The symposium ‘What is a letter? An interdisciplinary approach’ will bring together experts on letter writing from a diverse range of disciplines (including literary and cultural studies in a number of modern languages, linguistics, editorial studies, sociology, and history), countries (including Austria, Britain, and Germany), and institutions (including universities, museums, and libraries).

Against the background of a rapidly and internationally growing number of research and editing projects which centre around letters, the aim of the symposium is threefold: (i) to initiate a much-needed dialogue between disciplines (and scholars from different countries) about the theoretical concepts of ‘the letter’ which form the basis for any engagement with epistolary culture; (ii) to lay the foundations for an inclusive and interdisciplinary methodology for analysing letters, taking into account their subject-specific definitions and uses, and (iii) to make the results of these efforts available to other scholars through publication of the conference proceedings.

Please note: English and German are the working languages of the symposium. An interpreter will be present to summarize papers and assist with the discussion.

Programme :

Wednesday, 2 July

11:30 Registration
12:30 Welcome

Session I: Aspects of epistolarity

12:45 : Michael Sinding – The evolution of epistolarity: conceptual blending in genre transformation
13:30 : Robert Vellusig – Die Poesie des Briefes. Eine literaturanthropologische Skizze
14:15 : Coffee break

14:45 : Nicholas Cronk – Voltaire’s correspondence: When is a letter not a letter?
15:30 : Grace Egan – From ‘post to post’: epistolary valediction and the ‘horror of the last’
16:15 : Coffee break

16:45 : Oliver Herford – Letters, performance and performativity
17:30 : Alan Scott – Letters 2.0? Linguistic insights into the extent to which social media are a substitute for personal letters
19.30 : Pub evening (opt-in)

Thursday, 3 July

08:45 Registration

Session II: Concepts and contexts

09:00: Liz Stanley – ‘Here it ends with my pen, but not my heart’: letterness and the many ends of ‘the letter’
09:45 : Inka Kording – Epistolarisches – Die achtfache Relationalität des Briefes
10:30 : Coffee break

11:00 : Patrick Reinard – ‚…die Hälfte eines Dialoges‘? Briefe auf Papyri und Ostraka. Überlegung zur quellenkritischen Auswertung
11:45 : Zeev Kitsis – Letter writing and knowledge cybernetics in Rabbinic literature of the twentieth century

12:30 Lunch (own arrangements)

13:30 – 14:30 Seminar at the Bodleian Library

Session III: Transmission and postal history

14:45 : Pamela Clemit – Godwin’s letters: transmissions of value
15:30 : Katarzyna Jastal – Der Brief als Sammelobjekt bei Karl August Varnhagen von Ense
16:15 : Coffee break

16:45 : Emma Harper – From cross-written letters to human ones: how postal reforms changed the letter
17:30 : Julia Gillen – The Edwardian postcard revolution – a literacy studies perspective
19:30 : Conference dinner

Friday, 4 July

08:45 Registration

Session IV: Interpretation and materiality

09:00 : Jochen Strobel – Historische Semantik des Briefs und die Chancen digitaler Briefeditionen
09:45 : Caroline Socha – Der Status von Briefbeigaben in der Verlegerkorrespondenz – eine editionsphilologische Perspektive
10:30 : Coffee break

11:00 : Jana Dambrogio/Daniel Starza Smith – Using historic letterlocking to reseal the letters of John Donne: a collaborative approach to letters

12:00 – 13:15 Workshop : Lik Hang Tsui – * Letter writing, calligraphy, and literati taste in medieval China: a reading of a manuscript letter by Mi Fu
Lena Vosding – Gaben aus dem Kloster – die Briefe der Lüner Benediktinerinnen (1460-1550)

13:15 – 14:45 : Lunch (sandwich lunch provided)

14:45 – 15:30 : Discussion and conclusion

15:30 – 16:30 Workshop – postscriptum: An exercise in letter locking (Jana Dambrogio/Daniel Starza Smith)