9th annual GRAPHSY (Graduate Portuguese and Hispanic Symposium)
Department of Spanish and Portuguese
Georgetown University
Herencia y Tradición:
Looking back, Moving forward
February 26-27, 2016
CALL FOR PAPERS – DEADLINE NOVEMBER 30, 2015
The Department of Spanish and Portuguese at Georgetown University is pleased to announce the 9th annual
Graduate Portuguese and Hispanic Symposium (GRAPHSY), welcoming proposals within the theme
Herencia y Tradición: Looking back, Moving forward and encouraging research in the fields of Linguistics and
Iberian and Latin American Literature/Culture. This year the conference provides a forum both for research
that honors traditional frameworks of investigation and for research that breaks free from these customs to
pursue a new perspective. GRAPHSY 2016’s theme will pay tribute to the academic heritage established by
great minds of years past, but also examine how convention for convention’s sake can impede the progress
of these fields. We also invite proposals examining how herencia and tradición play a role in the literary
movements and linguistic phenomena of today, with the goal of better understanding how our past plays a
role in our present.
We welcome presentations and works in progress related to, but not limited to the following topics:
LITERATURE:
 Dialogue between the past and present
 Adaptations and revisions
 (Post)colonial (re-)readings
 Pop culture in dialogue with the canon
 Tensions in Latin American and/or Peninsular
Literature
 The Transatlantic focus as a space for negotiation
and change
 Post-national literatures
 Cultural representation in visual arts
 Borders, diaspora and travel writings
 The study/strengths/challenges of translation
 Narratives of social justice
 Marginal and periphery literatures
 Intermediality: Textual/Visual/Audio
LINGUISTICS:
 Bilingualism / Multilingualism
 Heritage languages
 Linguistic policy and practice
 Language contact and negotiation between
languages and culture
 Minority languages of Latin America/the Iberian
Peninsula
 Language and technology
 Historical linguistics
 Language acquisition (L1, L2, L3, etc.)
 Language attrition
 Connections between research and pedagogy
 Immersion/study abroad
 Psycholinguistics
 Cognitive linguistics
 Theoretical linguistics
 Discourse analysis
Keynote Speakers:
Román de la Campa is the Edwin B. and Lenore R. Williams Professor of Romance Languages at the
University of Pennsylvania. He is also General Editor of Hispanic Review, published by the University of
Pennsylvania. His publications take a comparative view of Latin American and Latino literatures, theory
and other cultural practices. They include over one hundred essays published in the United States, Latin
America and Europe, as well as the following recent books: Late Imperial Cultures, co-edited (Verso: 1995),
América Latina y sus comunidades discursivas: Literatura y cultura en la era global (Caracas: 1999), Latin
Americanism (Minnesota University Press: 2000), Cuba on My Mind: Journeys to a Severed Nation (London,
Verso: 2001), América Latina: Tres interpretaciones actuales sobre su estudio (2004), with Ignacio Sosa and
Enrique Camacho (Universidad Autónoma de México, Special Edition), Nuevas cartografías latinoamericanas
(Letras Cubanas, Havana: 2007) and Ensayos de otra América (Instituto Cubano del Libro: 2012). His next
book, Split States and Global Imaginaries (Cambria Press), is scheduled to appear in 2016.
Silvina Montrul is a professor in and the head of the Department of Spanish, Italian and Portuguese,
professor of Linguistics, and of Second Language Acquisition and Teacher Education at the University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. Her research is grounded in linguistic theory and uses psycholinguistic
methodologies to explore various theoretical issues. These include the linguistic nature of interlanguage
and bilingual grammars and the reasons why some L2 learners/bilinguals reach the native speaker level of
proficiency and linguistic knowledge, while others fall short of that level, even when optimal conditions for
learning are provided. She is co-chief editor of Second Language Research and has published several books,
including The Acquisition of Heritage Languages (Cambridge University Press, 2016), El bilingüismo en el
mundo hispanohablante (Wiley-Blackwell, 2012) and Incomplete Acquisition in Bilingualism: Re-examining the
Age Factor (John Benjamins, 2008). She has also published prolifically in peer-edited journals including
Language Acquisition, Theoretical Linguistics and The Modern Language Journal.
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES
• Submissions should be sent as an email attachment (Word/PDF file) to the GRAPHSY 2016
Organizing Committee: graphsy.georgetown@gmail.com
• The abstract filename should include:
◦ Whether the proposal is intended for Linguistics (LING) or Literature (LIT)
◦ The principal author’s name
◦ “GRAPHSY 2016”
◦ e.g., "LIT_Fernández Morales_GRAPHSY 2016".
• Abstracts may be submitted in English, Spanish or Portuguese.
• Deadline for proposal submissions is November 30, 2015.
All submissions should include the following:
• Author(s) contact information and other details:
◦ Full name of principal presenter along with contact information: affiliation, telephone, email.
All return correspondence will be to this individual only.
◦ Full names, affiliations, and email addresses of co-presenter(s) if any.
• Presentation/Abstract details
◦ Presentation Title (15 word limit)
◦ Presentation Summary (50-75 word limit): A brief description to be included in the
conference program.
◦ Abstract (250 words): Extended description of the presentation for committee review.
◦ Whether the proposal is intended for Linguistics or Literature and a few keywords about the
topic (e.g., LINGUISTICS: L2 Spanish phonology; study abroad; motivation).