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CALL FOR PAPERS – PERSPECTIVES ON CONTEMPORARY LEGEND CONFERENCE

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CALL FOR PAPERS – PERSPECTIVES ON CONTEMPORARY LEGEND 

40th conference – International Society for Contemporary Legend Research

Hosted by the Centre for Contemporary Legend at Sheffield Hallam University

Sheffield, South Yorkshire, UK | 26-30 June, 2023 

The International Society for Contemporary Legend Research is pleased to announce that the 2023 Perspectives on Contemporary Legend 40th International Conference will be held in the Dorothy Fleming Lecture Theatre, Charles Street building at Sheffield Hallam University, 26-30 June 2023. 

Poster designed by Doc Rowe for the first ‘Perspectives on Contemporary Legend’ conference, July 1982

The 40th conference will celebrate the return of legend scholars to the city where academic inquiry into this new genre of folklore began in the summer of 1982. Not only will we aim to celebrate that special anniversary but also to examine how contemporary legend scholarship has evolved and expanded its remit to incorporate new stories, rumors, conspiracy theories, fake and folk news in the age of pandemics and perma-crises.

SHU’s city campus is located conveniently alongside Sheffield’s Midland Railway station that has direct rail links with London St Pancras International (2 hours 10 minutes) and Manchester International Airport (approx 1 hour 30 minutes). The organisers are making arrangements for a special group rate with the Novotel on Arundel Gate, a few minutes walk from the venue and within easy reach of city centre pubs and restaurants.

The conference will be organised as a series of seminars at which most attendees will present papers. Concurrent sessions will be avoided so that all attendants can hear all papers. Presentations will be 20 minutes with an additional ten minutes for discussion. Proposals for papers on all aspects of contemporary, urban, or modern legend research are sought, as are those on any legends, traditions and stories that circulate actively at present or have circulated at an earlier historical period. Proposals for special panels, seminars and any other related areas to contemporary legend and folklore are encouraged. A few possible themes we could highlight for 2023 include:

  • Is the Truth still out there? Marking the 30th anniversary of The X-Files TV show
  • Under or mis-represented cultural communities/identities in legend studies
  • New legends from post-industrial urban areas 
  • Folk Horror: Cultural and global diversity

The organisers are Centre for Contemporary Legend co-founders David Clarke, Diane Rodgers and Andrew Robinson. To submit a proposal, please forward a title and abstract (250-300 words) by February 15, 2023 by e-mail to David Clarke (david.clarke@shu.ac.uk) and Diane Rodgers (d.rodgers@shu.ac.uk). 

As part of conference events, we will also be hosting film and multimedia screenings, we encourage submissions of short films or multimedia (5 -30 minutes in length) exploring, related to or influenced by Folklore, Legend or Custom as part of a curated evening of screenings – please send expressions of interest and/or links by February 15, 2023 to Andrew Robinson – (andrew.robinson@shu.ac.uk) (NB – further info will be provided shortly)

Sheffield, with a history brimming with stories and legends, is the UK’s greenest city with more trees per person than any city in Europe. Like Rome, the city is said to be built upon seven hills. One third of its area falls within the Peak District National Park, with its hills and moors forming a ‘golden frame’ around the valley of the river Don. Sheffield is world famous for its cutlery and steel industries symbolised by the statue of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire and forge, that stands on the city’s Victorian Town Hall.

Relief of Vulcan, the Roman god of fire and forge, Sheffield Town Hall – image David Clarke.

Sheffield was founded in Anglo-Saxon times as a settlement on the river Sheaf that marked the boundary between the kingdoms of Mercia and Northumbria, the ‘Sheaf-field’ or town beside the boundary river. Following the Norman Conquest, William de Lovetot built a castle at the confluence of the rivers Don and Sheaf to represent Norman power over the North of England. Sheffield Castle became one of the largest strongholds in the medieval England and in Elizabethan times it became the jail of Mary Queen of Scots. During the summer of 2023 archaeologists will begin excavating the ruins of that castle including its huge gatehouse as part of a £15 million project to regenerate the historic centre of Sheffield.

Comprehensive information on the conference will be forthcoming and will also soon be available on both HERE and on our Facebook Page. We look forward to welcoming you to this conference, the area, and the trading of our stories in our annual reunion of researchers who work on this ever current and growing legends! 

For more information on the International Society for Contemporary Legend Research and to learn how to join, visit: https://contemporarylegend.org/

Covid Customs Callout – Tell Us Your Stories!

Background image – Covid Pom-Pom display on church gate, Baildon, West Yorkshire.

Here at the Centre for Contemporary Legend at Sheffield Hallam University we have been collecting examples of responses to Covid-19 in the form of new customs, interventions and displays from scarecrows, rainbows, stone snakes and curbside gifts to communal responses such as the Belper Moo. We are also interested in how traditional calendar customs have adapted to the lockdown and the limitations imposed by the pandemic, often taking their activities online.

You can find some of the responses we’ve documented further down this blog and CCL members David Clarke and Andrew Robinson discuss their interest (along with the Belper Moo if you’ve not heard of it before!) in the Podcast they produced for the Festival of The Mind also detailed below.

We would very much like anyone who has an interesting story about ‘Covid Customs and Interventions’ they are willing to share to contribute it to our collection, along with any imagery they are happy to provide. All contributions will be fully credited (if desired) and the results shared with all contributors.

Please email us at centre.contemporary.legend@gmail.com with your story, images or for further details.

Podcast – Folkloric Customs in the Time of Covid-19

“Dr David Clarke and Andrew Robinson explore the new folkloric customs and traditions that have emerged nationally and in the Sheffield / Peak District area as an outcome of the COVID-19 lockdown.” Listen to the Podcast HERE. Part of the 2020 Festival of The Mind (see HERE) and the Off The Shelf Festival of Words (See HERE).

In this podcast Dr David Clarke and Andrew Robinson from the Centre for Contemporary Legend research group at Sheffield Hallam University discuss the new folkloric customs and traditions that have emerged nationally and in the Sheffield/Peak District area in particular, as an outcome of the COVID-19 lockdown. Whilst traditional customs such as the Castleton Garland and numerous well dressings were cancelled, others events were held online and new rituals emerged such as the weekly #ClapForCarers.  Rainbow artwork decorated windows, stone snakes appeared in parks and scarecrows in a range of guises popped up in front gardens across the country. David and Andrew reflect on these and other responses to the lockdown as forms of custom and legend in this socially distanced, remotely recorded podcast.

The podcast was written and presented by Dr David Clarke and Andrew Robinson. Andrew recorded and edited the audio and provided field recordings of a number of traditional customs.

Stannington Scarecrows

A small selection of images of Covid Scarecrows collected by Dr David Clarke during the May Bank Holiday from Stannington on the Western fringe of Sheffield.

Stannington Scarecrows

“I was out for a walk with my wife in late May in the Loxley Valley and we climbed the hill up towards Stannington and when we reached a back road we saw what appeared to be a person sitting on the top of a high stone wall. We watched as we climbed the hill and I thought this was an unusual person as they hadn’t moved for ages. It was only when we got close I realised that this was actually quite an elaborate decorated scarecrow. Sporting a tartan hat, dark sun glasses, bright red lipstick and fluorescent pink socks, all decked off with a flower garland and a ‘Support the N.H.S.’ rainbow hanging around its neck (see the far left image above). As we walked further into the village and along the main street we saw more and more scarecrows and increasingly elaborate designs and I believe a number of them have been subsequently photographed and featured in the local paper, the Sheffield Star.“

“It’s interesting how these and other scarecrows that appeared during the original lockdown and shortly afterwards have been decorated and the themes that have been used. Alongside the omnipresent rainbows and the showing of support for N.H.S. and care sector workers there has also been the appearance of heroes and villains with Boris Johnson and Dominic Cummings masks appearing on scarecrows alongside representations of Captain Tom Moore the veteran solider who raised millions for the N.H.S. These are all interesting themes that are being played out through these local displays which seek to both provide entertainment but also personal and political commentary during Corvid.”

This commentary is taken from a Podcast entitled: Folkloric Customs in the Time of Covid-19 (available HERE) recorded by CCL’s Dr David Clarke and Andrew Robinson for the 2020 Festival of The Mind (see HERE) and the Off The Shelf Festival of Words (See HERE).

Calendar Customs at the Earth(ly) Matters 2020 online conference.

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Moving a conference online is no mean feat: will the technology work? Will everyone feel engaged when they can’t make direct eye contact or network over finger food? How will Chairs and Speakers enliven the stilted atmosphere of the online world?

With Earth(ly) Matters 2020, Sheffield Hallam’s Humanities and Social Sciences Society have made it look fiendishly easy. Using the three thematic strands of the conference to organise presentations, Roots, Rebellions and Resolutions, Earth(ly) Matters was split over three Fridays in August to prevent Zoom fatigue and to enable attendance from anyone, anywhere.

The conference explored ‘what matters on Earth and how Earth matters’, taking Amitav Ghosh’s claim, that the current environmental crisis is ‘also a crisis of culture, and thus of imagination’, as provocation. What role, speakers were asked, can the humanities and social sciences play at a time of climate breakdown and a catastrophic decline in wildlife?

On Friday 7 August, under the banner of ‘Roots’, I was fortunate to be able to present my work on calendar customs and their link to the natural environment, exploring whether those involved in such calendar customs could become climate activists on a hyperlocal level. Presenters submitted a ‘verbal’ element (a written paper) and a ‘visual’ element ­(a recorded presentation with visual stimuli) for publication on the conference website to enable engagement beyond the ten-minute live talk on conference day.

Inspiring change remained at the heart of the day: how our work, actions, thoughts and ideas can contribute to a world where change is underway, and change is desperately needed. But there was also fun to be had. Once the conference came to a close, delegates were invited to try bingo – with a difference. Using the Zoom breakout room facility, we learnt more about the lives and research interests of our fellow delegates by collecting information on bingo cards. Finding someone that shares your preferred type of cooked potato has never been so urgent…

Sophie Parkes

You can visit the Earth(ly) Matters conference website HERE and view Sophie’s presentation of her paper Cheese-rolling, Pace-egging, Soul-caking: Can Calendar Customs Engender Stewardship of our Natural Environment below. Sophie would welcome any feedback you might have – contact her at: sophie@sophieparkes.co.uk

Covid Scarecrows from Calow, Chesterfield.

A collection of images of scarecrows on the streets of Calow, Chesterfield photographed by Andrew Rodgers during May 2020. As can be seen from the central image residents were encouraed to create scarecrows to brighten up the streets of Calow and “everyone’s daily walks”.

The majority of Scarecrows feature N.H.S. and healthcare workers of made humorous reference to the pandemic (such as the judo scarecrow preparing to fight the virus), Union Jacks and the flag of St. George were also popular motifs, probably as the festival too place close to V.E. day but also as an expression of national resilience against the virus.

Special thanks to Andrew Rodgers for contributing the photographs and for permission to reproduce them here.

Covid Rainbows and Scarecrows from Sheffield, S10.

Above are a selection of images of Covid Rainbows collected by Diane A. Rodgers of the Centre for Contemporary Legend during the first lockdown of the Covid-19 pandemic in April 2020 while on daily walks around the Crosspool and Fulwood areas of Sheffield, S10.

An impromptu mini Scarecrow festival was organised by residents of Valley Mews and friends in to give thanks to care workers and entertain children on their daily walks.