The Department of the History of the Literature of Positivism and Young Poland and the Department of the History of the Literature of Romanticism of the Institute of Polish Studies of the University of Wrocław invite you to a nationwide scientific conference entitled “Dzisiejszy XIX wiek”. The conference will be held on 6-7 December 2024 at the Institute of Polish Studies of the University of Wrocław.
The purpose of the meeting is to provide a platform for discussion of contemporary perceptions of the 19th century, its literature and culture. We propose to attempt to describe its legacy from the perspective of new research methods, the current needs of Polish language education, today’s continuations of 19th-century themes, and the controversies that the content of works from this century sometimes stirs up in public discourse. We want to consider whether the words of Czesław Miłosz indicating that “there our beginning” remain in force, or whether we have become the people of whom Witkacy wrote that “they will create a new life qualitatively unlike ours.” In the current era, is the 19th century still seen as “the great century of Poles” (Alina Witkowska), or are other traditions now carried more strongly – or perhaps it has simply ceased to matter?
The category of nineteenth-centuryism has long been at work in literary studies, describing the literature of the time as a single cultural formation, diverse in its manifestations but consistent in its worldview identity. The century was marked by points of reference: a sense of the volatility of history, the idea of progress, antinomies (reason-feeling, society-individual, science-faith), values such as novelty, youth, independence and, above all, freedom. Research by Maria Janion and Tomasz Burk, later considerations by, among others. Tomasz Sobieraj, Józef Bachórz, Wiesław Rzońca, Janusz Maciejewski or Ewa Paczoska, showed the numerous benefits of this way of reading 19th century literature. It often helps to understand its specifics better than the division into periods of Romanticism, Positivism and Young Poland – useful in school and academic didactics, but artificially distorting the overall view of the century, very important as a starting point for modernity. Therefore, we suggest looking at the 19th century holistically, in the context of long duration, covering the interval from 1795 to 1918.
We invite those engaged in research in the fields of literary studies, cultural studies, sociology, linguistics, history and history of art, pedagogy, psychology and other fields of humanities and social sciences interested in the culture of the 19th century to participate in the conference. We encourage you to pick up the following threads:
- the application of contemporary literary research methods to the reading of texts from the 19th century, such as ecocriticism, geopoetics, gender studies, animal studies, socioeconomics, physiognomy, widmontology, post-memory poetics and others,
- the risk of anachronism and overinterpretation when applying new perspectives to the study of 19th century literature,
- today’s perception of the nineteenth-century category, the issue of periodization in literary research and in Polish language education,
- the great problems and dilemmas of nineteenth-century literature in modern culture and literature, continuities, constancy of nineteenth-century paradigms,
- the presence of nineteenth-century motifs in media other than literature (films, TV series, games, comics and others)
- controversies surrounding literary works of the 19th century; questions about colonialism, Eurocentrism, racism, misogyny, anti-Semitism and more,
- contemporary reception of 19th-century literature, especially among younger generations, as well as suggestions on how to discuss 19th-century texts in school education,
- reinterpretation of 19th century works, new readings, polemics,
- nineteenth-century model in non-Polish literatures.
We are also open to other issues related to the conference theme.
Applications are accepted until 13 October via the form: https://forms.office.com/e/bb7Hp0hgBB.
Information on the qualification of topics for the conference will be sent out by 20 October.
After the conference, we plan to publish the submitted texts in the journal “Prace Literackie” – the title is on the ministerial list of scientific journals.
The conference fee is PLN 350. Contributions will be used to cover the cost of conference materials, coffee breaks and lunch. We do not provide accommodation.
Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions: dzisiejszy19@uwr.edu.pl.
