Can Toni Morrison’s Beloved (1987) be considered as a watershed in the contemporary representations of slavery and the slave trade, not only in the literary field, but also in historiography and Cultural Studies? This Symposium will attempt to assess whether (and how) this major text, together with its reception, represents a paradigm shift in the remembering and rewriting of slavery. After two decades and more, the time may be right to re-read these two decades of post slavery writing in the transatlantic as a body of work which, however non-homogeneous, shares certain trends and characteristics, and has impacted massively on transatlantic postmodern cultures.

Please send a 1-page abstract and biographical sketch before November 1st, 2011 to Michel Feith, Université de Nantes (Michel Feith <michel.feith@yahoo.fr>) Organized in cooperation between the CRINI (Center for Research on National Identities and Interculturality - Nantes) and CAAR (Collegium for African-American Research).