PEOPLE ON THE MOVE AND NOSTALGIA

IN HISTORICAL PICTUREBOOKS

 

The unprecedented refugee crisis Europe is currently experiencing, when thousands of refugees flee away from their war-torn countries, is not the only one mankind has witnessed. Throughout human history, people have time and again been forced to flee their homes due to dire political, social, and economic conditions. The pain for the lost homeland is a common feeling experienced by people living in the diaspora, and nostalgia usually accompanies those who abandon their homes in hope of a secure future. The effects of physical and emotional displacement on those who “have been othered geographically” (Nel, 2018: 358) or culturally are multifarious.

   

Nostalgia is experienced not only by those who abandon their homes out of necessity, such as refugees and asylum seekers, but also by persons who choose voluntary exile, such as travelers, adventurers, itinerants, or emigrants. In addition, nostalgia is not confined to those who themselves fled away from their homes, but it also occurs, as an inter- and cross-generational phenomenon, among their descendants who might also feel the longing for the lost homeland. Private or collective (Davis 1979), restorative or reflective (Boym, 2001), nostalgia generates a bittersweet affective clash; from joy derived from the object of longing to brooding melancholy, as a result of irreversibility. Especially today and, thanks to technology, nostalgia “can be fed forever by quick access to an infinitely recyclable past” (Hucheon &  Valdés, 1999: 20). Nostalgia implies a burning desire for a place and also a longing for past times, even for one’s idealized childhood, based not only on slippery memory, but also on creative imagination. According to Boym, nostalgia, defined as “a longing for a home that no longer exists or has never existed” (2001: 7), tends to confuse the real home with its imaginary counterpart.

​

Nostalgia is a common topic addressed in children’s books about people on the move. Yet, the focus of this conference is on nostalgia in historical picturebooks, which record the diasporas of people in specific temporal and spatial contexts. Nostalgia is explored in picturebooks not only as a topic, but also as a mode created both verbally and visually; through narrative elements, such as metaphors, analepses or intertextuality, and through visual stylistics, such as vagueness, sepia, or black and white photographs, which combine a nostalgic view with the attempt “to convey an authentic description of contemporary everyday life” (Kümmerling-Meibaue, 2018:162). In this conference we look into historical picturebooks on people on the move that experience nostalgia, ‘a bittersweet longing for former times and spaces’ (Niemeyer 2014, 1).

​

We invite papers related to the conference theme. Possible areas for investigation include, but are not restricted to:

 

• History and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

  • Certain historical situations, e.g. the current age of mass immigration and displacement

  • Temporal and spatial aspects of nostalgia

• Nostalgia and gender in historical picturebooks

• Nostalgia and childhood in historical picturebooks

• Memory and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

  • Memorative signs that trigger nostalgia, such as Proust’s famous Μadeleine cake

  • Authenticity and nostalgia

• Verbal and visual strategies for expressing nostalgia in historical picturebooks

• Paratexts and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

• Personal and impersonal nostalgia in historical picturebooks

  • Individual and collective nostalgia

  • Nostalgia related/unrelated to one’s personal past

• Ideology and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

  • Nostalgic longings and social and political transformations

• Nostalgia in different kinds of picturebooks (e.g. nonfiction books, wordless, postmodern)

• Nostalgia and re-negotiation of identity in historical picturebooks

• Symbolism and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

• Reimagining the past, present, and future through nostalgia in historical picturebooks

• Minority communities and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

• Comparative approaches to nostalgia in picturebooks across different countries/communities/cultures/languages

 

Please, send a short abstract (500 words maximum), and a short bio (no more than 100 words) in two separate attached word files to Nostalgia.conference@hotmail.com by 28/02/2022.

 

The email subject line should read as follows: People on the move and nostalgia in historical picturebooks

 

Abstracts should include the following information:

​

• Affiliation as it should appear in the program

• Email address

• The title of the proposal

• The text of the proposal

• Selected bibliography of no more than 2-4 academic references

• 3-5 keywords

 

Conference language

English

 

Important dates

Deadline for abstract submission: 15/01/2022

Notification of acceptance: 01/ 04/2022

Conference: 24-25/09/2022

 

Conference fees

The conference is free of charge

 

Paper presentation

Presentation of papers should not exceed 20 minutes

 

​