South Central Modern Language Association

The 2010 SCMLA convention will be held 28–30 October at the Sheraton Fort Worth Hotel and Spa in Fort Worth, Texas. The convention will be made possible in part thanks to the support of the SCMLA’s local sponsors, Texas Christian University and the University of North Texas. This year’s theme is New Frontiers. Highlights will include Thursday’s keynote address, by University of Texas, Austin, professors Barbara Bullock and Jacqueline Toribio, “Language Variation and the Foreign Language Curriculum.” Friday’s plenary will be “Fences and Fatalism: Teaching Critical Languages and Cultures in a Connected Age” by Pete Smith, University of Texas, Arlington. The 2010 conference will feature a special event sponsored by SCMLA and its official journal, the South Central Review: Pascal Bruckner, one of France’s most important writers and intellectuals today, will speak on Friday, October 29, at 5:30 p.m.

The 2009 meeting was held in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, at the Hilton Baton Rouge Capitol Center Hotel, on the banks of the Mississippi River. Louisiana State University (LSU) hosted the gathering. Highlights included the Friday plenary address, “Reconfiguring the South as Fact and as Fiction,” by David Madden, creator of the US Civil War Center at LSU and chair of the Louisiana Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Commission. May Waggoner delivered Thursday evening’s keynote, “Waiter! There’s Some French in My Naturalism: The Francophone Literature of Nineteenth-Century Louisiana.” Many of the 99 regular, allied, and special sessions reflected the conference theme Continuity and Displacements. The 2009 Kirby Prize for Best Article Published in the South Central Review went to Elizabeth Spiller (Florida State Univ.) for her article “Shakespeare and the Making of Early Modern Science: Resituating Prospero’s Art” (vol. 26.1–2, Spring and Summer 2009). The SCMLA Book Award went to Logan Whalen (Univ. of Oklahoma), for his book Marie de France & the Poetics of Memory (Catholic U of America P, 2008). The best paper prizes went to Paige Martin Reynolds (Univ. of Central Arkansas), for her paper “Sin, Sacredness, and Childbirth in Early Modern Drama,” and Nuri Creager (Oklahoma State Univ.), for her paper “‘En el fondo soy poeta’: María Luisa Bombal’s French Post-Symbolist Poetics.” Research Abroad awards went to Hester Baer (Univ. of Oklahoma) and Julie Sievers (Saint Edward’s Univ.). Kevin Morrison (Rice Univ.) received the Graduate Student Grant.

The 2011 SCMLA conference will take place 27–29 October in Hot Springs, Arkansas, at the Arlington Resort Hotel and Spa. Special-session proposals on any topic, including those related to the convention theme Sources of Inspiration, will be accepted until 18 February 2011. For more information, e-mail SCMLA@ou.edu.

To join SCMLA, please contact Diana L. Hodges, SCMLA, Univ. of Oklahoma, 332 Cate Center Dr., Room 455, Norman, OK 73019 (405 325-6011; fax: 405 325-3720; scmla@ou.edu). You may also download a membership form at www.southcentralmla.org. The Web site features our online newsletter, which includes current calls for papers, deadline and grant application information, and details on all upcoming conferences.

The South Central Review publishes articles, interviews, and book reviews written in English on any aspect of literature, literary history, film, and cultural studies. Manuscripts and editorial correspondence should be addressed to Richard J. Golsan, Editor, South Central Review, Dept. of European and Classical Languages and Cultures, Texas A&M Univ., College Station 77843-4215.

Current SCMLA Executive Committee members are Deborah Arteaga (Univ. of Nevada, Las Vegas), President; Gwendolyn Díaz (Saint Mary’s Univ.), Vice President;  John Morris (Cameron Univ.), Past President; Nancy LaGreca Univ. of Oklahoma), Executive Director; Richard J. Golsan (Texas A&M Univ., College Station), Editor, South Central Review; Sharon Ugalde (Texas State Univ., San Marcos), Spanish Representative; Melissa Bailar (Rice Univ.), At-Large Representative; Linda McManness (Baylor Univ.), At-Large Representative; Anne Quinney (Univ. of Mississippi), French Representative; Caroline Huey (Univ. of Louisiana, Lafayette), German Representative; Luciana Namorato (Indiana Univ.), Russian and Less Commonly Taught Languages Representative; Viki Pettijohn Craig (Southwestern Oklahoma State Univ.), American Literature Representative; and Joe Cash (McNeese State Univ.), English Representative.

NANCY LAGRECA
Executive Director

DIANA HODGES
Assistant Program Director