Organizers: Arline Cravens (Saint Louis University), Annie Smart (Saint Louis University)

Saint Louis University, St. Louis, Missouri USA

The conference theme, Frontiers, Borders and Gateways, is inspired by the event’s location and the unique history of St. Louis. St. Louis, Missouri – often called the “River City” or the “Gateway City” – sits along the west bank of the Mississippi River and served as the “Gateway to the West.” St. Louis’s most distinctive monument, the Gateway Arch, commemorates the “great explorers, Lewis and Clark, and the hardy hunters, trappers, frontiersmen and pioneers who contributed to the territorial expansion and development of these United States,” in the words of the founding Jefferson National Expansion Memorial Association. The Arch represents a portal, the gateway through which passed those travelling West in search of a new life and new frontiers – but it is also a reminder of those who suffered from the violence of migration in 19th-century America. St. Louis was also known as “Mound City,” due to the earthworks of the Mississippian civilization. The “hardy pioneers” who settled in St. Louis destroyed the mounds, just as the native peoples were hunted down and displaced. Cahokia Mounds, in nearby Cahokia, Illinois, bear witness to what was once a vibrant Native American culture. “Car, hélas! tout s’en va ….”

The 23rd International George Sand Association Colloquium will explore the representation of new frontiers and borders in George Sand.

We invite contributions on topics including but not limited to the following:

· new frontiers in Sand Studies

· travel and migration

· identity (national, regional, class, …)

· music and art

· utopia and politics

· role of wilderness

· terroir (agriculture, farming, food)

· space (personal/domestic/public)

· human and non-human worlds

· Sand as trailblazer

· gender roles and the limits of gender

Submissions for individual papers or sessions may be in French or English and should be in the form of an abstract (250-300 words).

Deadline for submissions is 15 October 2021

Decisions will be sent by 1 December 2021