CFP for 2018 MLA 4H: History, Hamilton, & Hip hop in High School

Here's the paper call for the session I'm chairing at MLA in 2018.

CFP for 2018 MLA

4H:History, Hamilton, & Hip hop in High School

2018 MLA Conference, New York City, January 4-7, 2018

Session sponsored by MLA’s Children & Young Adult Literature Forum

This session will examine the range of innovative informational texts and historical fictions that introduce young adult readers to significant events and figures in American history and culture in innovative formats. The session will consider creative texts that move beyond the traditional, and sometimes dull textbook approach, to reimagine American history and attempt to reach young adult readers/viewers in nontraditional ways. Possible texts might include, but are not limited to, the cast recording of Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Hamilton; John Lewis, Andrew Aydin, and Nate Powell’s March trilogy; Kate Schatz’s Rad American Women A-Z; Don Brown’s Drowned City; Carole Boston Weatherford’s Voice of Freedom: Fannie Lou Hamer; Derek Waters’s Drunk History; and John and Hank Green’s Crash Course YouTube Channel. The session will appraise the multiple methods that contemporary writers and illustrators are using to present and represent American history and culture in inventive, but accurate, ways that will resonate with contemporary young adults.

Send 250-word abstract by March 10, 2017 to Jan Susina (jcsusina@ilstu.edu) . In order to participate in this session, you need to be a member of MLA by April 7, 2017.

Jan Susina

Professor of English

English Department

Illinois State University

Review Cech's great book on Weston Woods' history now on Project Muse

John Cech's new book Imagination and Innovation: The Story of Weston Woods is a particularly interesting history of this ground-breaking film company known for its amazing adapatations of children's literature.  My review of his book is now available in the Children's Literature Association Quarterly section on Project Muse.  If you want a print copy, it's in Volume 36, Number 1, Spring 2011, pp. 115-117.  I think this book is well worth reading for children's literature scholars, librarians, film scholars, and all of us who remember watching these films in school and on television.

Childhood & Globalization conference

A conference on Childhood & Globalization: An International Colloquium will be held next week (Sept 13-17) on the campuses of Illinois State University and Illinois Wesleyan University with participants from Russian State University for the Humanities (RGGU) in Moscow.  We're looking forward to interesting presentations and conversations on thinking about children's literature and childhood from a global perspective.

Students in my ENG 470 course will be attending the evening session: Childhood in Image and Sound at ISU on Wednesday night as our class meeting.  I will be the moderator on a panel with Sonja Fritzsche and Rebecca Gearhart from IWU and Oksana Gavrishina from RGGU.

On Friday morning (Sept. 17), I will be speaking on "Globalizing Childhood through Children's New Media" on a panel with Marina Balina and Scott Sheridan from IWU.  RGGU professors Anja Tippner and Oksana Gavrishina will moderate.

Here's a link to the Colloquium Program (in .pdf format) as well as a press release from IWU.

I'm looking forward to interesting conversations!