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The ACH Guide to Digital-Humanities Talks at the 2006 MLA Convention


The Association for Computers and the Humanities has compiled this list of sessions with digital-humanities talks at the 2006 Modern Language Association Convention (in Philadelphia from December 27 through 30). Some of these sessions contain only one or two relevant talks, but this list includes the entire program for each session.

In most cases you must pay the convention-registration fee in order to attend these talks. But three sessions are free and open to the public: “The Sound of Poetry, the Poetry of Sound”, “Sounding the Visual”, and “Postmodernity: Liabilities and Opportunities”. MLA talks are published at the discretion of their authors; if you want to obtain the text of a talk you were unable to attend, the best method is to contact the author directly.

Although the 2006 convention is now in the past, this information will remain available, as a record of what went on. Similar information for many other years is available via the main page on ACH MLA sessions.

Corrections and additions are welcome; please send them to John.Lavagnino at kcl.ac.uk.


Summary of Sessions

Wednesday, 27 December 2006

5:15–6:30 p.m.

8:45–10:00 p.m.

Thursday, 28 December 2006

8:30–9:45 a.m.

10:00 or 10:15–11:30 or 11:45 a.m.

12:00 noon–1:15 p.m.

1:45–3:00 p.m.

3:30–4:45 p.m.

7:15–8:30 p.m.

Friday, 29 December 2006

8:30–9:45 a.m.

10:15–11:30 a.m.

12:00 noon–1:15 or 1:45 p.m.

1:45–3:00 p.m.

3:30–4:45 p.m.

7:15–8:30 p.m.

9:00–10:15 p.m.

Saturday, 30 December 2006

8:30–9:45 a.m.

10:15–11:30 a.m.

12:00 noon–1:15 p.m.

1:45–3:00 p.m.


30: Rhetoricizing Technology, Technologizing Rhetoric

Wednesday, 27 December 2006, 5:15–6:30 p.m., 411–412, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on the History and Theory of Rhetoric and Composition

Presiding: Peter Leslie Mortensen, University of Illinois, Urbana


91: iPod Capitalism

Wednesday, 27 December 2006, 8:45–10:00 p.m., 308, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Robert A. Wilkie, University at Albany, State University of New York


105: Innovative Uses of Technology in L1 and L2 Writing

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Regency Ballroom C, Loews.

Program arranged by the MLA Committee on Information Technology

108: Walter J. Ong's Orality and Literacy at Twenty-Five

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Congress C, Loews.

A special session.

Presiding: John P. Walter, Saint Louis University

For copies of abstracts, visit www.jpwalter.com/MLA2006.

111: Everquesting: Digital Learning and the Humanities

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Liberty Ballroom Salon C, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the MLA Executive Council

Presiding: Priscilla B. Wald, Duke University

112: Remapping Genre

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Commonwealth Hall A2, Loews.

Program arranged by the PMLA Editorial Board

Presiding: Wai Chee Dimock, Yale University


133: The Sound of Poetry, the Poetry of Sound

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 10:00–11:45 a.m., Regency Ballroom A & B, Loews.

The Presidential Forum. Presiding: Marjorie Gabrielle Perloff, Stanford University

For coordinated workshops, see meetings 192 and 244 and 272.

144: Screening the War Machine: Cinema, Sovreignty, Surveillance

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Film

Presiding: Anna Everett, University of California, Santa Barbara

155: Edition Wars

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., Grand Ballroom Salon I, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the MLA Committee on Scholarly Editions

Presiding: Nicholas Halmi, University of Washington, Seattle


173: Textual Materialities

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., Grand Ballroom Salon I, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Society for Textual Scholarship

Presiding: Neil Fraistat, University of Maryland, College Park

193: Wikis, Authority, and the Public Sphere: Examining the Impact of Dynamic, Multiauthored Digital Texts

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., Grand Ballroom Salon L, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Amit Ray, Rochester Institute of Technology

For copies of abstracts and working papers, visit http://honors.rit.edu/~wiki.

194: Literary Studies in the Public Sphere

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., Liberty Ballroom Salon C, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Jeffrey J. Williams, Carnegie Mellon University


232: Digital Medievalism and the Single Scholar

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 1:45–3:00 p.m., Grand Ballroom Salon K, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Association for Computers and the Humanities

Presiding: Dorothy Carr Porter, University of Kentucky

For copies of abstracts, visit www.ach.org/mla/mla06/ after 1 November.

233: Researching Advanced Foreign Language Learning

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 1:45–3:00 p.m., Washington C, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Applied Linguistics

Presiding: Julia R. Herschensohn, University of Washington, Seattle

244: Sounding the Visual

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 1:45–3:00 p.m., Regency Ballroom C, Loews.

A workshop arranged in conjunction with the forum “The Sound of Poetry, the Poetry of Sound”.

Presiding: Johanna Drucker, University of Virginia


268: Siting Citation: Quotation, Paratexts, and the Poetics of the Social

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., Grand Ballroom Salon L, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Alan C. Golding, University of Louisville

269: Bilingualism, Language Contact, and Language Learning

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., Congress B, Loews.

Program arranged by the Discussion Group on General Linguistics

Presiding: Roslyn Sue Raney, College of San Mateo, CA

270: (Re)Imaging the Performance Archive

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Drama

282: Digital Shakespeares

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., Liberty Ballroom Salon C, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Shakespeare

Presiding: Lowell Gallagher, University of California, Los Angeles


333: Reportage, Class, and War

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 7:15–8:30 p.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Nonfiction Prose Studies, Excluding Biography and Autobiography

Presiding: Jennifer L. Bernhardt Steadman, Trinity College, CT

337: High-Performance Computing and Textual Studies

Thursday, 28 December 2006, 7:15–8:30 p.m., Regency Ballroom C1, Loews.

Program arranged by the MLA Committee on Information Technology

Presiding: Geoffrey Rockwell, McMaster University


347: Research Instruction: Teaching Information Literacy with the MLA International Bibliography

Friday, 29 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., 404, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the MLA Advisory Committee on the MLA International Bibliography

Presiding: H. Faye Christenberry, University of Washington, Seattle

349: Theory of Mind across Disciplines

Friday, 29 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Liberty Ballroom Salon A, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Peter J. Simon, W. W. Norton

Respondent: Barbara Herrnstein Smith, Duke University

371: Cyphernetics: Signs, Codes, Texts

Friday, 29 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Literature and Science

Presiding: Arielle Saiber, Bowdoin College

381: The Digital Postcolonial

Friday, 29 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Commonwealth Hall A1, Loews.

Program arranged by the Discussion Group on Postcolonial Studies in Literature and Culture

Presiding: David Chioni Moore, Macalester College


390: Of Mass Graves and Transatlantic Exiles: Spain and the Civil War—Still Haunted after All These Years

Friday, 29 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., Regency Ballroom C1, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Twentieth-Century Spanish Literature

Presiding: Ofelia Ferrán, University of Minnesota, Twin Cities

398: Reading Code

Friday, 29 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Discussion Group on Media and Literature

Presiding: Rita M. Raley, University of California, Santa Barbara

Respondent: Mark Marino, University of Southern California

401: Television and Film Narratives

Friday, 29 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., 402–403, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Society for the Study of Narrative Literature

Presiding: Hilary P. Dannenberg, University of Bayreuth

For copies of abstracts, visit http://hilarydannenberg.uni-bayreuth.de/.

411: Closing Borders, Bridging Gaps? German Pop at the Millennium

Friday, 29 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., Washington A, Loews.

A special session.

Presiding: Anke S. Biendarra, University of California, Irvine


418: Postmodernity: Liabilities and Opportunities

Friday, 29 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:45 p.m., Liberty Ballroom Salon C, Philadelphia Marriott.

A forum. Presiding: Amy J. Elias, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

432: Contexts for Electronic Editing

Friday, 29 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., 404, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the MLA Committee on Information Technology

Presiding: Kenneth M. Price, University of Nebraska, Lincoln

448: Electronic Literature and Textual Scholarship

Friday, 29 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., Commonwealth Hall D, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Methods of Literary Research


462: The Impact of Identity, Authority, and Culture on Professional Communication

Friday, 29 December 2006, 1:45–3:00 p.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Association for Business Communication

Presiding: James K. Archibald, McGill University

For copies of abstracts, visit www.businesscommunication.org/.


502: Text and Hypertext: Dictionaries and Their Readers/Users

Friday, 29 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., 406, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Discussion Group on Lexicography

Presiding: Felicia Jean Steele, College of New Jersey

Respondent: John M. Morse, Merriam-Webster, Inc.

For copies of abstracts, visit http://steele.intrasun.tcnj.edu/mla/abstracts.

506: Resisting Texts: Teaching the Virtual Renaissance Book

Friday, 29 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on the Teaching of Literature

Presiding: David Scott Kastan, Columbia University

508: Children's Digital Literature and Culture

Friday, 29 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., Grand Ballroom Salon L, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Children's Literature Association

Presiding: Cathlena Martin, University of Florida

516: Electronic Textual Editing: What's Next?

Friday, 29 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., 203-A, Convention Center.

Program arranged by the MLA Committee on Scholarly Editions

Presiding: Martha Nell Smith, University of Maryland, College Park

For copies of abstracts visit www.mith.umd.edu/CSE/MLA2006.

530: Literature and the New Media Economy

Friday, 29 December 2006, 3:30–4:45 p.m., Washington A, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Luso-Brazilian Language and Literature

Presiding: Peggy L. Sharpe, Florida State University


570: Media Theory and Cultural Transformation

Friday, 29 December 2006, 7:15–8:30 p.m., Commonwealth Hall D, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Literary Criticism

Presiding: N. Katherine Hayles, University of California, Los Angeles

593: Deformative and Reformative Critical Practices

Friday, 29 December 2006, 7:15–8:30 p.m., 306, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Discussion Group on Computer Studies in Language and Literature

Presiding: Raymond G. Siemens, University of Victoria


611: The Lure and Violence of Globalized Digital Culture

Friday, 29 December 2006, 9:00–10:15 p.m., Congress C, Loews.

Program arranged by the Division on Comparative Studies in Twentieth-Century Literature

Presiding: Marcel H. Cornis-Pope, Virginia Commonwealth University


635: Writing the Machine: Materiality and Intentionality in Digital Poetry

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Commonwealth Hall A1, Loews.

A special session.

Presiding: Charles Alexander Baldwin, West Virginia University, Morgantown

For copies of abstracts, visit www.acsu.buffalo.edu/~lemerson/.

649: Meet the Bloggers: Blogging and the Future of Academia

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., 308, Philadelphia Marriott.

A special session.

Presiding: Scott Kaufman, University of California, Irvine

Respondent: Scott McLemee, Inside Higher Ed.

For copies of abstracts, visit http://acephalous.typepad.com/abstract.html.

653: Experimental Poetry and the Visual Arts

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 8:30–9:45 a.m., Grand Ballroom Salon K, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Twentieth-Century American Literature

Presiding: Marianne DeKoven, Rutgers University, New Brunswick


684: Early Modern Englishwomen in the Book Trades: A Session in Honor of Katharine F. Pantzer

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 10:15–11:30 a.m., Grand Ballroom Salon K, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Division on Methods of Literary Research

Presiding: Elizabeth H. Hageman, University of New Hampshire, Durham


707: Challenges of the Future: Foregrounding Diversity in the WPA Palette

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., 302, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Council of Writing Program Administrators

Presiding: Dominic DelliCarpini, York College, PA

723: Editing's Cultural Work: Building the Electronic New Variorum Shakespeare

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 12:00 noon–1:15 p.m., 308, Philadelphia Marriott.

Program arranged by the Association for Computers and the Humanities

Presiding: Alan Galey, University of Alberta

For copies of abstracts, visit www.ach.org/mla/mla06/ after 1 November.


755: History and Comparative Literature: The Future

Saturday, 30 December 2006, 1:45–3:00 p.m., Commonwealth Hall D, Loews.

Program arranged by the American Comparative Literature Association

Presiding: Eric R. J. Hayot, University of Arizona, Tucson