WIlliam Faulkner
William Faulkner, 1962, Martin J. Dain, Courtesy Martin J. Dain Collection, Southern Media Archive, Special Collections, University of Mississippi Libraries

The 39th Annual Faulkner & Yoknapatawpha Conference

FIFTY YEARS AFTER FAULKNER

July 7-11, 2012

Lodging | Registration | Schedule | Speakers | Transportation
Optional Tours | Posters | Southern Writing Graduate Conference
William Faulkner Remembrance

Becoming Faulkner: Pedagogy, Popular Culture, and Faulkner's Aesthetics
A course on teaching Faulkner with a particular focus on high school teachers offered during the Second Summer Session at The University of Mississippi

CONFERENCE PROGRAM

The 2012 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference, "Fifty Years after Faulkner," will gather writers, teachers, and literary scholars for five days of lectures and discussions reflecting on the author's life, art, and achievement from the vantage point of the half century since his death in 1962. In addition to four keynote lectures, there will be numerous panel presentations (including a writers panel), guided daylong tours of North Mississippi, the Delta, and Memphis, and sessions on "Teaching Faulkner" by James B. Carothers, University of Kansas, Terrell L. Tebbetts, Lyon College, Charles Peek, University of Nebraska at Kearney, and Theresa M. Towner, University of Texas at Dallas.

The conference will begin on Saturday, July 7, with the tour day. Formal ceremonies will commence on Sunday, July 8, with a reception at the University Museum at which artist John Turner Shorb will introduce his featured exhibition “Absalom, Absalom!,” a series of mixed-media works exploring the themes of memory and loss in the American South and finding a key source of inspiration in Faulkner's 1936 novel.

After the Museum reception, the academic program will open with a keynote address and panel presentation, followed by a buffet supper and an evening schedule featuring the writer's panel, where William Gay, Chris Offutt, and Olivia Milch will discuss Faulkner's work from a craft perspective. Over the next three days, a busy schedule of lectures and panels will also make room for "Faulkner on the Fringe," an open mike evening at the Southside Gallery, an afternoon cocktail reception, a picnic served at Faulkner's home, Rowan Oak, and a closing party on Wednesday. Throughout the conference, the University's John Davis Library will display Faulkner books, manuscripts, photographs, and memorabilia. The University Press of Mississippi will exhibit Faulkner books published by university presses throughout the United States, and there will be a display, with books for sale, by collector Seth Berner, who will also give a brown bag lunch presentation on "Collecting Faulkner."

SOUTHERN WRITERS, SOUTHERN WRITING GRADUATE STUDENT CONFERENCE

The 18th annual Southern Writers, Southern Writing Graduate Conference is set for July 12–14, 2012, at the University of Mississippi. Both critical and creative submissions will be accepted, dealing with all aspects of Southern culture. Submissions to the conference are not limited to literary studies—we are interested in all interdisciplinary approaches to Southern culture. Deadline for submissions is 5:00 p.m., April 2. Professor Suzanne Marrs (Millsaps College) will give the keynote lecture. Contact Victoria Bryan at swswgradconference@gmail.com for more information.

SPEAKERS

Ted Atkinson, associate professor of English at Mississippi State University and author of Faulkner and the Great Depression: Aesthetics, Ideology, and Cultural Politics.

Michael Bibler, lecturer in American Literature and Culture at Manchester University and author of Cotton's Queer Relations: Same-Sex Intimacy and the Literature of the Southern Plantation, 1936–1968.

Deborah Clarke, professor of English at Arizona State University and author of Robbing the Mother: Women in Faulkner.

Deborah Cohn, associate professor of Spanish and Portuguese at Indiana University and author of History and Memory in the Two Souths: Recent Southern and Spanish American Fiction.

David A. Davis, assistant professor of English at Mercer University and author of numerous essays on Southern literature and culture.

David M. Earle, assistant professor of English at West Florida University and author of Recovering Modernism.

Joseph Fruscione, adjunct professor of English at George Mason University and author of Faulkner and Hemingway: Biography of a Literary Rivalry.

Matthew Pratt Guterl, Rudy Professor of American Studies and History at Indiana University and author of The Color of Race in America, 1900–1940.

John Howard, professor of American Studies at King's College, London, and author of Men Like That: A Southern Queer History.

Gordon Hutner, professor of English at the University of Illinois, author of What America Read: Taste, Class, and the Novel, 1920–1960, and editor of American Literary History.

Cheryl Lester, associate professor of English and American Studies at the University of Kansas and author of numerous essays on American literature and culture.

Olivia Milch wrote her M.A. thesis at Yale University on the history and settlement of Oxford, Mississippi. She is currently adapting Light in August as a miniseries for HBO.

Sharon Monteith, professor of American Studies at the University of Nottingham and author of Advancing Sisterhood? Interracial Friendships in Contemporary Southern Fiction.

Richard Moreland, professor and chair of English at Louisiana State University, author of Faulkner and Modernism: Rereading and Rewriting, and editor of A Companion to William Faulkner.

Alan Nadel, William T. Bryan Professor of American Studies at the University of Kentucky and author of Containment Culture: American Narratives, Postmodernism, and the Atomic Age.

Chris Offutt, author of six books, including the forthcoming story collection Luck, teaches English and screenwriting at the University of Mississippi.

François Pitavy, emeritus professor of English at the University of Bourgogne and author of Faulkner's "Light in August."

Ramón Saldívar, Hoagland Professor of Humanities and Sciences at Stanford University and author of The Borderlands of Culture: Américo Paredes and the Transnational Imaginary.

Mab Segrest, Fuller-Maathai Professor of Gender and Women's Studies at Connecticut College and author of Memoir of a Race Traitor and My Mama's Dead Squirrel: Lesbian Essays on Southern Culture.

Hortense Spillers, Gertrude Conaway Vanderbilt Professor of English at Vanderbilt University and author of Black, White, and in Color: Essays on American Literature and Culture.

Harilaos "Harry" Stecopoulos, associate professor of English at the University of Iowa and author of Reconstructing the World: Southern Fictions and U.S. Imperialisms, 1898–1976.

Terrell L. Tebbetts, Martha Heasley Cox Chair in American Literature at Lyon College and editor of the Faulkner Journal's special issue on "Faulkner in Contemporary Fiction."

Charles Reagan Wilson, Kelly Gene Cook Sr. Chair of History and Professor of Southern Studies, and author of Flashes of a Southern Spirit: Meanings of the Spirit in the U.S. South.

Sally Wolff-King, adjunct professor of English at Emory University and author of Ledgers of History: William Faulkner, an Almost Forgotten Friendship, and an Antebellum Plantation Diary.

Additional speakers and panelists will be selected from the "Call for Papers" Competition.

REGISTRATION INFORMATION

The registration fee for the conference BEFORE June 21 is $150 for students, $250 for Friends of the Center, and $275 for other participants. The fee AFTER June 21 is $175 for students, $275 for Friends, and $300 for others. The fee includes admission to all program events, a buffet supper on Sunday, a reception on Monday, a picnic at Rowan Oak on Tuesday, conference session refreshments, and a closing reception on Wednesday. The fee does not cover lodging, the optional tours of Faulkner Country, and meals, except for those aforementioned. A deposit of $50, made payable to The University of Mississippi, should be submitted with a conference registration form. Please also include prepayment of $95, for a total of $145, if you are registering for an optional guided tour. The remainder of the fees will be payable at registration on July 8.

Click here to download the registration form. (PDF)

The student certification section of the registration form must be completed for all registrants who pay the student fee. A department head or academic dean must sign the form. Registrants who contribute to the Center between August 2011 and July 2012 are eligible for the Friends fee.

Student Group Discount Package: A special package is available for five or more students who attend the conference as a group. The package includes the conference registration fee and the Saturday tour, for $150. Accommodations, travel, and meals (other than those covered by the conference registration fee) are the responsibility of the individual. A designated person within the group must be identified as the group leader, who should submit the registration forms and deposits by June 25. Receipts and correspondence will be sent to the leader, who will be responsible for collecting the balance, presenting fee checks at on-site registration on July 8, and otherwise assisting with arrangements for members of the group. The group leader will receive a complimentary registration. Group registration must be done using the printable form only, or by contacting Barbara Thompson at bthompso@olemiss.edu or 662-915-5811.

A limited number of waivers of the registration fee are available for graduate students. Contact Jay Watson at jwatson@olemiss.edu for details.

Refunds: A refund will be made, less a $10 service charge, provided cancellations of reservations are made in writing and postmarked no later than June 25. No refunds will be made after that date.

ACCOMMODATING SPECIAL NEEDS

If you require assistance relating to a disability or have special dietary requirements, please contact Barbara Thompson at 662-915-5811 prior to the conference.

LODGING

On-campus lodging is available at the Inn at Ole Miss, and Oxford Square lodging is available at Downtown Inn & Suites. Both hotels are convenient to campus, include a complimentary continental breakfast, and offer special conference rates. Persons should make their own reservations. Phone numbers (area code 662) are listed below.

Housing in Ole Miss Dormitoriesis also available. Rates are as follows, per person:
Single: $50/night with linens provided, $45/night without linens.
Double: $40/night with linens provided, $35/night without linens.

Reservations should be submitted to Robert Fox via e-mail at rfox@olemiss.edu or by calling 662-915-1408. Dormitory reservations are required by June 21 to ensure rooms.

TEACHING FAULKNER

All registrants, whether they are teachers or not, are welcome at these sessions.

TRANSPORTATION

Persons who plan to fly to the conference should book their flights to and from Memphis (Tennessee) International Airport. The University will provide a shuttle service for conference participants who arrive at the Memphis International Airport (approximately 75 miles or 1 hour and 15 minutes drive). The cost of the shuttle is $135 round trip or $85 one way. Shuttle reservations must be made and paid for in advance. If you would like to use the University shuttle service, please copy and fill out the reservation form below and enclose it with your conference registration form. Shuttles will be confirmed via e-mail on Friday, June 29. Please meet your shuttle driver inside the airport and nearby Baggage Claim, Area B escalator. (AMTRAK shuttle cost is $135 round trip or $85 one way.)

MEMPHIS AIRPORT SHUTTLE SERVICE

Shuttle Service for participants arriving at the Memphis International Airport will be provided from Thursday, July 5, through Sunday, July 15, at the following times:

Memphis Departures
*(Shuttle leaves the airport at these times.)
Oxford Departures
**(Shuttle leaves Oxford at these times.)
10:00 a.m.
8:00 a.m.
2:00 p.m.
Noon
6:00 p.m.
4:00 p.m.

* Schedule your flight arrival 30-40 minutes (or more) before these shuttle departure times from Memphis.

** Schedule your flight departure 2 hours (or more) after these shuttle departure times from Oxford.

*** Should your arriving flight be delayed, please call 662-915-7015 and leave a voice mail message with your name and new arrival time. However, should you be unable to meet the next shuttle(s) you will be required to stay over in Memphis and take the 10:00 a.m. shuttle the next day, or rent a car. There is a Radisson Inn on the airport property, and it can be reached at 901-332-2370.

Please complete the reservation on the registration form and submit no later than June 29, 2012, with appropriate payment. Please retain a duplicate copy for your information.

CONFERENCE SCHEDULE

The conference will open on Saturday, July 7, with the guided tours of Faulkner Country for attendees who have preregistered and prepaid. Conference registration opens Sunday, July 8, at 10:00 a.m. in the E. F. Yerby Conference Center. A reception at the University Museum is set for 1:00 p.m., followed by the first keynote speaker at 2:30. The conference will conclude with the closing party scheduled for the afternoon of Wednesday, July 11. A detailed program will be provided with our conference acknowledgment letter.

OPTIONAL TOURS: Saturday, July 7

You will be given an opportunity to spend a day touring one of the areas listed below. All tours depart from Oxford at 9:00 a.m. and return around 3:30 p.m. except where noted. There is limited space on all tours, but specifically, the Oxford and Lafayette County Architectural Tour is limited to 25 and the Mississippi Delta Tour is limited to 45. The tours are optional and are available for an additional fee of $95, which must be prepaid in full along with the conference registration deposit of $50.

Oxford (overview): This tour moves throughout Oxford/Jefferson and Lafayette/Yoknapatawpha County. This tour will have lunch with the Oxford Architecture group. Some walking is required.

Oxford (architecture): This is a look at Faulkner-connected and other historic structures in the Oxford-University community with a side trip for lunch. The tour includes visits inside three or four private homes and "curbside tours" of others. Also included are the campus, the Square, the Oxford cemetery, and the College Hill Church, where Faulkner and Estelle Oldham were married. Some walking is required.

New Albany and Ripley: The Faulkners came to Oxford from Ripley and New Albany. The tour travels to the New Albany Museum and then on to the Ripley City Library, where Tommy Covington will talk about the Ripley/Faulkner background. The tour will go to the Ripley cemetery, where Faulkner's great-grandfather, "The Old Colonel" and model for John Sartoris, is buried beneath his impressive statue.

The Mississippi Delta: This tour consists of a circuitous drive to Clarksdale by way of Charleston, Sumner, and Tutwiler. The tour focuses not only on the hunting camps of Faulkner's fiction but also on the music of the Delta, the Mississippi blues. The Delta Blues Museum in Clarksdale is the centerpiece of our visit there. The historic district includes the childhood home of Tennessee Williams. After lunch, we wind our way back to Oxford and usually return between 4:30 and 5:00 p.m.

Memphis: This tour begins at the National Civil Rights Museum housed in the historic Lorraine Hotel. We'll enjoy a barbecue lunch before an afternoon ramble that will take us by Beale Street and the Peabody Hotel.

FAULKNER POSTERS

Flat copies of Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference posters with illustrations by Glennray Tutor (1989–1993), John McCrady (1994, 2003, 2005), and William Faulkner (2007) and with photographs by Martin Dain (1996, 2009, 2012), Jack Cofield (1997, 2000), Bern Keating (1998), Odione (1990), Budd Studios (2002), Phyllis Cerf (2008), Alfred Eris (2010), Henri Cartier-Bresson (2011), and from the Cofield Collection (2001), the Williams Library (2004), and the Commercial Appeal (2006) are available for $10.00 each plus $3.50 postage and handling. Mississippi residents add 7 percent sales tax.

Also available are two posters with duotone photographs of William Faulkner, one made by Martin J. Dain and the other by Colonel J. R. Cofield. Each poster costs $18.95 plus $5.00 postage and handling. Mississippi residents add 7 percent sales tax.

Send all orders to the Center for the Study of Southern Culture with a check made payable to the University of Mississippi or with Visa or MasterCard account number and expiration date. Credit card orders also may be made by calling 800-390-3527.

SPECIAL THANKS

The 2012 Faulkner and Yoknapatawpha Conference poster is produced through the generous support of the City of Oxford and the Oxford Convention and Visitors Bureau.

"A WILLIAM FAULKNER REMEMBRANCE"

On Friday, July 6, 2012, a day-long program marking the 50th anniversary of William Faulkner's death will include a marathon reading of The Reivers, addresses by scholar Philip Weinstein and author Randall Kenan, and a screening of the 1969 film adaptation of The Reivers. All remembrance events will be free and open to the general public. For details, contact Jay Watson at jwatson@olemiss.edu.

Becoming Faulkner: Pedagogy, Popular Culture, and Faulkner's Aesthetics

A course on teaching Faulkner with a particular focus on high school teachers offered during the Second Summer Session at The University of Mississippi

July 2-July 13, 2012

The University of Mississippi will offer a graduate-level course, ENGL 566, Faulkner Studies, in conjunction with next summer's conference. The class will incorporate all conference sessions and related events in its schedule of contact hours. Conference registration will be included in the course tuition. Affordable dormitory lodging will be available on the U of M campus. ENGL 566 is intended for teachers and graduate students seeking to enhance the conference experience by deepening their critical, pedagogical, and personal engagement with Faulkner's writings while also obtaining transferable credit hours Click here to find out more about this course.

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