Modernists to meet in Madison

The cream of creative thinkers from the fields of literature, philosophy, the arts and more will meet in Madison from Thursday, Oct. 31, to Sunday, Nov. 3, to consider new ways of approaching rapid and widespread changes in all sectors of society.

The occasion is the fourth annual Modern Studies Association conference, hosted this time by the UW–Madison Department of English. Departmental chair Susan Friedman is organizing the conference; she says the four-year-old association asked UW–Madison to host “precisely because holding the conference here could help consolidate the new association and ensure high quality and excitement for the event,” she says.

Friedman says the conference is expected to draw some 600 participants from all over the world. Among the topics for discussion are modernism’s impact on politics, science, music, warfare, concepts of geography and time, and how individuals and peoples construct their own identities.

“Modernist thinkers are helping to create change in the way people think, dream, feel and act,” Friedman says. “As globalization remaps human experience and interconnectedness around the world, modernists show the human imagination at work in exploring the relations between traditions and change, community and transformation.”