An International and Interdisciplinary Conference 11-12 September, 2014

Department of English and American Studies
Venue: lecture room J4.219
Organizers: Jarmila Mildorf & Till Kinzel

Confirmed keynote speakers:

Elke Huwiler (Amsterdam)

Alan Palmer (County Durham)

Sound and narrative pervade our lives from an early age onwards. The voice of our parents reading bed-time stories to us, the favourite song lyrics that form the soundtracks of our lives, the audiobooks we listen to when we need an alternative to reading stories, the radio plays we hear when we tune in to our favourite radio station, the sound effects and music that intensify our emotions when watching a movie. There are boundless examples for the ways in which sound and narrative intersect. These interfaces will be explored at this international and interdisciplinary conference. Sound in this context incorporates the whole spectrum from structured sound, as in music, to noise or prosodic features of voices, for example.

Audionarratology operates on the boundaries to related fields such as 'literature and music' or 'narrative and intermediality'. Unlike the former, audionarratology focuses more strongly on the relationship between forms and functions of sound and / as narrative. In contrast to the latter, it narrows down its interest to aural media / audio art genres and to aural / oral channels in other media, thus shifting emphasis away from questions concerning text-image relations and the visual in recent cultural studies.

The papers to be presented at this conference broadly address the following questions: How does sound highlight and support narrative structure in aural media and audio art genres such as radio plays, audiobooks and songs but also in video and computer games or film? What happens if the narrative voice of fiction is given a real voice in stories that are read out loud? How do listeners respond to such voices? In what ways can sound be said to be or become narrative in nature? How do narrative texts provide templates for sounds and sound effects? How is sound verbally encoded in narrative texts? What role do sounds and voices play in our lives?

The conference is free of charge and open to everyone who is interested.

This conference is funded by: