THE BIRDS
NOW!
A symposium on the present state of Hitchcock criticism:
The case of The Birds (1963).
Location:
(at
the corner of
Notes on Birds-Watching
What to Watch for:
Each invited speaker will present a 5-minute précis detailing what to watch for in the film.
A Showing of The Birds (Rice Media Center Cinema)
Introductory Remarks
Graduate Student Presentations
Michael Griffiths (Rice): “The Birds: Revenge of the Sublime.”
Jeffrey Wright (Carnegie Mellon): “Hitchcock and Wasserman: Two Dirty Birds.”
Discussion
Break for Lunch (South Servery@Hanzen/Weiss College)
Invited Speaker Introductions
Invited Speaker Presentations/Discussion
- Lee Edelman,
Fletcher Professor of English Literature at
- Tom Cohen is Professor of Literary, Cultural and Media Studies at State University of New York Albany : TBA
- Susan Lurie, Associate Professor in the English
Department at
Bird-B[r]eak
Another Showing of The Birds (Rice Media Center Cinema)
II
Joshua D. Gonsalves, Assistant Professor of English at Rice has invited three readers of Hitchcock from the fields of queer theory, deconstruction and feminism to offer updates on their influential work on the film.
Lee Edelman, a leading queer theorist, is Fletcher Professor of English Literature at Tufts University and the author of several formative essays on Hitchcock: “Hitchcock’s Future,” “Rear Window’s Glasshole,” and “Piss Elegant: Freud, Hitchcock, and the Micturating Penis”. His books include No Future: Queer Theory and the Death Drive and Homographesis: Essays in Gay Literary and Cultural Theory.
Tom Cohen is Professor of Literary, Cultural and Media Studies at State University of New York Albany and a radical reader in the tradition of deconstruction. His books include Anti-Mimesis from Plato to Hitchcock, Ideology and Inscription: “Cultural Studies” after Benjamin, de Man, and Bakhtin, as well as Hitchcock’s Cryptonymies, Volume 1: Secret Agents; Volume 2: War Machines.
Susan Lurie, Associate Professor in
the English Department at
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The oeuvre of Alfred J. Hitchcock
continues to be a site where canonical and innovative critical paradigms are
tested, debated and elaborated. The aim of this symposium—The Birds Now!—is therefore to question the construction of
“Hitchcock” in literary, film and Hitchcock studies: to engage the issues,
problems and contradictions at the heart of the theoretical study of culture by
explicating the test case of The Birds.
Lee C. Edelman (Chair of the English Dept. and Fletcher Professor of English
Literature at Tufts University), one of the most prominent queer theorists and
Hitchcockians working today, will be presenting an update on his influential
essay on The Birds: “Hitchcock’s Future” (in Hitchcock:
Centenary Essays, ed. R. Allen and S. Gonzales, British Film Institute
Press, 1999). Feminist theorist Susan Lurie (Associate Professor in the
English Department at
The organizer of this symposium wishes to thank the English Department, The Dean of Humanities Office, The Program for the Study of Women, Gender and Sexuality, The Humanities Research Center, and The Rice University Media Center for facilitating this event, as well as Michael Griffiths, Joshua Kitching and Amanda Phillips.
IV
Post-Friday the 13th
The organizer would like to thank all that made the conference possible; the speakers who made it an intellectual event; the various departments, programs and centers at Rice;
the undergraduate and graduate students who helped out; the staff and colleagues who assisted and attended; and, of course, all who attended the happening:
POST-CONFERENCE PICTURE (from left to right):
Michael Griffiths, Tom Cohen, Lee Edelman, Susan Lurie,
Jeffrey Wright, Joshua D. Gonsalves….