“Ladies who read those enormous great stupid thick Quarto Volumes, which one always sees in the Breakfast parlour there (at Manydown), must be acquainted with everything in the World.”

Letter 81 dated 9 February 1813,
from Jane Austen's Letters
collected and edited by Deirdre Le Faye.

Yes! ... we too will become acquainted with everything in the world - and more - at the World of Jane Austen 2002 Annual General Meeting. At long last we are able to announce our Breakout Speakers! It has taken the Program Committee some time to select from the more than fifty topics submitted to fill some forty spots - and that doesn't include the extra musical events listed at the end. A more compact version of this list will be published in the Spring 2002 JASNA News and, of course, will appear on our Conference Brochure.

To assist you in advance in making your selection of the Breakout Sessions you might wish to attend, we have given a more expanded version here. Our speakers come from Australia, throughout the United States and Canada, and some from as far away as Japan. This should give us a fine variety of topics and ideas.

The Committee has attempted to keep a balance between the four themes · Artistic · Domestic · Political · Social · and it hopes that you will find much food for thought and fodder for your brain - because all the topics are guaranteed to exercise the intellect and nudge our noodles. Come and enjoy!

The position number shown at the end of each speaker's biogaphy relates to their session position noted on page 8 of the Brochure. However, program placement is subject to change.

ARTISTIC STREAM:

Kathleen Anderson: “Actresses in Austen’s Age: Women and Theatricality On and Off Stage.” In the English theatre of Austen’s day, the position of the actress seemed both to improve and to worsen. Their stage roles improved and their dramatic powers increased, yet, as society became more morally conservative, it became increasingly obsessed with actresses’ sexuality. Kathleen’s paper will provide a detailed picture of actresses’ professional and social experience during Austen’s time, and she will then interpret the novelist’s representations of women’s “theatricality” in the context of the novels.

Kathleen Anderson is an Assistant Professor of English at Palm Beach Atlantic College, FL, and a specialist in 19th-century British literature. Her scholarship emphasizes women’s texts and theatricality, and her writings have appeared in a number of journals. Kathleen has also spoken at several JASNA AGMs. Her study of actresses, The Conquerors: Actresses in Nineteenth-century British Narratives by Women, is currently under consideration and she has started work on a new book, Jane Austen and Sex. A:1

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Lorrie Clark: “Shaftesbury’s ‘Art of Soliloquy’ in Mansfield Park.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “Saftebury’s Art of ‘Soliloquy’ in Mansfield Park.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 59-70.]
Like Shaftesbury, Austen is concerned with the reform or “improvement” of English mores or “manners,” a term which Edmund Bertram insists must be understood in a moral as well as an aesthetic sense. In Mansfield Park, Austen explores what have traditionally been the two greatest influences on mores: religion and the arts, especially the dramatic arts or theatre. Most significantly, Austen’s Fanny Price exercises a third force for moral improvement and reform, what Shaftesbury calls “the art of soliloquy.”

Lorrie Clark obtained her Ph.D at the University of Virginia and taught at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts before returning home to Canada in 1991. Currently, she is an Associate Professor of English at Trent University, Peterborough, ON. Her publications include: Blake, Kierkegaard, and the Spectre of Dialectic (Cambridge UP, 1991), an article on Austen’s Persuasion, and a number of book reviews for JASNA News. Her current project is a book-length study of Austen, Edmund Burke, and Shaftesbury on aesthetics. A:2

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A Reader’s Theatre Presentation: “Reading aloud: From Ann Radcliffe's The Italian.” The actors of the Reader’s Theatre will entertain us with a selection from Ann Radcliffe’s most accomplished work, The Italian. Radcliffe’s writings are known to have inspired Austen and served as a model for Jane’s own writing.

Russell Clark (DePaul University, Chicago, IL), Louise Heal (Sugiyama Women’s University, Nagoya, Japan), Kallie Keith (University of Chicago, Chicago), and William Phillips, (Aichi Prefectural University, Nagakute-cho, Japan), are collectively known as The Reader’s Theatre, a form of oral interpretation using a dramatic approach to literature, which places the locus of a story, not onstage with the readers, but in the imagination of the audience. B:1

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Sarah Emsley: “‘My Idea of a Chapel’ in Jane Austen’s World.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “‘My Idea of a Chapel’ in Jane Austen’s World.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 133-142.]
Emsley will investigate the social and spiritual significance of the ‘idea of a chapel’ in both Jane Austen’s world of novels, particularly in Mansfield Park, and in contemporary life. Fanny Price, Edmund Bertram and Mary Crawford all have different ideas of a chapel. What is Jane’s idea and is it distinguishable from that of her characters?

Sarah Emsley is a doctoral candidate in English at Dalhousie University, Halifax, NS, where she holds Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and Izaak Walton Killam Fellowships. Sarah has published articles in a number of journals, including Persuasions. She also wrote a book on the history of the oldest Protestant church in Canada, St. Paul’s in the Grand Parade, 1749-1999 (Halifax: Formac, 1999). B:2

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Susan Allen Ford: “Intimate...by instinct”: Mansfield Park and the comedy of King Lear.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “‘Intimate by instinct’: Mansfield Park and the Comedy of King Lear.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 177-197.]
Henry Crawford quotes from Shakespeare to Fanny Price and suggests that the author “is part of an Englishman's constitution ... one is intimate with him by instinct.” In Mansfield Park, as in no other novel by Austen, that theatrical instinct is pervasive. Numerous plays are alluded to or considered for performance, but it is a play not considered that contributes most to Mansfield Park; i.e. King Lear.

Susan Allen Ford, a life member of JASNA, is a Professor of English and Writing Center Coordinator at Delta State University in Cleveland, MS, where she teaches courses in British literature, the Gothic, and detective fiction. She has published articles on Jane Austen and her contemporaries, on contemporary detective fiction, and female gothic writers. Her earlier JASNA presentations were on Sanditon and the circulating library (1997) and Austen’s use of Mme. de Genlis’s Adelaide and Theadore in Emma (1999). C:1

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Beric and Elizabeth Graham-Smith: “Walking in Bath with Jane Austen,” is an illustrated guided tour of Bath presented in period costume.

Beric and Elizabeth Graham-Smith are both JASNA Life Members from the Ottawa Ontario Region and both are eminently qualified. Beric is an Architect and Town Planner, having studied town planning at Cambridge, with post-graduate studies in the social sciences at Syracuse University, NY. Elizabeth was born in Hampshire and is a pianist, accompanist, teacher and adjudicator. She studied at the Royal Academy of Music in London where she earned her B.A. in Music Education, and Diplomas in Piano Teaching and Performance. Some of you may remember Elizabeth’s enjoyable presentation of "Music and Dancing in Emma", at the 1991 Ottawa AGM. C:2

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Miriam Hart: “Hardly an Innocent Diversion: Music in the Life and Writings of Jane Austen.” Miriam’s adaption of her dissertation is an historical examination and critical re-evaluation of the role of music in the lives of eighteenth-century women as it is reflected in Jane’s writings.

Miriam Hart received her Ph.D. from Ohio University in Athens, where she is currently an Assistant Professor of English. She preserved Austen’s musical collections in Chawton and wrote the liner notes for the Vox CD, Jane’s Hand. As a singer in the vocal trio, "The Local Girls", Miriam tours throughout the Eastern states, has appeared at the White House, and on The Prairie Home Companion. D:1

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Annibel Jenkins: “Elizabeth Inchbald and Lovers Vows.” Inchbald was a contemporary of Jane Austen whose plays were very successful. These were presented not only in London but all over England. Her audience was Jane’s audience. In this paper Annibel will examine the author’s life and her views of both her play and of private theatricals in general.

Annibel Jenkins is a Professor Emerita at Georgia Tech in Atlanta. She has been very active in the American Society for 18th-century Studies and in the South-East American Society for 18th-century Studies, where she has presented papers and organized sessions for both. Recently she has written a biography of Elizabeth Inchbald (1753-1821) soon to be published by the University Press of Kentucky. It is from this that her paper was adapted. E:1

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Paula Schwartz: “Darcy vs Heathcliffe: A comparison of the Romantic Imagination in the Regency and the Victorian World.” The paper will centre on the differences between Austen’s ironic restraint and the Brontës’ sentimental excess. Paula hopes to provoke a lively discussion on the merits of the classical writing style of Jane Austen vs the lush romanticism of the Brontës.

Paula Schwartz lives in Annandale, VA, is a novelist, playwright and lyricist, and a well-known JASNA member - as we have seen from presentations at a number of past AGMs. Paula has also taught literature courses at various times, notably at Dunbarton College in Washington, DC. F:1

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Barbara Wenner: “‘I have just learnt to love a hyacinth’: Jane Austen as Landscape Artist.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “‘I have just learnt to love a hyacinth’: Jane Austen’s Heroines in their Novelistic Landscape.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 90-101.]
Through a series of paintings, photographs and sketches, Barbara will compare scenes from 18th-century landscape art with scenes from Jane’s own fiction, where we - like Catherine Morland - might well “learn to love a hyacinth.”

Barbara Wenner is an Associate Professor of English at the University of Cincinnati, OH, where she teaches courses on the literature of Jane Austen. She published an article “Enclaves of Civility amidst Clamorous Impertinence: Will as Reflected in the Landscape of Emma” in The European Romantic Review and, for the JASNA News, she wrote "Jane Austen and the Bermuda Triangle", about the Bermuda 2000 conference. Barbara has made presentations to the Dayton Chapter, of which she is a member, and performed in a number of Jane Austen theatrical adaptions as a member of the Pemberley Players. Currently, she is working on a book tentatively titled Scopophilia: The Gaze upon Jane Austen’s Landscape. E:2

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Barbara Franks Wieskamp: “How to Get Published in 1800” is an examination of how, in the 1800s, a book came to life - from the finished manuscript sent from the author to the publisher, then on to the hand press and, hence, to the bookstore.

Barbara Franks Wieskamp is a life-long resident of the San Francisco Bay area, where she is a teacher of English literature and composition. As well as English, she also taught music, history, and art, since 1988. Currently, she is teaching and living in Livermore, CA. In her scant spare time she cooks, sews, gardens, dances and reads far too many books, and is also working on several manuscripts and hopes to become a published writer - just like Jane Austen. D:2

DOMESTIC STREAM:

Sarah S.G. Frantz: “The Great Masculine Renunciation.”
[Published in Persuasions 25 (2003).  “Jane Austen’s Heroes and the Great Masculine Renunciation.” Persuasions 25 (2003): 165-175.]
George “Beau” Brummell affected a silent but total revolution in the 1790s and early 1800s in men’s fashion which is still seen today all over the world. Fashion historians named it the Great Masculine Renunciation. Similarly there was a renunciation in men’s ability to express their emotions. In her paper, Sarah will compare this change in masculine fashions and masculine emotional expression, the changed relations between men and women, and the revolution of manners and taste in the late 18th-, early 19th-century.

Sarah S.G. Frantz is currently a graduate student at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, where she is writing her dissertation, How were his sentiments to be read?: Masculine Emotion and British Women Writers, 1790-1820, in which a chapter each is dedicated to Austen’s heroes and anti-heroes. She has spoken at a number of JASNA events, including the Boston AGM. In May of 2001, she was keynote speaker at Chicago’s Gala Day hosted by the Illinois/Indiana Region. F:2

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Victoria Hinshaw: “What Every Woman Knew: Between the Covers of La Belle Assemblée.” Characteristic of the several widely-circulated women’s magazines of Jane Austen’s day, La Belle Assemblée, or Lady’s Fashionable Companion, carried a wide variety of articles each month. Beginning with its initial publication in 1806, the magazine endeavoured to be the arbiter of elegance and propriety for ladies. Victoria hopes to engage her audience in an active discussion, particularly in regard to our contemporary women’s magazines. How was Regency life shaped by La Belle Assemblée in relation to the effect of Vogue, McCall’s, or Victoria on today’s life?

Victoria Hinshaw holds a B.S. from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL, and M.A. from The American University in Washington, DC. She is a former instructor at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee and Alverno College. A lifelong Jane Austen devotee, Victoria actively combines her delight in research with public speaking. She has presented several programs, often illustrated with her slides, for the Wisconsin Region meetings and is currently working on the Milwaukee JASNA AGM in 2005. A:3

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Mary Humphries: “Dressing Jane Austen’s World: Social, Domestic, Artistic and Political.” Fashion of the time was more than abrupt shifts in style, the cut of a sleeve, etc., brought about by the French Revolution and Napoleonic Wars. It had as much to do with the fabrics of the time. Textiles manufacture is at the core of the Industrial Revolution, with machine developments begun early in the 18th century spreading rapidly in Jane Austen’s lifetime. These developments will be tracked and an examination made of the transitions in fabrics and dress, which touches on all four of the conference themes.

Mary Humphries obtained her B.A. and M.A. at the University of Toronto, is a Fellow of the Institute of Textile Science, and an Honourary Member of the Costume Society of Ontario. She is also its publications coordinator, and editor and producer of the Costume Journal and CSO News. Mary is a specialist in present-day fabrics with a great interest in the history of textiles. Two of her books are published by Prentice Hall: Fabric Reference and Fabric Glossary; the former a text on fabrics, the latter a fabric dictionary which includes origins of names. She is presently preparing a 3rd edition. D:3

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Hugh D. McKellar: will fascinate us with a “downstairs” view of domestic life with his talk on “‘Servants that can do their own work’ (P&P, ch.9).” What work did the mistress keep in her own hands and what was left for the servants to do? In her novels, Jane Austen did not necessarily note what work most of the servants were required to do, so this talk should fill in many of the gaps.

Hugh D. McKellar is a charter member of JASNA Toronto and a retired teacher-librarian for The Toronto Board of Education. Besides the interesting talks Hugh gives at the Toronto Chapter meetings, he has published many articles on hymns and church music - his other avid interest. C:3

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Joan J. Philosophos: “Reading between the lines: Jane Austen’s letters.” There was a cult of letter writing at the time and the British postal service was just developing. Joan will look at this phenomenon as well as what the letters tell us about Jane Austen and how she uses letters to develop her novels. All in all, it promises to be an interesting session.

Joan Philosophos has just completed four years as Regional Coordinator of the Wisconsin Region and is, presently, the chair of the JASNA Nominating Committee. She is very active in the Society and presents papers at the Wisconsin Regional meetings as well as in Chicago where she has often been invited to speak. Joan can usually be seen assisting Pat Latkin at the Jane Austen Books tables during the AGMs. C:4

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Hugh C. Rowlinson: “The Contribution of Count Rumford to Domestic Technology during Jane Austen’s Lifetime.” “The fireplace, where she had expected the ample width and ponderous carving of former times, had contracted to a Rumford.” (Northanger Abbey). Who was Rumford? The period of Jane Austen’s life was one of change in many areas, not the least in what we now call applied science. Rumford’s contribution to all this was his experimental work on the nature of heat which lead him to design a better fireplace which is still being manufactured today. That Jane knew about Rumford and his inventions is clear from the reference in Northanger Abbey.

Hugh C. Rowlinson was born in Hanforth, England and obtained his B.A., M.A. and D.Phil. at Oxford University in chemistry. He did post-graduate work at Evanston, IL and with the National Research Council in Ottawa, Canada. He remained in Canada, employed as an industrial chemist and, later, as VP of the Plastics Division, and VP of Research and Development at C.I.L. He retired in 1988 and is an active volunteer and avid Janeite. He is a member of the Montreal Chapter. E:3

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Pauline Russell-Hill: “Jane Austen - the Colours and Patterns of her World.” Manners created colour for Jane Austen. Likewise, manners (lifestyles) help to determine colour/design trends as do major events: economic, environmental and technological. What were the colour influences in the late 18th to early 19th centuries? Many visuals - slides, colourboards, documentary wallpapers and fabrics - will be used to illustrate these influences in greater detail, all accompanied by frequent quotes from Jane’s works and letters. This is a repeat of a talk given to the Toronto Chapter which we all found fascinating and informative.

Pauline Russell-Hill was a colour designer in the textile industry for thirty years, during which time she worked with trimmings and window treatments for ConsoGraber Company, with carpets for Crossley-Karastan, and on a range of floor coverings for G.E. Shnier, Canada’s largest floorcovering distributor. Prepare to be dazzled! B:3

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Joan R. Vredenburgh: “From Posts to Pillars: the Evolution of the English Country House.” Jane Austen, like most members of her family, was familiar with the social and political construct known as the English Country House. She understood the significance of the landed estate and knew what constituted a fashionable Country House. She also knew the social rituals involved in visiting such an establishment, the various entertainments it afforded and the expectations of both the host and guest. This paper will show the development of the Country House from a basic one-room dwelling, called a hall, through to the gracious many-roomed fashionable edifices known in the 18th-19th centuries. References will be made to the houses noted in the novels.

Joan R. Vredenburgh has her Ph.D and is with the adjunct faculty in the English Department at Salva Regina University, Newport, RI. She is also a proofreader at the Naval War College in Newport as well. She has taught for 13 years and has presented/published many papers on Jane Austen. Currently, she is learning to sail and, like Jane Fairfax, hopes not to be dashed from the boat. F:3

POLITICAL STREAM

Margaret A. Banks: “The Monarchy and the Office of Prime Minister in Jane Austen’s Time.” Jane Austen lived entirely during the reign of George III (1760-1820), In her latter years, while the King was mentally incompetent to rule, Parliament enacted The Regency Act in 1811, which appointed the Prince of Wales (later George IV) to rule as Regent. To understand the Monarchy in Austen’s time, the historical background of the ongoing battle between the British Monarchy and Parliament - which Parliament eventually won - will be discussed. During the reigns of George I (1714-1727) and George II (1727-1760), the office of “Prime Minister” began to evolve. During Jane’s short lifetime there were eleven Prime Ministers. Who were they and what was their relationship to the Monarchy?

Margaret A. Banks is a Professor Emeritus and former Law Librarian at the University of Western Ontario in London, ON. Born in Quebec City, she received her B.A. in Honours History at Bishop’s University, Lennoxville, Quebec. Her M.A. and Ph.D. in history were both obtained at the University of Toronto. She started her career as an archivist at the Ontario Archives, then moved to Western where she taught law and graduate history during her tenure as Law Librarian (1961-1989). She has written books and articles on topics relating to law and history. Her most recent book is on Sir John George Bourinot, published by McGill-Queen’s University Press, 2001. D:4

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Diane Novak Capitani: “Moral Neutrality in Mansfield Park.” This paper explores the world of the slave trade in Austen’s day, the source of Sir Thomas’s financial difficulties in Antigua, and the historical slavery-induced battles of the period. Readers often ask: what did Austen know about the economic and the political situation of her day and how could her strong moral sense accept a way of life which owed so much to the abuse of other human beings? Author Edward Said states: “Everything we know about Jane Austen and her values is at odds with the cruelty of slavery.” Is Austen taking a position of “moral neutrality” as Ruth Perry asserts?

Diane Novak Capitani received an M.A. in French Language and Literature and an M.A. in English at Northwestern University, Evanston, ILL, with a further M.A. in Comparative Literature from the University of Chicago. After teaching for a period she returned to graduate school for another M.A. and her Ph.D. in Theological and Historical Studies from the Garrett Evangelical Seminary, Northwestern University. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor of Languages and Literature at Kendall College in Evanston and lectures in the English Department at Northwestern and at the Garrett Evangelical Seminary. She has been a Janeite for many years and has presented papers for the Illinois/Indiana Region and is a frequent speaker in the northern suburbs of Chicago about “things Austen.” B:4

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Celia E. Easton: “Jane Austen and the Enclosure Movement: The Sense and Sensibility of Land Reform.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “Jane Austen and the Enclosure Movement: The Sense and Sensibility of Land Reform.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 71-89.]
An overview of the enclosure movement in Georgian England will be provided, then how Jane Austen’s view of such agricultural reform might be interpreted. Arguments for and against land reform waged on for many years. Although her references are few, Austen was well aware of the enclosure movement and its effect on rural life.

Celia E. Easton is an Associate Professor of English at the State University of New York College at Geneseo. An active member of the Rochester Chapter, she created and maintains its website. Her scholarship on Jane Austen includes “Jane Austen’s Sense and Sensibility and the Joke of Substitution” published in Journal of Narrative Technique, Spring 1993, and she has contributed an essay entitled “Emma and Grandison” to Marcia Folsom’s forthcoming Approaches to Teaching Austen’s Emma. (MLA) B:5

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Li-Ping Geng: “The Siege of Mansfield: Jane Austen’s Art of Political Manoeuvring.” The myth that Jane Austen was politically naive and less-than-well-informed has been blown away. This paper will examine Jane’s art of politics in her late novel, Mansfield Park (1814), and will focus on its “siege” by “foreign legions”, even as England was waging successful military campaigns across the Channel. It will ponder the moral destruction of a seemingly secure stronghold in the peaceful English countryside, and try to explain why and how the battle was lost. Li-Ping plans to illustrate some of the dramatic and poignant acts of political manoeuvring which typically reflect Jane’s art of irony and humour but, more importantly, reveal Jane’s political viewpoint towards the historic events of her day.

Li-Ping Geng was born in China and moved to Toronto, where he has been an Adjunct Instructor in English at the University of Toronto since 1999. He has also taught at Memorial University in Newfoundland. He became a member of JASNA in 1998 and joined the Toronto Chapter in 2000, where he spoke about his work on James Austen’s The Loiterer. He edited the facsimile edition of The Loiterer for Scholars’ Facsimiles & Reprints, 2 vols. (Ann Arbour, MI: 2000) and his article, “The Loiterer and Jane Austen’s Literary Identity”, was published in Eighteenth-Century Fiction Vol.13:4 (2001). E:4

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Joan Ghariani: “Ireland in the time of Jane Austen.” Joan will examine the state of Ireland for most of the 18th century, the apex of peace, power and prestige for the Anglo-Irish governing class. It was a time of utter powerlessness for the native Irish. Things began to slowly change about the time of Jane’s birth, fired by the efforts of the Catholics and the Presbyterians to gain civil and political rights, and by the American and French revolutions. Joan will examine the results of these in her talk.

Joan Ghariani was born and raised in Dublin and educated through Irish-Gaelic and English, obtaining a degree in business from Trinity College, Dublin. She is a member of JASNA and the Northern California Region. She has worked in local government, as an elementary school teacher, and as an international banking officer. For the past 12 years Joan has been a bookseller/bookkeeper for Books Incorporated in San Francisco, where she lives. F:4

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Sheila A. Quigley: “Jane Austen, the Law, and Women’s Rights in 18th-century England.” This paper will discuss the English property law system, married women’s rights, and the way both of these are reflected in Jane Austen’s writings. Married women were unable to make an enforceable contract or a valid will, to hold legal title to land, own her own personal property, or obtain custody of her children, or many other things taken for granted today. The intrigues of the English property law system which were a part of Jane Austen’s life, and which she described their effect with accuracy and wit, will be fully discussed.

Sheila A. Quigley, coordinator of JASNA South Carolina Region, is a graduate of the Catholic University of America Law School and a member of the District of Columbia Bar. She has been managing editor of a legal publication on government contracts and prior to that was an attorney with the U.S. Department of Defence. Who better qualified to speak on the above topic? E:5

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Walter Renaud: “Jane Austen’s Picture of the Militia.” In Pride and Prejudice, Austen makes use of the militia for her story-telling purposes. She picks and chooses from what she knows about the militia and she is careful not to go where she was unfamiliar. For instance, we learn almost nothing about the enlisted men, but more about the young officers during their social intercourse with the young women of her social class. However, a picture arises that tells us something about the militia that seems consistent with the picture that military historians present. An explanation of what this picture is, and what it tells us, will be examined.

Walter Renaud did his undergraduate work at the University of Massachusetts and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. from Harvard. He teaches courses in the Renaissance and on film at William Woods University in Fulton, MI, and, from time to time, a course on Jane Austen. He has spoken several times to the JASNA Mid-Missouri Chapter, of which he is a member, and presented a breakout session on Emma at the Colorado Springs AGM and Conference. C:5

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Christina Dadford Simpson: “The Port of Halifax and its importance to the Royal Navy in Jane Austen’s Time.” This paper will discuss what made Halifax important to the Royal Navy and why Jane’s “sailor brothers”, and later her nephews, would have been stationed there. What was Halifax’s role in the War of 1812 and why did Halifax have a love/hate relationship with the Royal Navy for over 200 years. Even some of the gossip that surrounded the Duke of Kent, Queen Victoria’s father, when he was stationed in Halifax from 1794-1800, will be imparted. All in all, it sounds like a fun presentation.

Christina Dadford Simpson has been reading Jane Austen since grade 11 and a member of JASNA since 1982. She is the Regional Coordinator for the Nova Scotia/Prince Edward Island Region and serving her 2nd term as a member of JASNA’s Board of Directors. Born in Portsmouth, England, Christina is known to her family as “Fanny”. She was raised in England, then Malta, and then in Canada, where she now resides. She is the accountant for Phoenix Youth Programs in Halifax, a community-based, non-profit organization specializing in programs for the homeless and at-risk youth. Who better to discuss the Royal Navy? F:5

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Pamela Whalan: “And what if Mrs. Leigh-Parrot had been Found Guilty?” In 1799, Jane Austen’s aunt was accused of grand larceny for having, in her possession, lace to the value of 20 shillings. She stood trial in 1800 and, fortunately, was acquitted. But what if she had been found guilty? It was possible to receive the death penalty for such a crime but a more usual sentence was seven to fourteen years transportation to the convict colony in New South Wales. This paper will give an idea of what that colony was like from its founding in 1788 until 1817, by which time Sydney was a thriving town and European settlement was established across a number of places on the Australian continent.

Pamela Whalan earned her M.A. from the University of Sydney and an M.L. from the University of New England. In 1994, Pam retired as a lecturer in the Faculty of Education, University of Technology in Sydney, Australia, and became the Director of the Genesian Theatre Company. She is a member of the Jane Austen Society of Australia (JASA), and of JASNA, and has presented a number of papers to both organizations. She has been a member of JASA’s Study Day Committee since 1999 and involved in the successful presentation of study days on Emma, Mansfield Park and Sense and Sensibility. She recently wrote a stage adaption of Mansfield Park which she directed for her theatre company in January of 2002. A:4

SOCIAL STREAM

Barbara Laughlin Adler: “A disagreement between us”: Gender and Argumentation Styles in Jane Austen’s Novels.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “‘A disagreement between us’: Gendered Argument in Austen’s Novels.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 164-176.]
Jane Austen’s society was dominated by social convention and conversational rules. Men and women held pretty clear “notions” of behaviours appropriate to their sex, and one of these notions held that women must remain meek when in conversation with the opposite sex, or - if they must speak - they should discuss “light topics with men” and speak with “ease and gaiety, laughter and wit.” Late 20th-century research in gender and communication has uncovered fascinating differences in the argumentation styles that men and women adopt when engaged in verbal battle. This paper describes these modern argumentation styles and then examines social dialogue found in Emma, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park and Persuasion to discover the argumentation styles of Austen’s men and women.

Barbara Laughlin Adler, an avid Janeite and member of JASNA since 1994, is a full-time professor of Communication Studies at Concordia College in Ann Arbor, MI, Barbara obtained her Ph.D. from Wayne State University in Rhetoric and Communication. Her dissertation focused on the persuasive appeals used by two Lutheran Church leaders in their monthly periodicals. She is interested in the conversational styles of Austen’s characters and feels that no one writes dialogue as well as Jane. Barbara has published in several Speech Communication journals and presented at professional communication conferences. Active in the JASNA Michigan Chapter, she has enjoyed presenting and leading discussions at recent Chapter meetings. A:5

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Pauline Beard: “The ‘unified commonwealth’ in Jane Austen’s World: an Exploration of Illness.” This paper will deal with illnesses, real and imagined, in Jane Austen’s world, and her writing as a means of coping with the sickness she witnessed and experienced herself. Pauline will explore “real” illness in the books and the remedies and healing, physical and mental, then contrast these with the imagined illnesses in the later novels — and the role of the hypochondriac. Laughing at the these imagined illness perhaps functioned as a coping device as Jane, herself, became more ill and faced death.

Pauline Beard grew up and was educated in England, moving to the U.S. in 1976 after two years in Venezuela. Having taught high school English in Britain, and English as a second language in Caracas, it seemed a natural progression to teach at a university after she gained her degree at SUNY Binghamton, NY. Pauline is now an Associate Professor at Pacific University, a small liberal arts college in Forest Grove, OR, thirty miles west of Portland. Pauline’s book, A Riding Thing: Time in Five Modern Novels, reflects her first love: the history of the novel. She is active in the local chapter of JASNA and her hobbies are wine education and cooking (the matching of food and wine) and developing an English garden. B:6

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Mary Jane Curry and Sarah E. Brown: “‘Follies and nonsense, whims and inconsistencies do divert me’: Pride and Prejudice, Henry Fielding’s ‘An Essay on Conversation’ and ‘The Landscape of Politeness’ - or Elizabeth Bennett meets Tom Jones.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “‘Follies and nonsense, whims and inconsistencies do divert me’: Politeness in Pride and Prejudice, Henry Fielding’s ‘Essay on Conversation’ and Tom Jones.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 47-58.]
Fielding’s essay was a popular contribution to the 18th-century courtesy book tradition. He defines “the art of conversation” as integral to "good breeding" which he defines, in turn, as “the art of pleasing” by practising the Golden Rule. We know Jane read Tom Jones which dramatizes the principles in Fielding’s essay, and is likely to have read the essay itself. The presentation will compare scenes in the essay to passages in Pride and Prejudice revealing Mr. Darcy’s and Mr. Wickham’s actions and conversation. After examining other prominent essays on good breeding and conversation by Chesterfield, Shaftesbury, Swift and Addison, the audience will be invited to discuss some implications of these writers’ connections with Austen’s fiction.

Mary Jane Curry has her Ph.D. in English and she studies and publishes on the British novel, Jane Austen in particular. Her secondary interest is the history of landscape design and the fiction of developing nations. Having decided that she can no more become a college administrator than Austen could have written a saga of the monarchy, she is happy to be returning this year to full-time scholarship and writing. Before she moved to Georgia, her friends in JASNA-Alabama gave her a life membership in JASNA for founding the Alabama Region.

Sarah E. Brown [biographic material not yet available] E:7

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Joan Freilich: “Pierce Egan’s Life in London: or, Is This What Jane’s Gentlemen Were Up To When Their Author Wasn’t Looking?”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “Pierce Egan’s Life in London, or Is This What Jane’s Gentlemen Were Up To When Their Author Wasn’t Looking?.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 121-132.]
Jane Austen never depicts men except in the presence of women. Yet her male characters must have led lives outside the drawing rooms, ballrooms, and country walks which they shared with the females of their acquaintance. What may these lives have been like? Pierce Egan’s Life in London: or The Day and Night Scenes of Jerry Hawthorne, Esq. and his Elegant Friend, Corinthian Tom, Accompanied by Bob Logic, the Oxonian, in their Rambles and Sprees through the Metropolis, published in 1821, gives us a vivid picture. Egan’s book will be summarized and a short biographical account given of the author, with some comments on the book by John Camden Hotten in his Preface to the 1869 edition. A contrast will be made with Egan’s completely masculine outlook with Austen’s feminine perspective, as well as his total focus on London with her primary interest in country life. As a man, Egan could write openly about men’s lives. Was Jane even cognizant of this life? Perhaps not. But, if she was, she averted her eyes.

Joan Freilich is a graduate of Cornell University in Ithica, NY with a major in English. Her M.A. was received from Columbia in Comparative Medieval Literature. There she completed all her requirements for a Ph.D. except her dissertation. She taught English in New York City, Tucson, and in Jerusalem in the early ’50s. She also taught English as a second language to Russian immigrants in Cleveland. Active in both the Dickens Fellowship and JASNA, she has written papers for both groups. Her latest for the Dickens Fellowship was entitled “Fagan, Riah, and the Power of Myth” in connection with Oliver Twist. Presently, she is auditing classes in Latin (Virgil and Livy) at a nearby Jesuit University. C:6

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Susannah Fullerton: “The Costly Pleasures of Adultery.”
[Published in Persuasions 24 (2002).  “Jane Austen and Adultery.” Persuasions 24 (2002): 143-163.]
Jane Austen was intrigued by adultery - it was in her earliest writings when she was a teenager and it plays a major role in Mansfield Park and puts a fleeting appearance in some of her other novels as well. Adultery threatened the established social order. The English were certain that sexual laxity had brought about the French Revolution! It introduced disharmony into the family unit and it broke one of the moral laws of God. The legal system of the day regarded it as a crime, but what did Jane Austen think about adultery? This presentation will look at the place of adultery in Jane Austen’s world and in her fiction.

Susannah Fullerton has been the President of the Jane Austen Society of Australia (JASA) for the past five years. She presented the paper “We shall call it Waterloo crescent ... Jane Austen’s Art of Naming” at the San Francisco AGM, which was later published in Persuasions. Susannah has lectured extensively on Austen in Australia, has written book reviews and papers for JASA’s journal, Sensibilities, and has just completed her book - Jane Austen Down Under - which looks at the responses of Australians and New Zealanders to Jane and her novels. This will have its North American book release at the JASNA 2002 AGM. Susannah’s current efforts are on her new book, Jane Austen and Crime, which discusses crimes in the life and works of Austen such as theft, murder, suicide, adultery, etc. F:6

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Lynda Hall and Laura Fauteux: “Jane Austen, Early Feminist or Conservative Matchmaker?” This presentation will be a debate: a discussion between a student and her teacher, beginning with the student’s notion that the current interest in everything “Jane” has brought back the old values. She argues that Austen’s novels reflect the “good old days” and she longs to live in such a time. Her teacher, however, is armed with evidence to the contrary and argues that Austen found a socially acceptable way to make radical assertions about women’s rights through the irony and characterization in her novels. The debate would seem to offer contradictory views but, as the discussion continues, it will become clear that both women are right and their seemingly disparate views are supported by the same arguments.

Lynda Hall is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of English and Comparative Literature, Chapman University, Orange, CA. She completed both her B.A. and M.A. at Chapman in the ’80s. Currently she is the Director of Composition Programs, which limits the time she can dedicate to Jane Austen, but she did teach three courses devoted, at least in part, to Austen studies. A JASNA member since 1986 she shared a Breakout Panel in Richmond, VA. Her paper, “Jane Austen’s Attractive Rogues: Willoughby, Wickham and Frank Churchill”, was published in the 1995 Persuasions. She participates in the AGMs and in many regional events throughout JASA-SW Region, and is on the planning committee for the 2004 Los Angeles AGM. She plans to obtain a Ph.D in English Literature, focusing on 18th- and 19th-century women writers, hoping to spend time at the Chawton Centre doing research.

Laura Fauteux obtained her B.A. and will receive her M.A. in English Literature at Chapman this year. Her interest in Jane Austen began when she took an Introduction to Fiction course with Professor Hall, and read Sense and Sensibility. Later, she read all of the novels. She wrote a paper for the class, “Men are from Mars, Jane is from Jupiter”, which focused on Jane’s male characters and their believability. She also participated in an independent study last year and wrote, “Jane is SO Popular”, in which she discussed Austen’s balancing several ideologies within her novels. Last year she submitted a paper to the JASNA 2001 Conference entitled “Every Savage can Dance.” She plans to apply to the Ph.D. program to continue her studies in Nineteenth-Century British Literature, concentrating on Jane Austen and George Eliot. A:6

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Sylvia Hunt: “Jane Austen’s Fictions and the 18th-century Courtesy Books: Teenage Rebellion versus Mature Conformity.” Without argument, Austen’s novels reflect the lives of a fairly affluent segment of English society and, for the 21st-century reader, provide an interesting and accurate picture of her age and of its class behaviour. A great influence on this behaviour was the courtesy book produced in the 16th and 17th centuries and read, avidly, well into the 18th. It is evident that Jane was well-acquainted with these books and her writings reflect her attitude to their value system. But what was Austen’s attitude? The talk will explore young Jane’s reading and interpretation of this material as it is reflected in her juvenilia, and compare it to that of her more mature writings.

Sylvia Hunt is a Ph.D. student at the Université de Laval in Québec City and her doctoral thesis is on the Jane Austen juvenilia, under the direction of Dr. Peter Sabor. The selection of Austen as her research subject is appropriate since it was her membership in the Québec JASNA group that induced her to enrol in the English Literature programme at Laval. Her master’s thesis was a study of the literary tradition of Maria Edgeworth, a writer much admired by Jane. D:5

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Cheryl Cox Kinney: “Hot Flashes and Hormones: Menopause in the World of Jane Austen.” This paper will examine female characters in Jane Austen’s novels exhibiting potential influences of menopause. The first segment will be an explanation of what we know today about menopause; the second segment will examine what was known, or supposedly known, about menopause in the early 19th century. The third part will examine some of the characters in the novels who exhibit menopausal-like symptoms. The audience will be asked to participate in the discussion of these and other female characters, looking for the clues left for us to discover by the incredible Miss Austen.

Cheryl Cox Kinney, M.D. is a Obstetrician and Gynaecologist in Dallas, TX. She received her M.D. at Indiana University School of Medicine and did her residency there. She is affiliated with both St. Paul Medical Center and Medical City Dallas, and is a Clinical Instructor in Obstetrics and Gynaecology at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical School. Cheryl is also an avid Janeite and writes that she is “in awe of Jane Austen. My knowledge as a physician increases that exponentially. Miss Austen’s astute physical and emotional characterizations in her novels would have made her the busiest gynaecologist in the country.” C:7

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Robin McKarns: “Women’s Health in the Regency Period: or, Why Jane Austen had so many sisters-in-law.” The co-relation between the progress of women’s rights and advances in women’s health care is still a hotly-debated issue. It is therefore no surprise that the quality of health care during the Regency period was poor for women who were, effectively, considered to be property of their husbands. Robin plans to place the Regency period within the timeline of the benchmarks of medical science, examine the most common causes of morbidity and mortality of that time and the treatments available, and, finally, examine the specific roles of the health care practitioners available, including physicians, surgeons, chemists and midwives, and the training available to them.

Robin McKarns, RN, MSN, was the regional coordinator of the JASNA South Carolina Region (1997-2001) and was a staff RN and Clinical Educator for Paediatric Intensive Care at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston. Currently, she is the Hospital Services Coordinator, Adult, Paediatric and Storm Eye Hospitals for the Medical University of South Carolina. D:6

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William Phillips and Russell Clark: “On the Road with Georgian Ladies: Travels by Female Writers Contemporary with Jane Austen.” Jane Austen travelled relatively little herself and the women she created travelled rather little as well. In that context, Mrs. Croft’s declaration, in Persuasion, that she had been across the Atlantic four times and to the East Indies once and back, and to several places closer to home, stands out in stark relief in the whole of Austen’s major work. What about Austen’s contemporaries in the sisterhood of writers? One of the best known, Fanny Burney, lived significant periods of her long and active life in France. This presentation will take selected women writers, particularly those known to have been read by Jane, and investigate their travels and the travels of their characters. These may include, but not necessarily be limited to, Burney, Ann Radcliffe and Maria Edgeworth and characters from their work.

William Phillips has published and presented on film treatments of Austen’s novels including a presentation at the 1999 AGM on film adaptions of Emma, a version of which appears in Persuasions-on-line. He is presently teaching with the Department of British/American Studies at the Aichi Prefectural University, Nagakute, Aichi, Japan.

Russell Clark has published and presented on the topic of Readers’ Theatre and teaches at DePaul University in Chicago. Both are currently collaborating on a series of pieces which bring together the works of Jane Austen and Barbara Pym. The two gentlemen will also be performing with Louise Heal and Kallie Keith in a Reader’s Theatre presentation at the 2002 conference as well. E:6

IN ADDITION, THERE ARE OTHER EXTRAS:

On Thursday evening at 8.00 p.m.:

Patrice Boyd will entertain the early birds with “An Evening at Pemberley: The Music of Jane Austen’s Heroines,” a program of vocal music ranging from Purcell through Handel, to Haydn and Mozart. This program was presented last year at the Baisley Powell Elebash Recital Hall, City University of New York Graduate Center, New York City where Miss Boyd was accompanied by Susan Kagan on piano and Andrea LaRose on flute. A program, with notes written by Miss Boyd, will be placed in the tote bag of each registrant.

A Coloratura soprano, Patrice Boyd has appeared in opera, concert, oratorio, and musical theatre throughout the United States, Europe and Asia. She sang the world premiere of Giampaolo Testoni’s Alice, (based on Alice in Wonderland) and has appeared as Marie in La Fille du Régiment at Barcelona’s Gran Teatre del Liceu under Richard Bonynge. As cantor at St. James Cathedral, she appears regularly on television in the New York metropolitan area. Miss Boyd is currently pursuing the Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Vocal Performance at the City University of New York, were she studies voice with Professor Norma Newton. Take advantage of this extra and come to the conference early.

On Saturday evening at 9.00 p.m.:

Mark Turner will amuse those who do not wish to dance after the banquet with a session entitled: “What am I, Fair Lady? The Charades of Jane Austen’s Time.” His presentation will introduce us to the charade, its history and traditions in Western literature up to Austen’s time. He will then discuss the charades of the Austen family and those used as a plot device and character test in Emma. A booklet of charades prepared by Mr. Turner, as well as the usual Jane Austen quiz, will be part of the registration kit. Winners will be announced at the brunch.

After the Sunday Brunch at 11:00 a.m.:

Amanda Jacobs Dean and Lindsay Warren Baker will present a preview of their new musical based on Pride and Prejudice, entitled “Translating Jane Austen: the characters of Pride and Prejudice in song.” We all are aware that music played an important part in Jane Austen’s life and she reflected this in her novels. In American musical theatre, the story is advanced with dance and song and, for the characters, this form of expression is as natural as speech. Therefore, Austen’s P & P easily lends itself to musical theatre format because her melodic language contains powerful subtext. When translated on stage, the writers feel that Jane’s world becomes more accessible to our world. A selection of solos and duets will be performed by the composers and other singers from the Rochester region.

The writers/composers, Amanda Jacobs Dean and Lindsay Warren Baker, are members of the JASNA Rochester, NY Region and have been working together for four years now, creating and adapting a musical called Daniel: the musical which had a production with a CD issued. They are currently working on their adaption of Pride and Prejudice which will be workshopped at the GCC Theatre in Batavia, NY in its 2001-2002 season. The musical will also be taken to the Eugene O’Neil Center in Waterford, CT for a dialect workshop and development. They authors have also been invited to pursue co-production in Scotland at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2002 this summer.

and finally, on Sunday afternoon at 2:00 to 3:30 p.m.:

Don’t forget our presentation of Joan Austen Leigh’s Our Own Particular Jane produced under the guidance of noted television director Norman Campbell. It will be done as a reading, much like the First Drama Quartet performances, with four Canadian actors taking all the various parts. This presentation is in honour of Joan Austen Leigh and is the finale element in the 2002 Conference.