CFP - Material, Spatial and Sensory Encounters with the Picturebook Object

CFP: Material, Spatial and Sensory Encounters with the Picturebook Object
International Workshop at Koç University, Istanbul, Turkey, June 9 - 10, 2017

From hornbooks to i-pads, children’s reading experiences have been mediated via transforming book systems in ways serving to educate, to entertain, and to facilitate narrative. Material and sensory aspects of picturebooks also have the capacity to act as a third narrative system, operating beside words and images.These aspects may engage and challenge the child to comprehend a subject through the experiential handling of the picturebook, resulting in an embodied meaning-making process. The exposure to these types of picturebooks may turn into a creative encounter, curated experience, an event or a performance. Physical interactions may be explored further in printed as well as digital picturebooks with the rise of multimodal literacies supported with novel technologies that can support diverse needs.

Through this workshop we seek to explore the educational, developmental, creative and intimate qualities of materials and structures in picturebooks. What is the importance of materiality in meaning construction for the child? How do spatial and sensory encounters influence a child’s understanding of a narrative, their recollection of the story? What does the future hold in relation to the physical and digital realms of children’s reading? How can this reading experience involve active participation through different materialities?

The purpose of this international workshop is to bring together scholars and experts of children’s literature, children’s media, art and design, education, psychology and other cross-disciplinary fields from different countries who are particularly interested in picturebooks that explore material, spatial and sensory experiences. We therefore invite papers dealing with one or several of the following topics:

• picturebooks appealing to the senses (edible, audio, tactile, scented)
• accessories and inserted gadgets, altered vision in picturebooks
• transformative technology (surfaces, chemicals, and processes)
• materiality and metaphor
• materialities that support reading in special needs
• physical form and narrative correspondence (volvelles, panoramas, scrolls, accordion books etc.)
• unconventional handling of picturebooks
• physical space and narrative space, interactive reading
• picturebooks as an event, an installation, an architecture
• embodied reading of picturebooks

Invited and Confirmed Speakers (in alphabetical order):
Marnie Campagnaro, Università Degli Studi Di Padova, Italy
Hande Ilgaz, Bilkent University, Turkey
Bettina Kümmerling-Meibauer, University of Tübingen, Germany
Frank Serafini, Arizona State University, USA
Angela Yannicopoulou, University of Athens, Greece

Reading Committee (in alphabetical order):
Sandra Beckett, Brock University, Canada
Tilbe Göksun, Koç University, Turkey
Bettina Kümmerling-Meibauer, University of Tübingen, Germany
Aylin C. Küntay, Koç University, Turkey
Margaret Mackey, University of Alberta, Canada
Ilgım Veryeri-Alaca, Koç University, Turkey

Deadline for proposals: August 16, 2016
Please send abstracts of 500 words (for a thirty-minute paper), 5 keywords and a short biographical note (100 words) as e-mail attachment to convenor, Ilgım Veryeri-Alaca: ialaca@ku.edu.tr

Notification of acceptance: September 15, 2016

Deadline for extended abstracts for accepted papers: April 15, 2017 (Please send extended abstracts of 2000 words)

The format of the workshop consists of sessions with 30 minute presentations followed by discussion and plenary sessions with 45 minutes lectures given by the invited speakers. The proceedings of the workshop will be published in book form, in an international publication to be determined. The workshop, which is funded by Koç University, College of Social Sciences and Humanities seeks to explore the multimodal impact of material, spatial and sensorial encounters during reading of picturebooks for children.

Registration fees: Forty (40) Euros, payment on arrival (the registration fees include the workshop file, coffee-breaks, buffet snacks, reception dinner, the peer-reviewing and editing of all papers).

For further inquiries please contact: Ilgım Veryeri-Alaca: ialaca@ku.edu.tr, Koç University, Rumelifeneri Yolu, Department of Media and Visual Arts, Sarıyer, Istanbul, 34450, Turkey. https://kure.ku.edu.tr/en/