The Second Annual

English Graduate Conference on Literature

Brewer-Hegeman Conference Center

April 10-11, 2008

“The play’s the thing”:

Drama and Performance

in America and the World

Sponsored by the University of Central Arkansas

Department of English Graduate Students

Thursday, April 10

Refreshments and Registration

8:15-8:45, Conference Room 2, BHCC

Welcome

8:45, Conference Room 5AB, BHCC

Maurice Lee, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts

Matt Chiorini, Artistic Director of the Arkansas Shakespeare Theatre

SESSION ONE

9:30 – 10:45

Panel 1:  “Binding our Desires”: Self-Worth and Deferred Dreams in Modern Drama

Conference Room 1, BHCC

Moderator:  Dr. Wayne Stengel

“Sex and Woman’s Worth:  Reconciling Self with Self in Edward Albee’s Three Tall Women”

Jeanette Holland, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Walter Younger and the American Dream”

David Nickell, Department of English, Arkansas Tech University

“Dancing around the Speech Act:  Kristeva’s ‘Bounded Text’ within Soyinka’s Mise-en-Abime”

Gretchen Tressler, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Panel 2:  Archetypes and Phallicies: Gender Constructs in Literature

Conference Room 4A, BHCC

Moderator:  Dr. Jay Ruud

“Breaking the Archetypal Mold:  Power and Submission in Zora Neale Hurston’s ‘Sweat’”

Aubrey Pangle, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“‘Come on Baby, Light My Fire’: Cigarette Smoking and Phallic Imagery in Clear Light of Day”

Katie Bruich, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

SESSION TWO

11:00 –12:00

Panel 3:  Romantic Values and Victorian Desires: Fairy Tales, Romances, and Wilde

Conference Room 1, BHCC

Moderator: Dr. Jim Fowler

“Oscar Wilde: Writing For a Victorian World”

Anna Nath, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Escaping Experience: The Cycle of Organized Innocence in The Blithedale Romance”

Whitney Jones, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“A Muted Call to Activism: Dinah Maria Mulock Craik’s The Little Lame Prince and His Travelling Cloak.”

Jerrica Ryan, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Panel 4: Breaking Down Barriers: Feminine Voices Far and Near

Conference Room 4A, BHCC

Moderator: Katie Evans

“I am Woman, Here Me Cry:  Bishop’s Gender Performances ‘In the Waiting Room’”

Ashley Byrd, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Behind the Veil: Images of Hijab”

Justin Tinsley, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Can a Woman Speak… or The Voices of the ‘Other’ in Greek Tragedy”

Irina Strout, Department of English, University of Tulsa

LUNCH (On Your Own)  12:00 – 1:30 p.m.

SESSION THREE

1:30 – 2:45 p.m.

Panel 5:  Creative Performance in Poetry, Fiction and Drama

Conference Room 1, BHCC

Moderator:   Dr. Charles Bane

“When You Grew Up ”

Jerrica Ryan, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Traces”

Paulette Bane, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Drama and the Short Story:  How I Used Drama to Create ‘Hero Girl and the Sno-cone Man’”

Monica Hooper, Department of English, Arkansas State University

Panel 6: “An Awareness of Worth”: Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye

Conference Room 4A, BHCC

Moderator:   Dr. Jeff Johnson

“Laughing at Power:  Morrison, Cixous, and the Whores”

Linda Bessette, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“The Beautiful Dandelion”

Kelly Graham, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Writing the Body in The Bluest Eye”

Leisl Sackschewsky, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

SESSION FOUR

3:00 – 4:00

Panel 7: Street Sc(r)eens: Post-Modern Performance

Conference Room 1, BHCC

Moderator:   Dr. Michael Schaefer

“Photos and Paintings in Auster’s The Invention of Solitude”

Thomas O’Banion, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“‘Lana Turner’ and ‘Collapse’:  Frank O’Hara and the Spectacle of Mass Media”

Jackson Meazle, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Post-Modernity and Street Theater:  The Question of Frame Analysis”

Phillip Huddleston, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Panel 8:  “Come on Down!”: Religion and Faith in the Post-Modern World

Conference Room 4A, BHCC

Moderator:  Dr. Dwayne Coleman

“Faith and Sight in Randall Kenan’s A Visitation of Spirits”

Holly Threm, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Religion in the Age of Advertisement”

Leisl Sackschewsky, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Dinner – Mike’s Place 5:00 – 7:00

William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night: Reynolds Performance Hall, 7:30

Friday, April 11

SESSION FIVE

9:30 – 10:45

Panel 9:  Love or Marraige? Justice or Revenge? - Confusing Concepts in Tudor-Stuart Drama

Conference Room 4A BHCC

Moderator:   Dr. Raymond Frontain

“Love and Marraige in The Duchess of Malfi, 'Tis a Pity She’s a Whore, and Women Beware Women”

Carolyn Harder, Department of English, Hendrix College

“The Relationship Between Justice and Revenge in The Duchess Malfi, The Jew of Malta, and The Spanish Tragedy”

Alana Buie, Department of English, Hendrix College

“The Deterioration of Justice in Revenge Tragedies: 'Tis a Pity She’s a Whore, Women Beware Women, and The Jew of Malta”

Kathryn A. Kirk, Department of English, Hendrix College

Panel 10:  Shaking It Up: Bringing the Bard into the 21st Century

Conference Room 4B, BHCC

Moderator:   Dr. Paige Reynolds

“Truthfully Mad: Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night”

Amanda Cooper, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Henry V: The Rhetoric of War”

Amanda Rossman, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

“Gender, Agency, and the Function of ‘Witchspace’ in Macbeth

Tim Sisk, Department of English, University of Tennessee

10:45 – 11:45

Roundtable Discussion: “Performing Shakespeare”

Conference Room 4B, BHCC

Matt Chiorini, Artistic Director of the Arkansas Shakespeare Theatre

Paige Reynolds, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Jay Ruud, Department of English, University of Central Arkansas

Read about last year's conference in the Summer 2007 issue of The Graduate.

  English Department

  Irby Hall

  210 Donaghey Ave.

  UCA

  Conway, AR 72035