|
 The
Society for Critical Exchange sponsored a mini-conference on the
New Economic Criticism at the 1996 Midwest Modern Language Association
convention in Minneapolis. Three sessions were held on Friday, Nov.
8, 1996, beginning at 8:30 in the morning and continuing into the
afternoon. The three sessions were: |
|
|
| New
Economic Criticism I: Testing Markets |
| Chair:
Mark Osteen, Loyola College |
| 1. |
"Shakespeare
and the Types of the Market." Donald K. Hedrick, Kansas St. U |
| 2. |
"From
Entrepreneur to Employee: The Descent of the New Woman in Edith
Wharton's The Custom of the Country. Martha Patterson, U of Iowa |
| 3. |
"Everything
That's Unexpected: Free Trade, Protection, and the Daughters of
Silas Lapham." Richard Adams, Harvard U |
| Discussant:
Howard Horwitz, U of Utah |
|
|
| New
Economic Criticism II: Marketing Texts |
| Chairs:
Martha Woodmansee, Case Western Reserve U; Mark Osteen, Loyola C
|
| 1. |
"Labor
Theory of Poetry: Material Production and Urban Semiosis in Renaissance
England." Max Thomas, U of Iowa |
| 2. |
"'Imaginary
Capital': The Shape of the Victorian Economy and the Shaping of
Dickens's Career." Tatiana M. Holway, Columbia U |
| 3. |
"Voodoo
Economics: Magic, Storytelling, and Value in Charles Chesnutt's
The Conjure Woman," Anne Baker, Columbia U Discussant: Linda M.
Austin, Oklahoma St. U |
|
|
| New
Economic Criticism III: Pedagogies |
| Co-Chairs:
Martha Woodmansee and Mark Osteen |
| Panelists:
Charis Bower, Tiffin U; Cathy Birkenstein-Graff, Loyola U--Chicago;
Mary Beth Combs, U of Iowa; Russell Reising, U of Toledo; Andrew
Herman, Drake U |
|
The
panelists briefly offered syllabi, commentary and accounts of courses
they have taught that involve the intersections of economics, literature,
and writing, but discussion was open to audience members as well.
The format worked so successfully, especially as the third session
in a mini-conference, that it the SCE has adopted it for future
mini-conferences as well. |
|
|
 The
first panel's papers all centered on depictions of female commodification
or merchandising. However, the discussion ranged widely, and eventually
focused on the conflicts between humanistic and business education,
and the disparate forms of value in each. This discussion carried
over into both the second and third panel. |
| Each
of the papers in the second panel addressed specific and general
problems in the economics of authorship: to what degree do authors
create their own audience? How do wider cultural forms and systems
affect the economics of publishing? What conflicts between aesthetic
and exchange value do authors negotiate? |
