Mini-Conference 2023

The Modernities MA program and the Medieval MA program recently participated in the annual Textualities mini-conference. I was quite anxious in the days leading up to this event. Though I’ve become fairly comfortable with public speaking over the last few years, this presentation in particular had me on edge. I think the idea that it kind represented the culmination of all of our hard work felt a bit intimidating. However, as the day came to a close, I felt proud of what I did and the effort I put into it.

We had the option to either present on a topic that was related to the research we were conducting for our thesis or on a completely unrelated topic. For me personally, I felt it would be beneficial to present on a topic related to my thesis; I figured that receiving feedback, good or bad, at this stage in our research process would be instrumental in the success of the final product. I decided to present on Anne Enright’s The Forgotten Waltz. The novel, which I hadn’t read prior to this year, was kindly recommended to me by a professor in the Creative Writing department after I explained that I was hoping to write a thesis that surrounded Contemporary Irish Literature during and after the Celtic Tiger years. The title of my presentation was “[It’s] a Toy House: Performing Identity in Anne Enright’s The Forgotten Waltz”. I primarily focused on the main character, Gina, and how her romantic and familial relationships exhibit connections to Ireland’s more rigid and conservative past. I wanted to examine the ways that oppressive or stereotypical gender roles, for example, can still situate themselves in a country that had become the figurehead for modernity and wealth. While I still feel my topic as a whole needs quite a bit of work, I think the mini-conference really helped me to determine the direction I want to take my thesis.

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Below I'll include the social media/hashtags that are associated with this year's conference!

Instagram: Textualities_2023

Twitter: Search the hashtag #textualities2023

Blog: Hcommons.org Textualities 2023

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Works Cited:

Bracken, Claire, and Susan Cahill, editors. Anne Enright. Irish Academic Press, 2011.

Enright, Anne. The Forgotten Waltz. Jonathan Cape, 2011.