displays of children’s literature treasures, staff publications, and poster presentations by current MA students, we also enjoyed fascinating talks by Zetta Elliott and Peter Hunt.

Zetta Elliott: “Inclusivity and Indie Authors: the Case for Community-Based Publishing”

Photograph via Zetta Elliot

Award-winning Canadian author and educator Zetta Elliott spoke of her experiences as an author published through both traditional publishing and self-publishing routes. She advocated for “organic writing”, which “originates within a particular community and emerges without outsider approval and/or interference”, and prioritises the welfare of the community over commercial success. The value of self-publishing for marginalised groups was underlined by Elliott pointing out bleak statistics related to white supremacy in the American publishing industry:

 

Infographic via Sarah Park

The First Issue of RoundTable

The first issue of RoundTable, the new postgraduate journal for academic and creative writing at the University of Roehampton, is now available online (open access)! The first issue focuses on the theme of journey and includes fascinating children’s literature-related content: a candid interview with Professor David Rudd, academic articles, a YA short story, and reviews! You can access the journal here.

The cover of the first issue

NCRCL PhD Day 2017

Rebecca Sutton, PhD student with the NCRCL, reports on her experience of our 2017 PhD Day, which she organised this year.

Illustration by Anne Malewski

The annual NCRCL PhD Day went ahead on Thursday 18th May in the pristine new Elm Grove Conference Centre at the University of Roehampton. It was a day of eight stimulating presentations by current PhD students and one soon-to-be PhD student. Here is an overview of the presentations, in the running order of the day, so you can get an idea of our current research projects:

• Rebecca Sutton: “Inside/Outside: Contested Space in Young Adult Literature set in Israel/Palestine”
• Sarah Pyke: “An “archive of me”: Constructing queer adult subjectivity through an oral history of adolescent reading”
• Aliona Yarova: “Narrating Humanity: Children’s Literature and Global Citizenship Education”
• Erica Gillingham: “Princesses and Hard Core Lady-Types Fall In Love: Pictorial Representations of Same-Sex Attraction in All Ages Comics”
• Sinéad Moriarty: “P-P-P Pick up a Penguin: Antarctic Penguin Stories for Children”
• Manuela Salvi: “The Secret School of the Mooning Guerrillas: a Creative Project on Children’s Fiction, Age Banding and Censorship”
• Anne Malewski: “Playing Adults: Camp Wildfire and KidZania”
• Emily Corbett: “Transgendered Identity and Bio-Social Determinism in Contemporary Young Adult Fiction”

It was exciting to share our research with each other and to see the sheer diverse nature of the research projects that we as the NCRCL research community are conducting, and to observe the passion, creativity, and academic rigor with which each project is being undertaken.  I felt very proud to be part of such an innovative and inspiring research group.

Two Memories of Fiction Events on Childhood Reading Experiences

Illustration via Quentin Blake

Welcome to these two Memories of Fiction project events!

Memories of Children’s Books

Wednesday 31st May 2017

6.30 to 8 p.m.

Putney Library

Shelley Trower, lecturer at the University of Roehampton and project leader of Memories of Fiction: An Oral History of Readers’ Life Stories, and Ferelith Hordon, children’s librarian and editor, will lead a discussion of the items in the Wandsworth collection of Early Children’s Books. The collection will be on display, and the discussion will focus on memories of children’s books, especially as material objects: their covers, their smells, their feel. Please bring memories (or even physical copies) of a children’s book you remember reading!

This event is free, and refreshments will be available. All welcome!

You can read more about this event, and register for it here.

Our Lives in Libraries

Wednesday 7th June 2017

6.30 to 8 p.m.

Balham Library

Shelley Trower, lecturer at the University of Roehampton and project leader of Memories of Fiction: An Oral History of Readers’ Life Stories, and Alison Barton, librarian and book group facilitator, will discuss memories of libraries and what they mean to us, ranging from childhood to the present, from book groups to cuts and hopes for the future. In preparation for the event, please have a think about a visit you remember making to a library!

This event is free, and refreshments will be available. All welcome!

You can read more about this event, and register for it here.

These events are part of the Wandsworth Heritage Festival and supported by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. If you can’t make it to these events, Memories of Fiction welcome any comments on their blog.

RoundTable Journal Launch

Welcome to the launch of RoundTable, the English and Creative Writing Department’s new postgraduate journal:

RoundTable is a peer-reviewed journal which actively promotes original and imaginative work by postgraduates and early career researchers within the fields of Children’s Literature, Creative Writing, and English Literature. RoundTable is invested in fostering a postgraduate community committed to research and practice beyond discipline boundaries.

Bookings for the NCRCL Open Day!

NCRCL Open Day

Saturday 13th May 2017 | 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Duchesne Building, Ground Floor, Digby Stuart Campus

Welcome to the National Centre for Research in Children’s Literature’s spring event for MA/PG Dip and PhD students past, present, and future! The Open Day is an opportunity to meet the NCRCL team over tea and cakes, celebrate current research, and hear fantastic speakers.

We are delighted to announce that award-winning Canadian author and educator Zetta Elliott, an advocate for greater diversity and equity in publishing, and distinguished children’s literature critic Peter Hunt, the first Professor of Children’s Literature in the UK, will be joining us this year.

Current students and alumni are all warmly invited as is anyone curious about the work of the NCRCL, and anyone interested in applying to the MA/PG Dip in Children’s Literature, or undertaking doctoral research at the NCRCL!