Abstract deadline: 18th December 2017
Notification of acceptance: 25th December 2017
Deadline for full paper submission for conference: 15th January 2018
Conference Date: 13th March 2018
Arrival: 12th March 2018
The Nizami Ganjavi International is seeking paper, panel and roundtable proposals for an interdisciplinary conference to be held at the Nizami Ganjavi Centre, Baku, Azerbaijan on 13th March, 2018. We are looking for presentations within the broad topic of the interpretation of cultural heritage in the recent stage(s) of history based on the example of Nizami’s poetry. The topic encompasses questions of identity in cultural heritage: for example, the interaction of new identities with existing identities or the change in the parameters of identity over time – from the criterion of ethnicity to that of the state, from religion to language.
The conference aims to cover both theoretical and practical aspects of the topic, such as the criteria for the national attribution of literature and culture, irredentism, shared cultural past, and the aesthetics of Nizami’s poetry. We encourage consideration of irredenta within the literary-cultural framework rather than the political one, both from the point of view of the metropolis, and the peripheries, including in post-socialist countries, and Canadian Quebec, Belgium, from local and global perspectives. We welcome papers on all areas relevant to the topic, viewed through various spatial and temporal prisms, and from participants from different backgrounds, with special focus on the following topics:
- Regional motifs, symbols in Nizami’s literary work (recycling cultures in literature, Khizr, the reversed love story of Shamash and Enkidu)
- Ethical and philosophical values in Nizami’s literary heritage
- Folklore elements and esoteric symbols; common elements and symbols
- Islamic and regional elements
- Nizami and his contemporaries
- Nizami’s influence on modern literature (e.g. Ptisin’s “Khosrov and Shirin”, Khlebnikov’s “Medlum and Leyli”)
- Collapsing countries, transitional periods and new approaches to cultural and national identity
- Shared pasts, irredentism and new approaches to classical heritage
- Splitting identities, migration and the rethinking of new identities
- Established identities: between classical culture and folklore
- Criteria for the identity of literary and cultural heritage
- Interpretation and re-interpretation of the past based on the example of Nizami’s heritage
Paper proposals (no more than 150-word abstract for a paper to last 15 minutes, brief CV, contact information) should be sent by 18th December 2017 to: rahilya_g@hotmail.com
Prof. Dr. Rahilya Geybullayeva
Founding Head of Azerbaijani Comparative Literature Association
Head of the Azerbaijani Literature Department
Baku Slavic University
S. Roustam str., 25
Baku, Az-1014, Azerbaijan
Tel.: + 99 412 597 04 19
