[AMS-announce] CFP: Skin-Surface-Circuit: Emboying the Improvisatory, McGill Univ., Montreal, June 2012

[Announcements for the AMS]

CFP: Skin­Surface­Circuit: Embodying the Improvisatory

An ICASP-McGill Interdisciplinary Conference June 14-16, 2012, Montreal

What does it mean to say we improvise our bodies, or embody our 
improvisations? The theme of this conference addresses the 
implications of new research emerging from the humanities, social 
sciences, arts and sciences on what counts in general as a body, and 
specifically what improvising bodies might be. What is the 
relationship of improvisers to their corporeality? Do the social 
dimensions of improvisation suggest limitations, or opportunities for 
new kinds of improvising agents and networks? What bodily norms do 
genres, communities, instruments and technologies either assume, or question?
We invite proposals on these issues, and the host of other questions 
they suggest, such as: How do new methods of musical mediation and 
new technologies for improvising across times and places question 
assumptions of what improvising bodies might be? How are traditional 
sites of essentialist thinking about bodies, be they concerning sex, 
gender, race, class, culture, ability or other either undermined, or 
assumed, by new ways of improvising, and new technologies for 
facilitating it? Has the whole notion of a body become redundant, or 
do we need a new concept to make sense of emerging modes of music 
making and new models of embodied knowledge and community?

The Adaptive Use Musical Instruments group 
(http://deeplistening.org/site/adaptiveuse) will be in attendance, 
and will conduct a series of events concerning their work.

Proposals should be no longer than 250 words, in either English or 
French. Only one proposal may be submitted per person. Please include 
name, address, and audiovisual requirements. Submit abstracts 
electronically (as .doc or .pdf) to either eric.lewis at mcgill.ca or 
lisa.barg at mcgill.ca by Feb. 1. Please also send a c.v. in the same 
format. Papers should be of 30 min reading length. We will also 
consider non-standard presentations, involving multi-media, 
performance, and so on.