CFP: MLA 2004 (Philadelphia), “Political Theater, Mimesis, and the Limits of Empathy”

Proposals are being accepted until March 15 for an MLA special session sponsored by the G.E. Lessing Society on “Political Theater, Mimesis, and the Limits of Empathy.”

This session will consider formulations of mimesis and empathy in German dramatic theory and practice during the long eighteenth century, questioning in particular the implications of stated or implied boundaries (cognitive, emotional, political, ethnic, religious, linguistic, etc.) of empathetic identification. Proposals for theoretical analysis focused upon earlier (Reformation, Baroque) or later (19th-21st-centuries) German sources may also be considered.

Please send abstract (1 page) and brief cv in the body of an email by March 15 via email or fax to Sara Eigen.