Community & Culture
6th Annual GOTH Symposium
EVENT: 6th Annual GOTH Symposium
Free of charge and open to all.
CFP DEADLINE: 12 December 2025
EVENT DATE: Friday 15 May 2026
ORGANIZERS: The Open University Centre for Research into Gender and Otherness in the Humanities
GUEST PANEL: The Open University Medieval and Early Modern Research Group
TYPE: F2F
HOST: Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, School of Arts & Humanities
LOCATION: The Open University, Milton Keynes, Library Seminar Room 7.
THEME: Gender and otherness in drama, literature, creative writing and visual culture.
REGISTRATION: via Eventbrite (https://6th-Annual-GOTH-Symposium.eventbrite.co.uk)
The Annual GOTH Symposium welcomes scholars from within and outside The Open University for productive interdisciplinary discussion and debate. The Program Committee invites proposals for presentations focusing on any aspects of gender and/or otherness in creative writing or pre-modern drama, literature and visual culture, in two formats:
1. Postgraduate students only: 5-minute lightning papers on any aspects of human gender and otherness in creative writing or drama, literature and/or visual culture.
2. Open call: 15-minute papers focusing on any aspects of gender and otherness in creative writing or drama, literature and/or visual culture, with particular emphasis on:
o performed otherness
o otherness in secular dramatic texts
o otherness in religious drama (eg convent drama, liturgical drama within the church, performances of Biblical episodes or Saint's lives in religious and/or secular spaces).
o understanding performed otherness through the study of performativity, gesture, costume, crossdressing and/or textiles.
o Dark tourism and memorialisation
o Ekphrasis
o The portrayal and representation of “other” in creative writing
o The role of the outsider in contemporary writing
o The role of the body political in contemporary writing
o The Gothic genre in contemporary writing
o the role of gender in cultural creation, performance and patronage
o cultural patronage as a pathway to female legal power and status.
o Ways of using gender, costume, cross-dressing and textiles to study and reframe dramatic narrative (eg women as 'story-weavers' /embroiderers of vestments/costumes).
Radical Otherness? Utopia and other ideal societies in the medieval and early modern world, with topics including but not limited to:
o Self and other in visual, literary and musical utopias
o Gender, race, age and disability
o Self and other in monastic and other ideal communities
Please submit your proposal (200 words max) and academic bio (100 words max) on or before the CFP deadline of 12 December 2025, to m.a.katritzky@open.ac.uk & FASS-GOTH-Admin@open.ac.uk. All presenters who stay for the whole symposium will be provided with 1 night of paid accommodation (14-15 May) and all refreshments on the day.
Further information on the event and registration is being posted on the GOTH website as it becomes available: http://fass.open.ac.uk/research/centres/goth.
Inquiries on any aspect of the symposium may be emailed to FASS-GOTH-Admin@open.ac.uk.
Circulated on behalf of Team GOTH
Consultant: Dr Chloe Fairbanks
Committee:
· M A Katritzky – Director, GOTH & Professor of Theatre Studies, OU, ECW
· Dr Andrew Murray, GOTH EDI Co-ordinator, Lecturer in Art History, OU
· Mrs Jennie Owen, GOTH Health & Safety Co-ordinator, Lecturer in Creative Writing, OU, ECW.
· Isabelle Lepore, GOTH PG Forum Convenor (OU, ECW)
Please check GOTH website for latest details: http://fass.open.ac.uk/research/centres/goth
