[Wgcp-whc] WG/CP--last session, this Friday

[richard.deming at yale.edu]

Dear All--

In the fullness of time, I'll send a report recounting the terrific discussion
of last Friday, when the seminar was joined by digital poet John Cayley.


However, now  I'm just sending a note to remind people that this Friday we will
have our last session of the academic year.  The focus of this session will be
the newly published anthology Language for a New Century: Contemporary Poetry
from the Middle East, Asia, and Beyond.  We will be joined for a discussion of
this important collection by the editors Ravi Shankar (one of our members as
most people will recognize), Tina Chang, and Nathalie Handal.

Given the size of the collection (copies of which were distributed at our last
session,  it will be necessary to focus our reading, and so it would be best to
concentrate on the section "Slips and Atmospherics."  This would allow for the
discussion of ideas of innovation or newness versus
that of tradition in Middle Eastern and Asian poetics.

Following models of how we have discussed anthologies in the past, we might do
well to look closely at organization - how the book is put
together and what's gained/what lost by such an arrangement. A general question
that has also been offered is that of how "the East" (described in detail in
the Preface) is represented.  How might it inhere to certain expected notions
and ruptures other notions (especially in terms of its inclusion of Central
Asian poets when they might have closer roots to the
Slavic and Russian culture and language than anything typically Asian)?

The preface thus deserves particular attention as do the recurring editorial
interventions that occur throughout.

Give that so many of our group members are deeply invested in what constitutes
"the East" and Asian literature(s), this should be a very generative and
productive exchange.

An important note: the session will not be held at our usual room in the Whitney
Humanities Center.  It will be in Room 001, William L Harness Hall (100 Wall
Street).  However, it will be from 3-5, as usual.

Please feel free to extend invitations to anyone who might be interested in this
particular session.

cheers,
Richard Deming