Atlantic Archipelagos Research Project 2013 State of the Art Conference

The Atlantic Archipelagos Research Project (AARP) is a forum to think about identities, cartographies and cultural ecologies. First conceived of in context of the islands of Britain and Ireland, this conference offers the first opportunity to expand the idea into North America. In doing so it coincides with established interests at UGA in the environment, ecology, art and creative writing, including the Institute of Native American Studies’ conference on the “Red Atlantic.”

Our horizon includes engagement with international colleagues to establish a world-class specialism in the study and research of “archipelago” as a creative, intellectual, and political concept that connects pillars of research in existence at UGA. In doing so AARP builds new connections between the Willson Center and its regional, national and international partners, including Emory, Exeter, NUI Galway, Trinity College Dublin, University College Dublin, the Universities of London, of Liverpool and of York.

AARP begins with a reading by Ciaran Carson on Wednesday, April 10 at 7 pm in the Special Collections Libraries Building at UGA. Carson will be introduced by Paul Gleeson, Consul General for Ireland. The conference continues on Thursday and Friday, April 11–12 with panel discussions and lectures from an international array of speakers. AARP moves to Sapelo Island on Friday, April 12, where participants will learn more of the complex histories of the Georgia coast.

This meeting follows three significant milestones in the history of AARP. The first was a one-day salon to discuss the work of the writer and cartographer Tim Robinson at Cambridge University in the Spring of 2011; the second was a major international symposium on Robinson’s work in Galway in Autumn 2011, which was part-funded by the British Academy; third was the Over the Irish Sea conference that took place in University College Dublin in April 2012.

The intellectual questions we intend to raise through AARPCiaran Carson speak powerfully to the “archipelago” as an activity and as a way of visiting the landscape in new ways. Our textual and cartographic practice can be read as “economising” or “environmentalising” the land through a succession of contexts, from the literary to the geophysical.

Our conceptual aim is to analyse the tensions in coupling identity and nationhood with ecology and the environment, relationships usually underplayed or overlooked in similar projects. To this end, we have selected potential participants with certain specialisms: the Atlantic and capitalism; early modern culture and transnational exchange; literary and cultural theory; literary environmentalism and nature writing; cartography and literary mapping; archipelagic, regional and national identities.

This AARP meeting is a State-of-the-Art Conference sponsored by the Office of the Provost at UGA, in partnership with the British-Irish Studies Program; Center for Native American Studies; Creative Writing Program; Center for Undergraduate Research Opportunities; Department of English; Department of History; and Russell Special Collections Libraries.

All AARP events are free and open to the public. For more information contact Dave Marr, Willson Center communications specialist, at davemarr@uga.edu.

The full conference schedule is available here.