Fwd: CFP: Global Mythologies and World Cinemas (edited collection)

[Aaron Gerow]

Begin forwarded message:
>
>
> Apologies for Cross-posting:
>
> *Global Mythology and World Cinema*
>
> A proposed edited collection by Mikel J. Koven (University of  
> Worcester)
>
> m.koven at worc.ac.uk
>
>
>
> *Global Mythology and World Cinema* will be a collection of essays  
> which
> discuss how a variety of world cinemas use their own indigenous  
> cultural
> mythologies. The *function* of these myths and their filmic  
> counterparts
> will vary from culture-to-culture and from film-to-film. The  
> collection will
> argue against the extant paradigm of “mythic cinema”, wherein the term
> “myth,” co-opted by Jungians and Campbellians, refers to any vague  
> perceived
> universal archetype.  This collection will be about cultural  
> specificity,
> not universal generalizations, regarding the sacred and how that  
> sacred is
> manifested in world cinema.
>
>
>
> In terms of a definition of “myth”, *Global Mythology and World
> Cinema*begins with William Bascom’s 1965 definition (in “The Forms of
> Folklore:
> Prose Narratives” in *Journal of American Folklore* 78: 3-20) and  
> builds
> from there. Bascom defined myths as “prose narratives which, in the  
> society
> in which they are told, are considered to be truthful accounts of what
> happened in the remote past”. Bascom continues,
>
> They are accepted on faith; they are taught to be believed; and they  
> can be
> cited as authority in answer to ignorance, doubt, or disbelief.  
> Myths are
> the embodiment of dogma; they are usually sacred; and they are often
> associated with theology and ritual. Their main characters are not  
> usually
> human beings, but they often have human attributes; they are animals,
> deities, or culture heroes, whose actions are set in an earlier  
> world, when
> the earth was different from what it is today, or in another world  
> such as
> the sky or underworld. (4)
>
> While *Global Mythology and World Cinema* will not be limited to  
> Bascom’s
> definition, we use it here to make that distinction between the  
> current
> project and how other scholars have used the word “myth”, often in  
> the same
> generalized and universalized way that Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell  
> have.
> This current project seeks to rescue the genre from its use to refer  
> to
> (imagined) archetypes, and welcomes opportunities to bridge the
> anthropological and folkloric definitions with more cultural studies
> approaches (i.e. Levi-Strauss and Barthes).
>
>
>
> We seek in-depth papers (approximately between 8000-10, 000 words)  
> exploring
> the indigenous mythic visions from the following cultural groups’  
> cinemas:
>
> ·         Japanese cinema
>
> ·         Chinese cinema
>
> ·         Korean cinema
>
> ·         Polynesian and South East Asian cinemas
>
> ·         Oceanic cinemas (i.e. Maori and Australian Aborigine)
>
> ·         Indian cinemas
>
> ·         African cinemas (from many regions and groups)
>
> ·         Middle-Eastern and Arab cinemas
>
> ·         and the cinemas and mythologies of Native Ameicans
>
> Other topics may also be suggested; the above list is intended as
> illustrative, not definitive.
>
>
>
> While an academic publisher has been approached, and interest in the
> collection has been expressed, we are not yet at the stage to request
> abstracts: We are currently looking for statements of “interest”.
>
>
>
> If you have an idea which you would like to be considered for  
> inclusion in
> this book, please email Mikel J. Koven (m.koven at worc.ac.uk) with a  
> brief
> (informal) description of what you would like to write on by 31  
> October
> 2010. The deadline for formal abstracts (200-words) will be a few  
> months
> later, and final papers would not need to be submitted until January  
> 2012.
>
> -- 
> Mikel J. Koven
> Sed quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
> - Juvenal (Satires VI)

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