UPCOMING CONFERENCES

Civil & Religious Liberty: Ideas of Rights and Tolerance in England c.1640-1800
July 23-26, 2008
This conference sponsored by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, the Lewis Walpole Library, the Whitney Humanities Center, the European Studies Council, and the Royal Holloway College, London.
For more information: http://beinecke.library.yale.edu/civil or 203.432.3423
Registration is free, but required for planning purposes. The deadline for registration is July 9, 2008.

PAST CONFERENCES

The Great Mirror of Folly: Finance, Culture, and the Bubbles of 1720
April 17-19, 2008
an interdisciplinary symposium sponsored by the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library and the International Center for Finance of Yale University

The Great Mirror of Folly [Het Groote Tafereel der Dwaasheid] is a compilation of texts and images that came out within months of the crashes that affected the financial markets of England, France, and the Dutch Republic in 1720. Texts include prospectuses for new equity issues, plays, poems, epistolary exchanges, moralistic sermons, journalistic accounts, and town edicts. Images include elaborate satirical prints, detailed allegories of finance and speculation, complex emblematic warnings of impending madness and penury, maps, and decks of cards.

This conference will bring together scholars from a number of different fields, including economics, history, art history, and literature to talk about this extraordinary volume, its context, and its aftermath. The three day conference includes presentations and breakout sessions for group discussions of individual prints and related works in a workshop setting.

The conference also includes a public plenary presentation by Professor Robert Shiller on the evening of Thursday, April 17 and a staged reading (in English) of Pieter Langendijks Arlequyn, Actionist (Arlequin, Stockbroker) on the evening of Friday, April 18.

Conference website: http://icf.som.yale.edu/GREAT_MIRROR/index.shtml
News Release (pdf file)

2007

Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry, Art, and the Book
March 13-14, 2008
In conjunction with the exhibition “Metaphor Taking Shape: Poetry, Art, and the Book,” a symposium featuring poets, artists, publishers, and critics in conversation. Speakers include Carolee Campbell, Macy Chadwick, Steve Clay, Simon Cutts, Johanna Drucker, Ann Lauterbach, Anna Moschovakis, C. Mikal Oness, Kyle Schlesinger, Buzz Spector, C. D. Wright, and John Yau.
Registration is free, but required for planning purposes. The deadline for registration is Monday, 25 February 2008.

At the Turn of the Centuries
The Influence of Early Twentieth-Century Book Arts on Contemporary Artists' Books
April 13, 2007
This symposium will consider the work of various innovative and avant-garde artists and writers working around the turn of the twentieth century, including the Dadaists and Surrealists, and its influence on post-war artists and writers, including those associated with OULIPO and Fluxus, and contemporary inheritors of these traditions in art, literature, and bookwork.

2006

Mapping the Worlds of Sixteenth-Century Mexico
September 15 - 16, 2006
Symposium participants will treat a broad range of topics relevant to studies of the early colonial period in Central Mexico, including the changing politics of land usage, the role of women in society, and the place of religious institutions in the Nahua-Christian world. The symposium will also examine other related manuscripts from sixteenth-century Mexico and their social, cultural, and visual contexts

2005

Friedrich Schiller
November 4-5, 2005
In commemoration of the 200th anniversary of Friedrich Schiller's death.

Literary Biography of the Twentieth Century
October 13-14, 2005
The conference highlighted the strengths of the Yale Collection of American Literature in the areas of American Modernism, the Harlem Renaissance, and twentieth century American poetry.

Alexis de Tocqueville
September 30 - October 1, 2005
In commemmoration of the bicentennial of his birth.

2004

John Locke through the Centuries: Assessing the Lockean Legacy, 1704-2004
October 28-30
An international conference commemorating the tercentenary of Locke's death.

Witold Gombrowicz
October 22-23
An international conference commemorating the centenary of Witold Gombrowicz' birth.

Henry Fielding
October 8-9
In commemoration of the 250th anniversary of Henry Fielding's death.