Deadline: May 10, 2020
Call for Papers for a collection of essays
"Magic. A Companion"
Edited by Katharina Rein
For the longest time, magic has been devalued as both a concept
of belief and as an artform. Western philosophy conceived of
magic in opposition to itself: Aristotle, Heidegger, Nietzsche,
Hegel, and Marx considered it as a dangerous deception, standing
in the way of understanding. Among the performing arts, magic
has been underresearched for a long time, associated with
children’s birthday parties and not deemed worthy of academic
attention. Slowly but steadily, however, it has in recent years
made its way into the visual field of academics, becoming the
topic of a number of research projects. Performance and other
magic have also invaded popular culture in the last two decades:
Starting with J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series, magic and
magicians appeared increasingly in cultural artefacts from
Hollywood blockbusters with star casts, to TV series,
literature, games and the arts.
This edited volume aims to explore a variety of concepts of
magic, providing a historical overview as well as investigating
representations and translations across various media. Topics
covered include magic in anthropology, as well as rituals,
shamanism, spiritualism, occultism, performance magic, Magick
and Pagan Witchcraft. We encounter these magics, if you will, in
literature, film and TV, art, (video) games, graphic novels,
music, exhibitions and advertising. In what ways does magic
influence our perception of reality and subjectivity? How and
why can it be and was it construed as opposing reason or have
they never been intertwined with one another? How can magic and
illusion be understood as producing new ways of viewing the
world instead of as something blinding us to reality? How does
magic change in modernity or with increasing digitization? In
what ways does magic and do its representations broach issues of
different bodies, abilities, ethnicities and sexualities?
Each short essay is dedicated to a single cultural artefact that serves to shed light on the larger context of the various guises of magic in past and present cultures. Contributions focusing on non-Western artefacts and minority discourse are very welcome. The range of artefacts, media, topics and questions is by no means limited to the list above.
To propose an essay, please send an abstract of no more than
300 words to:
magic.a....@gmail.com no later than the 10th of May 2020.
From the original at
CFP: Magic. A Companion. In: ArtHist.net, Apr 14, 2020 (accessed
Apr 28, 2020), <https://arthist.net/archive/22974>.
| Dr Leo Ruickbie | |||||||||||||||
| PhD (Lond), MA, BA (Hons), Associate of King's College, Elected Member of the Royal Historical Society | |||||||||||||||
|
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