Deadline for submissions: August 1, 2017
Full name/name of organization: Film and History
Contact email: smatheson@ucn.ca
CALL FOR PAPERS
Westerns: Where The Deer and The Antelope Play
An area of multiple panels for the 2017 Film & History Conference
Representing “Home”: The Real and Imagined Spaces of Belonging
The Hilton—Milwaukee City Center, Milwaukee, WI (USA)
November 1-5, 2017
EXTENDED DEADLINE for abstracts: August 1, 2017
In the Western, be it ever so humble—a teepee, a log cabin, a covered wagon, or a sod house—there is no place like home. Representations of “home,” quickly built, lovingly maintained, and often fiercely defended, reflect cultural ideals and refract complex ideologies—relaying stories of nations, ethnicities, genders and classes, technologies and economies in film as well as in television.
How can “home” be a memory or a destination for those travelling West? What about contested homes, as Native Americans defend tribal lands from white men who seek new homes of their own? In what ways is the absence of a home as important as its presence in the Western? How do we continue to think about gender roles in an ideological “home” where women often tend the home fires while cowboys feel more at home riding the range –and outlaws, of course, can never go home again?
This area, comprising multiple panels, welcomes papers on the subject of “home” in all aspects of Western film—from production and distribution to exhibition and reception. Possible topics include, but are certainly not limited to, the following:
* Heading for Home: The Covered Wagon, Westward The Women, Cheyenne Autumn, Meek’s Cutoff
* The Home Place: Shane, Bonanza, Little House on the Prairie, Unforgiven
* Home Sweet Home: Drums along the Mohawk, The Magnificent Seven, City Slickers
* Angels of the Western Hearth: Cat Ballou, Deadwood, Jane Got A Gun
* Returning and/or Leaving Home: The Searchers, Forsaken, Unforgiven, The Ballad of Little Jo
* Protecting Home and Hearth: The Sons of Katie Elder, The Outlaw Josey Wales, Hannie Calder, Home On The Range
* Home Studios for the Western: Warner Brothers, Twentieth Century Fox, Republic Pictures
* Homes for Westerns: Towns, Backlots and Locations: Melody Ranch, Old Tucson, Bronson Canyon, Monument Valley, Death Valley
Proposals for complete panels (three related presentations) are also welcome, but they must include an abstract and contact information, including an e-mail address, for each presenter. For updates and registration information about the upcoming meeting, see the Film & History website (www.filmandhistory.org).
Please e-mail your 200-word proposal to both of the area chairs:
Sue Matheson
University College of the North
smatheson@ucn.ca
Gaylyn Studlar
Washington University in St. Louis