Call for Papers: Special Session on “Dark Romantic Automata”
Organized by Chris Clason and Michael Demson
International Conference on Romanticism, October 20-23, 2016 (abstracts due May 25, 2016) Colorado Springs, Colorado
At the turn of the nineteenth century, ‘dark’ engineers – working at the intersection of artistic imagination and technological ‘progress’ – produced a number of automata, robots, and other simulations of life, both via literary conceptualization and in material realizations. While in some circles these developments were heralded as scientific advancement, in others dire warnings were sounded against such uncanny imitations of life – ‘horrid aberrations,’ the production of which evinced technological hubris, the arrogance of Enlightenment philosophy, and the vain attempt of science to supplant God and nature in the act of creation. Indeed, these manufactured monsters were sometimes taken as assaults upon human identity, psychology, and religion.
In line with the conference theme of “Dark Romanticism,” we are proposing a session of 15-20 minute papers on “Dark Romantic Automata,” to focus on the broadest possible interpretation of the title. We encourage submissions of 300-word abstracts by May 25, 2016 to Chris Clason clason@oakland.edu and Michael Demson mtd007@shsu.edu on this topic, including (but not limited to):
Automata in Romantic literature & art
The borders of life – human & mechanical
Romantic prostheses & the able-bodied
Ocular & auditory instruments: Romantic telescopes, eyeglasses, hearing aids
Devious puppets & dolls
Uncanny mechanisms
From Metropolis to Blade Runner and beyond: automata and Romanticism in film
Romanticism and science fiction
Automata, exhibitions and exhibiters
Animations & reanimations
The machinery of the theater
Musical automata, player pianos, Aeolian harps
Automata, Doppelgänger, & psychological responses
Automata & Romantic apocalypse
