The 2021 MLA is not in Toronto, as we thought it would be at this time last year – indeed, at this time even six months ago. The 2021 MLA is… wherever you are. Like everything else, it’s on Zoom! But it is happening!
Questions about what this will look like? Check out the MLA’s Virtual Convention FAQ! This post is devoted to the sessions on Children’s Literature, Comics/Graphic Novels, and Childhood Studies. All times are EST (even though I am in CST). Did I miss anything? Let me know, and I will add.
NOTE: The Children’s and YA Literature Forum Business Meeting will be held Friday, 8 January, at 1:45 PM EST. Contact Philip Nel for the Zoom link.
61 – Graphic Narratives: Tools for Intersectional Resistance against Systemic Injustice
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM
Description
Panelists focus on the representation of unique and multiple forms of resistance through words and art in graphic narratives and interrogate the form and genre of these texts as tools for intersectional resistance and social justice.
Presider
- Sayanti Mondal Illinois State U
- Nithya Sivashankar Ohio State U, Columbus
Speaker
- Aaron Agorsor Arizona State U
- Daniel Hengel Graduate Center, City U of New York
- Courtney Mullis Duquesne U
- Delon Omrow Centennial C
- Anthony Pearce U of British Columbia
Session Information
- Program: Special Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Literature and Other Arts, Humanities, Law, Psychology, Science, and Sociology
67 – Impertinent Pedagogy: Mischievous Praxis in Children’s and Young Adult Literature and Culture
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM
Description
This session features five-minute lightning talks introducing innovative, irreverent, revolutionary, or downright disorderly approaches to teaching children’s and young adult literature and culture in the college classroom.
- Victoria Ford Smith U of Connecticut, Storrs
Presentations
- Ideology and the Hunger Games Game Amanda Allen, Eastern Michigan U
- Indirect Service but Direct Impact: Buying Diverse Books with Community Partners Ramona Caponegro, Eastern Michigan U
- Breaking (Open) the Internet for Scholarly Research Maria Roxana Loza, U of Texas, Austin
- How to Talk about Languages You Haven’t Learned: Comparative Translation Pedagogy and Children’s Literature Carl F. Miller, Palm Beach Atlantic U
- Teaching Young Adult Literature in the Digital Era Toloo Riazi, U of California, Santa Barbara
- Performing Pooh Plays: Drama and Storytelling in the Children’s Literature Classroom Jan Christopher Susina, Illinois State U
- Break All the Rules: A Queer, Multimodal Approach to Teaching Youth Literature Bryanna Tidmarsh, Illinois State U
Session Information
- Forum: GS Children’s and Young Adult Literature
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Children’s Literature
86 – New Flashpoints in Comics History
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 1:45 PM – 3:00 PM
Description
Participants share work that identifies moments in comics history that have been overlooked. They discuss how American and transnational comics histories have been shaped by cultural conflict and exchange, the comics industry and its discontents, and changing technologies of production.
Presider
- Margaret Galvan U of Florida
Speaker
- Rachel Miller Ohio State U, Columbus
- Anna Peppard Brock U
- Xose Boan State U of New York, Oswego
- Alexander Ponomareff U of Massachusetts, Amherst
- Debarghya Sanyal U of Oregon
- Kay Sohini Kumar Stony Brook U, State U of New York
- Daniel W. Worden Rochester Inst. of Tech.
Session Information
- Forum: GS Comics and Graphic Narratives
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Literary History
144 – Growing Up, Down, Sideways: Adolescence and the Literary Imagination
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Presider
- Nancy C. Backes Cardinal Stritch U
Presentations
- Truman Capote, Carson McCullers, and the ‘Polymorphous Perverse’ Tomboy Rachel Warner, U of North Carolina, Chapel Hill
- Militarized Girlhood: Queer Bonding and Lateral Birth in Nora Okja Keller’s Fox Girl Sharon Tran, U of Maryland Baltimore County
- ‘Far Out of Proportion’: Growth in the Publication of Adolescent Authors Amy Fish, Boston U
Session Information
145 – Comics on the Couch
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Description
In the words of the psychoanalyst Didier Anzieu, “psychoanalysis has a greater need of people who think in images than of scholars, scholiasts, abstract or formalistic thinkers.” Reflecting on psychoanalysis’s understanding of drawn images and the affective states such images reach, panelists explore how comics reveal the personal and political expression of the unconscious.
Presider
- Vera Camden Kent State U, Kent
Speaker
- Eric Lawrence Berlatsky Florida Atlantic U
- Tammy Birk Otterbein U
- Tammy J. Clewell Kent State U, Kent
- Sika Dagbovie-Mullins Florida Atlantic U
Session Information
- Allied Organization: American Psychoanalytic Association
- Program: Allied Organizations
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Literature and Other Arts, Humanities, Law, Psychology, Science, and Sociology
177 – Comics and Illness: Mediating Trauma through Image-Textual Encounters
Thursday, 7 January 2021, 7:00 PM – 8:15 PM
Description
Panelists focus on comics about disability and illness–especially those that combine social circumstance with intimate individual accounts by juxtaposing words and pictures in a seamless narrative, challenging essentialist notions of race, gender, and sexuality through their pedagogical yet nonpedantic and accessible storytelling–looking at how the comic space can be used to process trauma and map memories, as well as how comics function as a holding environment.
Speaker
- Belinda Seagram Landing Strong
- Coyote Shook U of Texas, Austin
- Harriet Elizabeth Hustis C of New Jersey
- Lee Okan Northeastern U
- Cathy Preciado U of Texas, Austin
- JoAnn Purcell York U
- Marna Clowney-Robinson U of Michigan, Ann Arbor
Respondent
- Erin Williams independent scholar
Session Information
208 – “Hear Their Cry”: Understanding the Jewish Orphan Experience
Friday, 8 January 2021, 10:15 AM – 11:30 AM
For related material, write to sjacobowitz@qcc.cuny.edu
Presider
- Myriam Ackermann-Sommer U Paris-Sorbonne IV
Presentations
- Comparative, Textual Insights into the Use of Child Emigration Amy Traver, Queensborough Community C, City U of New York
- Queer Deronda: The Jewish Orphan and Late Victorian Citizenship Aliza Atik, Queensborough Community C, City U of New York
- The Pain of ‘Resurfacing’ for the Dutch Jewish War Orphan Sarah Ropp, U of Texas, Austin
- Yizkor: Losing Father(s): The Failure of Mourning in Malamud and Bellow Myriam Ackermann-Sommer, U Paris-Sorbonne IV
Session Information
224 – The Traffic in Childhood
Friday, 8 January 2021, 10:15 AM – 11:30 AM
Presider
- Natasha Hurley U of Alberta
Presentations
- Espaldas Mojadas Cubiertas de Miel: The Child Border Crosser and Queer Intimacies Alicia Nunez, Northwestern U
- The Child’s Voice in the Peace Processes in Contemporary Colombia Mai Hunt, Brown U
- Minor Fictions: The Traffic in Childhood in the Bildungsroman Genre Katie Collins, Washington U in St. Louis
Session Information
- Forum: TC Women’s and Gender Studies
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Cultural Studies, Folklore, and Popular Culture
The Children’s and YA Literature Forum Business Meeting
Friday, 8 January 2021, 1:45 PM EST.
Contact Philip Nel for the Zoom link.
342 – #OwnVoices in Children’s and Adolescent Literature
Friday, 8 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Description
The session fosters a nuanced discussion about textual representation, inclusivity, social justice, and power in books and media for young people. Panelists give much-needed critical attention to #OwnVoices texts and scholars, delving into complex, fluid, and multifaceted considerations of textual representation.
Presider
- Brigitte Fielder U of Wisconsin, Madison
Speakers
- Maria Roxana Loza U of Texas, Austin
- Yoonji Kim Ewha Womans U
- Kelsey Dufresne North Carolina State U
- Thomas Frattaroli York U
Session Information
- Forum: GS Children’s and Young Adult Literature
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Children’s Literature
396 – Comics and Graphic Narratives for Young Audiences
Saturday, 9 January 2021, 10:15 AM – 11:30 AM
Presider
- Philip Nel Kansas State U
- Aaron Kashtan U of North Carolina, Charlotte
Presentations
- ‘Loving Deeper than Lovers’: Melancholy and Queer Desire in Shojo Manga Keiko Miyajima, John Jay C of Criminal Justice, City U of New York
- ‘Manga Gave Me Self-Confidence’: Young People in Nepal and Canada Using Manga as a Pedagogical Tool Adrian Khan, U of Toronto and Janet Seow, York U, Keele
- Snakes and Ladders: Collaboratively Exploring Youth Refugees in an (Ethno)Graphic Novel Sarah Walker, Goldsmiths, U of London
- Unapologetic Complexity: The Chaotic and the Esoteric in Contemporary Children’s Comics Gwen Athene Tarbox, Western Michigan U
Session Information
- Forum: GS Comics and Graphic Narratives
- Forum: GS Children’s and Young Adult Literature
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Children’s Literature
417 – Questioning the Canon: Rethinking the Golden Age of Children’s Literature
Saturday, 9 January 2021, 12:00 PM – 1:15 PM
Presider
- Jill Coste U of Florida
Presentations
- Golden Age Orientalism: Japan through the Looking Glass Erica Kanesaka Kalnay, U of Wisconsin, Madison
- Voice of the Translator: Polish Translations of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland and Winnie-the-Pooh Aleksandra Wieczorkiewicz, Adam Mickiewicz, U of PoznaÅ„
- ‘To Educate Is to “Educare”’: Frances Harper’s Educational Poetics and Reception Tabitha Lowery, West Virginia U, Morgantown
Session Information
- Allied Organization: Children’s Literature Association
- Program: Allied Organizations
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Children’s Literature
501 – The Poetics of Childhood in Early Modern Iberia
Saturday, 9 January 2021, 3:30 PM – 4:45 PM
Presentations
- On Not Maturing: Childhood Poetics; or, How Cervantes Queers Literary History Sonia Velazquez, Indiana U, Bloomington
- Children May Not Be Seen, but Do They Herd? The Figure of the Zagal in the Spanish Pastoral Book Margaret Marek, Illinois C
Session Information
- Forum:Â Spanish and Iberian – LLC 16th- and 17th-Century Spanish and Iberian Poetry and Prose
- Program:Â Forum Sessions
- Subject:Â Spanish Literature – Before 1700
517 – The Other in Narratives of Rival Nations
Saturday, 9 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Presentations
- Mediating the Ethnic Other: Migrant Protagonists and Their Italian Authors in Italy’s Young Adult Novel Maria Rosa Truglio, Penn State U, University Park
- The Clash of Standardized Representations and Real-World Identities Laura Kieselbach, East Stroudsburg U
- Twice Othered: Ecological Imperialism and Settler Colonialism in The Rabbits Kay Sohini Kumar, Stony Brook U, State U of New York
- Greek Young Adult Fiction and the Turk Other Lissi Athanasiou-Krikelis, New York Inst. of Tech., New York
Session Information
- Allied Organization:Â Modern Greek Studies Association
- Program:Â Allied Organizations
- Subject:Â Comparative Literature – Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
559 – Rereading L. M. Montgomery’s Rilla of Ingleside One Hundred Years Later
Sunday, 10 January 2021, 10:15 AM – 11:30 AM
Description
The stories of loss, endurance, and survival in L. M. Montgomery’s Rilla of Ingleside persist one hundred years after the novel’s publication. Montgomery scholars explore interrelated stories within the novel from different perspectives–for example, the power of small things, vulnerability, womanhood, motherhood, death, and war–to facilitate conversation on the legacy of this wartime novel.
For related material, write to lclement@lakeheadu.ca
- Katherine Scarth U of Prince Edward Island
- Heidi A. Lawrence U of Glasgow
- Laura Robinson Acadia U
- Rita Bode Trent U
- Lesley Clement Lakehead U, Orillia
- Andrea C. McKenzie York U
Session Information
540 – The Graphic Novel and Humanistic Inquiry
Saturday, 9 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
Presider
- David Green Howard U
Presentations
- Lines Drawn: Antiphotography and Decolonization in Miné Okubo’s Citizen 13660 Stephen Pasqualina, U of Nevada, Reno
Session Information
- Forum: TC Popular Culture
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: American Literature – Twentieth and Twenty-First Centuries
556 – Theorizing the Child for the Twenty-First Century
Sunday, 10 January 2021, 10:15 AM – 11:30 AM
- Derritt Mason U of Calgary
Presentations
- Rethinking the Child: Katie Rain Hill and the Burden of Trans Youth Witness Narratives Megan Paslawski, Queens C, City U of New York
- The Child as Prosthesis in the Post-9/11 United States Sarah Ropp, U of Texas, Austin
- Embracing the Uncertainty of Destructive Imagination: Making Space for Youth’s Future (Re)Visioning Brittany Tomin, York U, Keele
- The Performativity of Childhood as Ethical Relationality Gabrielle (Brie) Owen, U of Nebraska, Lincoln
Session Information
- Forum: GS Children’s and Young Adult Literature
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Children’s Literature
636 – Decolonizing Comics and/as Activism
Sunday, 10 January 2021, 1:45 PM – 3:00 PM
Presider
- Rachel Kunert-Graf Antioch U, WA
Presentations
- Singaporean Comics and Decolonial Feeling Weihsin Gui, U of California, Riverside
- Decolonial Futures and Afrodiasporic Spiritualities in Comics of the Circum-Caribbean Paul Humphrey, Colgate U
- El viaje más caro: Collaborative Comic-Based Storytelling among Latino/a Farmworkers Kaitlin Thomas, Norwich U
- Wangari Maathai: A Comic as a ‘World’ Ecological Medium? Crystal Lynn Bartolovich, Syracuse U
Session Information
- Forum: GS Comics and Graphic Narratives
- Program: Forum Sessions
- Subject: Genre, Theory, Method – Cultural Studies, Folklore, and Popular Culture
695 – “Nevertheless, She Persisted”: Girls, Literature for Girls, and the Politics of Persistence
Sunday, 10 January 2021, 5:15 PM – 6:30 PM
For related material, write to mgreenb6@uwo.ca
Presider
- Miranda A. Green-Barteet Western U
Presentations
- ‘Doing the Right Thing’: Black Girls’ Persistence in Historical Novels Miranda A. Green-Barteet, Western U
- The Passivity of Persistence in Betty Cavanna’s Postwar Junior Novels Amanda Allen, Eastern Michigan U
- Telling New Stories: Disability and Determination in Contemporary Young Adult Fairy Tales Jill Coste, U of Florida
- Becoming: Persistence and the Lure of Heteronuclearity Meghan Gilbert-Hickey, Guttman Community C, City U of New York