The L.M. Montgomery Institute’s
12th Biennial International Conference
University of Prince Edward Island
23-26 June 2016
From Anne’s initial iconic and heartrending cry in Anne of Green Gables—“You don’t want me because I’m not a boy”—to the pressure on young men to join the war effort in Rilla of Ingleside, and from the houseful of supportive co-eds in Anne of the Island to the tyrannical grandmother in Jane of Lantern Hill, Lucy Maud Montgomery’s work highlights gender roles: how formative and deterministic they seem, and yet mutable they may be. Much Montgomery criticism of the past several decades has regarded her work from a feminist and gender studies perspective.
Given that Canada is fast approaching the centenary of women’s suffrage in the province of Manitoba (1916) and nationally (1918), the twelfth biennial conference hosted by the L.M. Montgomery Institute (LMMI) at the University of Prince Edward Island, which will take place 23-26 June 2016, will re-consider the role of gender in L.M. Montgomery’s work, broadly defined: her fiction, poetry, life writing, letters, photographs, and scrapbooks, as well as the myriad adaptations and spinoffs in film, television, theatre, tourism, and social media.
Our Co-Chairs for LMMI’s L.M. Montgomery and Gender Conference 2016:
Laura Robinson
Laura Robinson, Visiting Scholar at the LMMI, is a Professor of English and Dean of Arts (Interim) at Royal Military College of Canada and recently curated a travelling and virtual exhibit on The Canadian Home Front: L.M. Montgomery’s Reflections on the First World War.
Andrea McKenzie
Andrea McKenzieis Associate Professor at York University with the Writing Department and the Graduate Program in History. With Benjamin Lefebvre, she co-edited the restored original text of Rilla of Ingleside (Viking, 2010), and she has published several book chapters on Montgomery’s works. Her new book, War-Torn Exchanges: The Lives and Letters of Nursing Sisters Laura Holland and Mildred Forbes, will be published in 2016 (UBC Press).
Keynote Speakers:
Elizabeth Epperly
Elizabeth Epperly, Professor Emerita, was the first student to register at the “new” University of Prince Edward Island in 1969. A Victorian scholar and English professor from 1976-2006, she taught at UPEI for 22 years where she also served as founding chair of the L.M. Montgomery Institute and UPEI's fourth (and first female) president (1995-1998). Originally from Virginia, Epperly became a citizen of Canada because of her love for L.M. Montgomery’s writing. Dr. Epperly’s The Fragrance of Sweet-Grass was the first full-length critical study to address all of Montgomery’s novels.
Mavis Reimer
Mavis Reimer is professor in the Department of English and Dean of Graduate Studies at the University of Winnipeg, where she has also been Canada Research Chair in the Culture of Childhood and founding director of the Centre for Research in Young People’s Texts and Cultures. She is co-author with Perry Nodelman of the third edition of The Pleasures of Children’s Literature and editor of a collection of essays on Anne of Green Gables, entitled Such a Simple Little Tale.
Jane Urquhart
Jane Urquhart is the author of internationally acclaimed and award winning novels, including: The Whirlpool; Changing Heaven; Away; The Underpainter, winner of the Governor General’s Award; The Stone Carvers, which was a finalist for The Giller Prize and the Governor General’s Award, and longlisted for the Booker Prize; A Map of Glass, a finalist for a Commonwealth Writers’ Prize for Best Book; Sanctuary Line, and, most recently, The Night Stages. She is also the author of a collection of short fiction and four books of poetry. She also published a biography of Lucy Maud Montgomery as part of Penguin’s Extraordinary Canadians series.
The LMMI is pleased to welcome an exciting mix of scholars, writers, and readers of L.M. Montgomery’s fiction and life writing from around the world, including Sweden, Finland, Japan, Iceland, and the United States. This interdisciplinary conference includes perspectives from the fields of literature, gender studies, anthropology, law, history, and much more.
Thursday June 23rd to June 24th: Friends of the LMMI Silent Auction
Thursday June 23rd: Launch of KindredSpaces: L.M. Montgomery Research Collections Online
Friday June 24th @ 7:00 pm: Evening Reading with Jane Urquhart
Studio 1, Confederation Centre of the Arts
Chair: Philip Smith (Chair, LMMI, University of Prince Edward Island)
Introduction of Jane Urquhart by Her Honour, Mrs. Dorothy Lewis
Saturday June 25th: Reception for Donors and Banquet
Wanda Wyatt Hall
Sunday June 26th @ 1:45: Bus Tour of L.M. Montgomery’s Island
(Departing from outside of Andrew Hall Residence)