Conferences

The 2024 International Komplitt Symposium

In connection to Banned Books Week in october 2024, Komplitt will arrange an international symposium on the topic of "Literature and Censorship." The symposium is part of an ongoing collaboration between Komplitt, the Dawit Isakk library in Malmö, PEN Sweden, GRIDH (GU) and the Swedish Royal Library.

The symposium will gather scholars from different disciplines, as well as writers, translators and other non-academic agents. Its purpose is, firstly, to chart and critically investigate the forms literary censorship takes in different parts of the world, and how censorship connects to judicial, bureaucratic, and technological surveillance practices. Secondly, we want to examin hoe individual literary works, as well as writers, punlishers and other agents on the literary field are affected when texts are censored, prohibited, destroyed, or by other means kept from circulating. The ambition is to foster exchange of information and knowledge between agents within and outside academia, and to establish lines for further research.

Keynote speakers

Jon Helgason, Associate Professor of Literary Studies, Linneaus University

Shuangyi Li, Senior Lecturer in Comparative Literature & Cultures, University of Bristol

Presenters

Johanna Lindbladh, Lund University

Berit Grønn, Østfold University College

Joana Roqué Pesquer, KU Leuven

Oscar Jansson, Lund University

Mohammed Lamahfali, Malmö University

Parvin Ardala, Dawit Isaak library

Hanna Nordell, PEN Sweden

Anna Hultman, Lund University

Anna Sofia Churchill, KU Leuven

Julia Beck, Gothenburg University

Siska Humlesjö, Gothenburg University

Valentyna Savchyn, Lund University

Christopher Messelt, Østfold University College

Naja Bjørnsson, Lund University

Lovisa Olai, PEN Sweden

The 2022 International Komplitt Symposium

Held at Lund University on 22–23 September 2022, the international Komplitt symposium "Translation/Transmission/Transgression" will address the complex forms of difference that are actualized when literature is translated and circulated beyond its origins. It aims for vibrant interdisciplinary exchange and to reconfigure the boundaries of world literature and translation studies.

The symposium will gather scholars from Belgium, Britain, Norway, Sweden and the US working in the fields of translation studies and comparative literature, as well as Chinese, English, French, German, Scandinavian, and Spanish literatures. Reflecting this diversity topics under consideration are wide raning: case histories on translations of specific literary works; theories of multilingual and transcultural reading practices; sociological analyses of peritextual traces of international consecration; close examinations to de-sexualizing modes in translations of canonical authors; writing pracitices in transcultural LGBTQ-communities. 

The symposium will not have any parallel sessions, but gather all participants and presenters in shared venues. Indeed, one might envision the two days of the symposium as a continual and creative workshop, fostering discussion and exchange on the variuos "trans-function" of world literature. 

Keynote speakers

Emily Apter, Silver Professor of French and Comparative Literature at New York University

Kanika Batra, Professor of Comparative Literature, Globalization and Translation at Texas Tech University

Paul Tenngart, Senior Lecturer and Director of Studies of Comparative Literature at Lund University

Presenting researchers

Berit Grønn & Britt W. Svenhard, Østfold University College

Cecilia Wadsö Lecaros, Lund University

Remo Verdickt, University of Leuven

Oscar Jansson, Lund University

Marcus Axelsson, Østfold University College

Tom Toremans, University of Leuven

Anna Hultman, Lund University

Shuangyi Li, University of Bristol

Astrid Møller-Olsen, Lund University & Oxford University