Professional Notes and Comment

Abstract

Although the items printed in this section are meant to serve the professional interests of the membership, the editor does not solicit the items and cannot vouch for their reliability. Members should therefore exercise reasonable judgment in responding to them. Contributors may send items by e-mail to pnc@mla.org.Utopian Writing For Children. Contributors are sought for a collection of essays about aspects of utopia in children's literature. Works by writers as diverse as Frank Baum, George MacDonald, Katherine Paterson, J. R. R. Tolkien, James Gurney, Monica Hughes, Madeleine L'Engle, and Lois Lowry portray Utopias and dystopias and raise issues fundamental to utopian studies, such as the nature of government and societal organizations. Both children's and utopian literatures have educational and social agendas, and both delight in the use of the imagination. Critical attention on how these two growing fields intersect is long overdue. Suggested topics include fantasy and utopia, dystopias in children's literature, ethics of utopia, fairy tales and utopia, environmental-ecological depictions of utopia, issues of self-governance and governing, fantasies of control, questions of nationalism and children's literature (including propaganda), nineteenth-century treatments of utopia, feminist utopias in children's literature, secret worlds, uses of magic, portrayals of the past as utopia, the utopian home, school as utopia/dystopia, utopia as a picnic (food in children's literature), and topsy-turvyism in children's literature. Send 2-page, double-spaced abstracts of proposed essays, along with a brief c.v., by 1 November 2000 to either Carrie Hintz, Dept. of English, Queens Coll., City Univ. of New York, Flushing 11367 (carriehintz@hotmail.com), or Elaine Ostry, Dept. of English, Champlain Valley Hall, State Univ. of New York, 101 Broad St., Plattsburgh 12901 (eostry@hotmail.com).