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The editors of Modern Fiction Studies seek essays for inclusion in a special issue entitled "Paris, Modern Fiction, and the Black Atlantic." We welcome new approaches to the study of diasporic modernism that challenge the traditional depiction of Paris as the meeting-point of great minds. This special issue aims to show Paris to be a site of provisional and contingent subjectivities, a city whose ties to the modern mark the emergence of work that seeks psychological and historical agency beyond the claims of the individual subject.
Responding to recent critical studies of transnational black culture in the twentieth century, contributors should examine the travels made to Paris (whether literally or imaginatively) by black writers of American, Caribbean, and African descent. As significant for its imaginary topography as for its actual landscape, the Paris inhabited by these writers offers a provocative means for exploring the circulation of objects and concepts that Paul Gilroy has named the Black Atlantic. Why did Paris become such an important place for such writers—especially those whose work fought against the dominance of capitals, boundaries, nations, or empires?
We are especially interested in essays that explore how the interactions between black expatriate fiction writers and European intellectual movements (Marxism, psychoanalysis, cubism, surrealism, existentialism) became instrumental to broader intellectual and political projects: struggles against colonialism and imperialism; redefinitions of or resistances to colonial, national, or racial identity; or even the interrogation of individual subjectivity itself.
Queries should be directed to Jonathan Eburne (jpe11@psu.edu), or to Jeremy Braddock (jbraddoc@haverford.edu). Articles should range from 20-30 pages and should conform to the current MLA Style Manual. Please submit two copies of your essay to The Editors, Mfs, Department of English, Purdue University, 500 Oval Dr., West Lafayette, IN 47907-2038.
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