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July 2012

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Seeing the ICA adaptation pressed me to just re-read DFW's "Suicide as a Sort of Present" from Brief Interviews.

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Probably won't make the Beckett as my viva is proximal, but Come & Go, Ohio Impromptu, & Rockaby are, in my reckoning, among Beckett's best.

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Does state, nonetheless: "if you're going to use these games, you're better off using them on GNU/Linux rather than on Microsoft Windows"

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Trying a new research tactic of working on 2 articles simultaneously. Seems to work well, actually. Grow tired of 1 and switch.

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When academic has changed name, I've used "X née Y" as introduction. Should I refer to him/her as X or Y throughout? X at time of pub...

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That piece I just RTed on Arts research funding, TRAC/FEC is brilliant and well worth a read.

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Ac. journ article: "I should simply like to suggest that a consideration of the...general tone is more helpful than an academic discussion"

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Laughing a great deal (in despair) at how many pictures of Obama crop up on a Google Image search for "Marxist"

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Working on an article on Roberto Bolaño's 2666. I've grown so accustomed to e-editions now that tracking down a quote took 1/2 hour :/

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This may be insanity, but I now have to travel into London. May as well pull a British Library day as I'm in. :s

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'The [...] ceremony is themed around the notion of the "Isle of Wonders", referencing Caliban's speech in The Tempest' PoCo reading required

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Chipped in a couple of responses on the interesting @GdnHigherEd chat on #AciWri. Only one was in anger to a troll!

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In Portsmouth for interview today. About to catch a bite to eat with @OwenDevineUK beforehand.

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Mythbusting: "A Proposed List — 60 Things Journal Publishers Do"

Kent Anderson recently wrote a post over at Scholarly Kitchen entitled "A Proposed List — 60 Things Journal Publishers Do". I think this list needs a little mythbusting: I agree with some of the points, think others need qualifying and that others are just hands-down false. So here's my rundown: I…

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Batman saved capitalism from the anarcho-Leftist terrorist. If you don't like it, Catwoman/liberal cinemagoer, then you want them to win.

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Had a proper day off in the sunshine today! Finished Mitchell's Black Swan Green, Eggers' Heartbreaking work & read lots of Dostoyevsky.

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Post-Submission Weirdness

This is just a quick post about my experience of submitting a Ph.D. having worked full-time on it previously since October 2009. It's odd. During the Ph.D. I wrote several articles for journals and book chapters concurrently (ie. that were nothing to do with my Ph.D. work). Now I'm awaiting a viva…

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Was struggling to locate my copy of Borges there. Needed a map of some kind. Perhaps one-to-one in its scaling.

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The undervalued book collection and peer review

I've had several conversations in the past few weeks on the different modes of dissemination and the REF's undervaluation of the book collection. The argument goes that essays in a book collection are less valued because they're not peer reviewed. Except... they are. They're just not shipped out by…

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On my way back now from the ace #WHN2012 conference. Tired, but a great event. Congratulations to all the Lincoln team!

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Narrator splits in Nowhere Man and external character has first person agency, says Ward #WHN2012

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Hemon breaks conventions of hetero- and homo-diegetic narration through first person plural narration & intrusive voice, says Ward #WHN2012

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Ward cites Stocks on dependence on previously coherent subject in most notions of banishing trauma narrative reconstruction #WHN2012

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Classic symptoms of dissociative trauma in The Question of Trauma, says Ward, but will argue that texts resist healing #WHN2012

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Both texts seem to share a Bergsonian model of memory and recovery, says Cliffe #WHN2012

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This links back to modernist stream of consciousness, says Cliffe. Sounds like another area for David James' project. #WHN2012

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Waves the overlap point that Cliffe will use to interweave authors and their memory modes as they relate to endings #WHN2012

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Kermode first obvious touching point for Cliffe: immediate memory and forward memory #WHN2012

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Kunzru preoccupied with dispersed data points and problematic attempts to connect and read them says @the_blochian #WHN2012

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Distinction between Judeic, Christian and capitalist models of eschatology important, says @the_blochian #WHN2012

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Genuine vs illusory moments of enlightenment in Kunzru. False enlightenment predicated on domination says @the_blochian #WHN2012

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Thresholds of time and notions of exteriority also in Burnside, Crace and others, says @the_blochian #WHN2012

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Notion of swarm intelligence seems to embody this networked mode, read through Hardt and Negri's Multitude #WHN2012

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Interesting notions of transmigration in David Mitchell, says @the_blochian, especially in a post-secular frame #WHN2012

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Hardt, Negri and Bloch are key influences on @the_blochian's understanding of delinearization and weak utopia #WHN2012

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Towards a Networked Artform is @the_blochian's title. She also has a prezi, so there goes my novelty #WHN2012

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Now kicking off the narrative theory panel and it looks like @the_blochian will be on first. #WHN2012

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Some great discussions in this panel on the return of solipsism and pragmatic escapes in c21 fiction #WHN2012

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Timothy Baker from Aberdeen up now - speaking on Sarah Moss and John Burnside #WHN2012

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I have an uneasiness towards papers that diagnose characters' trauma - these are literary devices, not people - but can be fruitful #WHN2012

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Redpath now giving Derridean backdrop to haunting (the title of this panel) #WHN2012

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Different models of dissociative identity disorder - focus here on DID blaming other: most difficult to treat w explosive behaviour #WHN2012

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Catherine Redpath and Carly Stevenson using medical humanities framework (DID) to read explosive dissociations and dark matter #WHN2012

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Bloody hell. One of Michael Gove's creationist schools will be just down the road from me.

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Less live tweeting at #WHN2012 than my usual form as room setups not conducive and seems not quite the done thing!

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Speaker looking at Amy Kennedy's comedy and how it changed when she moved to stand up comedy #WHN2012

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Eggers' self-reflexivity chimes with Rorty's definition of an ironist as one who sees his/her central beliefs as contingent #WHN2012

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I'm interested in the presuppositions of private language and epistemic privacy in these papers on Eggers and sincerity #whn2012

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Issues of trust and sincerity occur in Eggers' form as well as inter-character relations says Kelly #whn2012

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Kelly speaking on relevance of Eggers' motives in What is the What. Risk of Postcolonial arrogance etc #WHN2012

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Sincerity as congruence of avowal and feeling. Authenticity as core, rejecting social realm, says Kelly #WHN2012

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Modes of literary trauma - working through and representation - both ignore the reader in their practice says Kelly #whn2012

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Eggers signposts infinite regress of metafiction says Funk. Mark Currie says this also, adds Eve. #WHN2012

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Werner Wolf cited on Metareferential Turn. How does this fit with Patricia Waugh's argument, I wonder? #WHN2012

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Funk asks "why authenticity?": mediated immediacy, undecidability and instability #WHN2012

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Funk talking about the aesthetics of reconstruction - divided across authenticity and metareference #WHN2012

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Wolfgang "Wolfie" Funk up first speaking on Dave Eggers and metareference. #WHN2012

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Gold Open Access does **NOT** mean: "author pays"

I've had two people now come back to me on Twitter saying that Gold Open Access, "by definition", means that the author pays. It does not. Much of the terminology around Open Access was proposed by Peter Suber and here's what he has to say about it (I've bolded the relevant portions): OA journals…

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Like peer review we need to instill DIY ethos to remove commercial element, unless that element really adds to our work.

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Scholar publisher or library publisher are gold routes without pay. My journal - gold OA. No fees. Done as service to field.

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Gold doesn't *have* to be pay-to-publish. If a generation are going to be bankrupted out of research, I want true publisher value explained.

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This is a hard slog in the face of credentialist assessments that favour conservatism, but our generation of ECRs are screwed if we don't.

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In light of new gold OA route, the need to build independent dissemination mechanisms free from profit-driven enterprises is now urgent.

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As if battling public transport wasn't bad enough, we now have announcements from the ever-odious Boris Johnson at stations.

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Actually, that's rubbish. There are loads of more satisfying things, but this pleases me nonetheless.

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Few things quite so satisfying as timing a conference paper the day before the conference & finding it's *precisely* on the time limit.

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I'm pretty sure it would have been impossible for me to sleep any worse last night.

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Amount of effort I'm putting in to this Prezi, you'd better come to my talk if you're at the "What Happens Now?" 21C fic. conf. next week!

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Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 5

Following on from part 1, part 2, part 3 and part 4, this is the third in a series of posts designed to get a new journal off the ground. So, you've got your issue together. It's all typeset, final galleys are uploaded and you're ready to launch.Pressing the final button is scary and is a cause for…

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Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 4

Following on from part 1, part 2 and part 3, this is the third in a series of posts designed to get a new journal off the ground. Copyediting and Proofreading When I started out work on Excursions journal almost three years ago, I didn't know the difference between copyediting and proofreading. In…

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The @GdnHigherEd chat tomorrow looks very interesting. Hope to be there for some of it. Situation so dire for ECRs.

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Alright, confession time. Dropping deadly serious academic mode for a min, I went to the Harry Potter studio tour today

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I was, however, sent this information in an email that contained nothing but that link.

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Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 3

Following on from part 1 and part 2, this is the third in a series of posts designed to get a new journal off the ground. Launching the Journal The key to launching a good journal is getting to the right people. Targeting field leaders (who may also be in your wider editorial board) and asking for…

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. @bsms38 @MassObsArchive @jharvell did you see this Times crossword clue? "What may be celebrated following study of everyday life (4,11)"

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Without the freely available tech tools, the situation won't improve. The arguments against Open Source are FUD.

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I might give up selling on Ebay. People seem to just try it on with minor problems (cpu fan came off in transit - big deal; re-seat it)

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All is still going well on the negotiation of license rather than copyright assignment. #amazed

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"A clear brilliant flash of pain from A to B. What was A? What was B? Kleinzeit didn't want to know. His hypotenuse was on that side."

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I have a viva date! Don't think I want to broadcast the specific date itself, though, in case it goes badly! Early September. #phdchat

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Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 2

Following on from Part 1, let's begin to talk about the technological side of starting an OA journal. There are several components to the system that all need to come together. The timescales for ensuring this happens are different, but here's some descriptions and estimates on the different…

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I have an interview for a part-time lectureship for next year, which is pretty exciting (and some reassurance for having some teaching!)

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Starting an Open Access Journal: a step-by-step guide part 1

Prefatory note (2016) Please note that I receive several email requests per week from individuals asking for help or detailed guidance in how to setup an OA journal. With my deepest regrets, I am afraid my time is simply insufficient to provide such guidance beyond what is here on these pages.

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I have a rash of "print this PDF, scan it and sign it" emails at the moment. Aaargh!

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Find it somewhat disheartening when I submitted an article two months ago and it's still awaiting reviewer selection :/

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Initially positive noises from publisher over license to publish instead of copyright transfer.

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Extremely pleased that Zotero can automatically detect the metadata from our PDFs. DOI excellence!

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Hmm. Hi vis jackets stopping entry to British Library courtyard. Wonder what's happening...

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Metro's headlines "New bawls please" and "tear we go again" fairly subtle, I thought. In case you didn't know, Andy Murray cried yesterday.

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Orbit: Writing Around Pynchon is live

It's taken quite a while and a lot of energy on my part, but my journal of scholarship on Thomas Pynchon, Orbit: Writing Around Pynchon, is now live and launched. I've learnt many things about academic publishing, most notably the full mechanisms by which CrossRef works. Indeed, here's a very fine…

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Hope all had fun at the Weather Reports symposium - I went to the Tate with friends to see Hirst and Munch.

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“@ScientistMags Just heard of a PhD student taking their own life. No PhD is worth this.” cc @qui_oui

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Dear Crossref, please hurry up with processing my membership, I have a journal to publish! Yours, Martin

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Train tweet alert. Greater Anglia seem not to be running trains from Enfield Town, thus doubling my journey time. #thanks

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Signing over copyright vs. licensing your journal articles

I've just had through the request to sign a copyright form for a forthcoming article in a Taylor and Francis journal and duly read through their material on copyright. Taylor and Francis explicitly state that: We prefer authors to assign copyright to Taylor & Francis or the journal proprietor…

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Fairly urgent Q.: if I have to grant perpetual exclusive license to a publisher, is there any advantage in not signing over full copyright?

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So this "grilling" that Diamond is supposed to get. When's that happening again?

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Much like the retracted resignation of their chairman, Barclays now say they don't have a recording.

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“@VC_UEL Scientists say new subatomic particle not Higgs but bankers' moral compass. "We did not expect to detect anything that small"”

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So Co-Op is the place to move to when I don't want to give the banks a penny, right?

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I got alarmed for a minute there. Suddenly occurred to me that I noticed no mention of kazoos in Against the Day. There is one mention.

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"No decision as hard as the one to stand down", presumably including decisions to fraudulently rig interest rates, which are easy.

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"How could Labour have let the city go so unregulated?", bleats Cameron, ignoring his own calls for less regulation at the time.

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Ugh. If you value your humanity, do not read the Metro letters section on "benefit scroungers" today.

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Dinnen's last text is Super Sad True Love Story as set in the network fiction tradition (and potential failure?) #HEAdayC21

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Dinnen points out the problem of teaching McSweeney's: hard for all students to get hold of #HEAdayC21

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Dinnen talking about the unusual aesthetics of the literary journal McSweeney's. Edited by Dave Eggers. #HEAdayC21

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N Katherine Hayles' model of a technotext: "a literary work that interrogates the inscription technology that produced it" the #HEAdayC21

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Not canonised, says Venezia, but part of an emergent order: new publishers branching out #HEAdayC21

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Hillary Chute argues that some of the most effective feminist cultural production lies in edgy graphic novel, says Venezia #HEAdayC21

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Now Venezia talking about Bechdel's Fun Home - double movement of authorial paternal identification says Venezia #HEAdayC21

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“@diminutivebird @martin_eve ...and again from Tony Venezia!” < more embodiment bingo

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Comics, as a term, enters discourse in late 19c. Graphic novels in 1960s. Venezia points out arguments against this. Validation. #HEAdayC21

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Venezia relates how Harold Bloom has been appropriated by superhero comic studies - misprision indeed! #HEAdayC21

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Tony Venezia now up, speaking on the c21 texts he'd set, focusing on the graphic novel #HEAdayC21

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Leggett thinking through Moretti's 2 metaphors for local and global: waves for transnational and trees foe national #HEAdayC21 @afrayn

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Leggett arguing for British authors situated in a transnational mode: Cloud Atlas, Transmission and Lara #HEAdayC21

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On the other hand, says Leggett, there are many global literature courses and centres: St Andrews, Manchester #HEAdayC21

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Nationalist boundaries still enforced in HE syllabi, says Leggett - cites rise of Scottish courses in light of devolution #HEAdayC21

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Bianca Leggett invoking @BobEaglestone's condemnation of the term "British" in their recent conference title #HEAdayC21

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Now a Birkbeck panel, the last of the day, bringing out Bianca Leggett's transnational literatures to start #HEAdayC21

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Duncan gives a hilarious slide showing the Amazon blurb that Milton would have written #HEAdayC21

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Category of second material guides discursive approach - eg reviews, says Duncan #HEAdayC21

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Historical is the catch-all when students don't have critical or theoretical secondary sources, says Duncan #HEAdayC21

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You should HIRE Dennis Duncan to give an academic paper. Hilarious hilarious guy and very interesting! #HEAdayC21

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Students asked if anything specifically study of delineated c21 lit. Most responded with: no secondary material, says Duncan #HEAdayC21

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Duncan has marking guidelines up for the structure of his paper: critical, theoretical, historical #HEAdayC21

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“@Casserine @martin_eve I've come across both Banville and Trevor on many syllabi both in Ireland and the USA” #HEAdayC21

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Last up, Dennis Duncan brings our attention to the bibliography. He told me on the train it could be summarised in 1 minute #HEAdayC21

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Turner points out under-taught prize winners: Hazard, Lively, Banville, Trevor #HEAdayC21

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Turner now examining an MA course on c21 fiction. Syllabus looks good from here. Mitchell, Sebald, DeLillo. No Pynchon #HEAdayC21

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Nicholas Turner now up, talking about sculpting c21 syllabuses. Ishiguro, Smith and McEwan on his MMU course. #HEAdayC21

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Unfortunately, I have not read any of the cited neuroscience and am not a neuroscientist. I remain very sceptical though. #HEAdayC21

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Slater has basically dismissed all forms of theoretical reading of literature & social construction. #HEAdayC21

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Slater claims that neuroscience has undermined these premises and that subjectivity can be evaluated #HEAdayC21

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Slater: assumptions of theory are that language is consciousness & that reality is linguistically determined #HEAdayC21

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Slater claims that science is undermining the epistemological foundations of literary theory. Which theories? What science? #HEAdayC21

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Slater citing Springerland(?), critiquing French theory and looking for vitality and epiphany #HEAdayC21

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Slater warns against bolting on creative practice to critical theory #HEAdayC21

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Slater warns that his argument is an attempt to push arguments to their limits and warns of savage rhetoric! #HEAdayC21

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Mark Slater now up on theory and practice, drawing many thematic areas together #HEAdayC21

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I'd say Pynchon's Against the Day also possesses all the characteristics that James is bringing out here #HEAdayC21

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James warns against treating modernist fiction as a homogenised amoral block #HEAdayC21

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James applies my term "crypto-didacticism" to Atonement #HEAdayC21 #blowingmyowntrumpet

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McEwan's affiliation to impressionism is stronger than Briony's pastiche would imply, says James #HEAdayC21

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James picks up on J. Palmer Parker's microcosmic focus for teaching. Sounds very much like Adorno's primacy of the object. #HEAdayC21

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James looking at Lorna Sage's critique of deconstruction, receivership and novelty. #HEAdayC21

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Right, now I'm off the podium, David James is on, picking up where Peter Boxall left off with defining c21 lit. #HEAdayC21

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Wilson leaves us with permutations on the phrase "is it still writing?" #HEAdayC21

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Who has access to digital writing if it requires a specific craft, asks Wilson #HEAdayC21

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Return to notion of craft in art work, says Wilson, resurfacing in the digital #HEAdayC21

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Digital writing promises democracy/accessibility, but has problems as predicated on writing and tech. #HEAdayC21

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Wilson says that digital literature spans many fields. Social media, gaming, art writing, text sculpture, media arts #HEAdayC21

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Wilson speaking of terminological shifts. Text, narrative, book, fiction, writing. #HEAdayC21

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Last in this panel is Michael Wilson on Digital Writing. Old dogs and new tricks. #HEAdayC21

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Moriarty's closing shot: how can we, or should we even, link teaching and employability agenda #HEAdayC21

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“@drkayem tho McCarthy's take on Modernism is idiosyncratic & there are cont writers who engage with Euro mod, e.g. Coetzee” #HEAdayC21

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Moriarty had AMEX sponsorship. I have a slide critiquing this in my presentation. Whoops. #HEAdayC21

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“@svejky @martin_eve interesting work as a result. Probably because literature in its essence is only quotation, I conjecture.” #HEAdayC21

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“@svejky whereas 19c English writers engaged closely with the history of literature, as did the modernists & produced far more” #HEAdayC21

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“@svejky It's v telling that Pynchon & DFW have sustained engagements with early modern lit, & then compared to English” #HEAdayC21

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“@svejky I actually feel more strongly about it than that...not even failure to engage with modernism, but w the entire history” #HEAdayC21

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Moriarty's project attempted to fuse graduate employability with disciplinary integrity. Many buzzwords flying! #HEAdayC21

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“@EarlyModernist I'm mixing cultural hist w naval history, study of professionalization, hard to place into a seminar series.” #HEAdayC21

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“@svejky @martin_eve true! see also Tom McCarthy's constant lament about the refusal of English writers to engage with modernism” #HEAdayC21

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Now Jess Moriarty speaking on "work, write, live". A project on inter-generational biographical writing #HEAdayC21

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Pleasanse argues for integration of creative in critical literature studies. Suggests as mode of assessment. #HEAdayC21

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Pleasanse now giving a crash course in Sick Hebdige and sociology of the sublime. #HEAdayC21

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Problem with utilitarian "getting published" model of creative writing in academia. Neglects epistemological form of cr writing #HEAdayC21

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Slowing of motion in Tom McCarthy, Don DeLillo and others brings this local global disjunct to the fore, says Box all #HEAdayC21

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Box all looking at fictions that focus on locality through unwanted imposed globalities. #HEAdayC21

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Boxall paranthetically acknowledges problems of de-territorialised model - still experience the hard reality of checkpoints #HEAdayC21

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C21 writing as grouped by writers dealing with a time of flux and shifting geopolitical conditions #HEAdayC21

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Marx says commodity form can also exist in realm of ideas, thus again encroaching on the academy #HEAdayC21

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To put this otherwise: isn't academic knowledge also pre-obsolete? Not unique to the commodity Form. #HEAdayC21

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I have problems with this theorisation of obsolescence through software - knowledge is cumulative #HEAdayC21

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Boxall on Baumann's extra-territorialisation of power (Microsoft) - feeds into Hardt and Negri, I'd suspect #HEAdayC21

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Boxall: Baumann on modernity and speed. Moving now to examine specificity of c21 #HEAdayC21

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Boxall: fusion of a-historic and the specific that illuminates our relationship to the present #HEAdayC21

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Boxall quoting Sound and the Fury - train journey that shows perspectival dynamics brought by technology #HEAdayC21

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Boxall: Nietzsche, Barthes and Agamben on untimeliness, says Boxall. Those who are aligned with their time are misaligned. #HEAdayC21

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Very difficult to bring the contemporary into focus. Too immanent. I'm thinking of Foucault's empirico-transcendental doublet. #HEAdayC21

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Boxall introducing theoretical issues in speaking on 21C lit. Historical determinants. #HEAdayC21

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... But first, a quick guide to the HEA - call put out for those who would like to run their own conferences on HE teaching #HEAdayC21

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Blair says he doesn't avoid tax. "We spend a fortune on lawyers & accountants to make sure all is legal". Errr, why then?

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Today, though, I'm off to see Elevator Repair Service's 8-hour production of The Great Gatsby, Gatz. I will not be tweeting this!

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Tomorrow I'll be tweeting from the teaching post-millennial fiction conference. Am proposing to use #T21CF