Intercultural Travel Writing
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Recent papers in Intercultural Travel Writing
Fully open access: https://unipub.uni-graz.at/mcsj/periodical/titleinfo/6011478 Travel writing – on the interplay between text and the visual Guest editors: Sandra Vlasta und Birgit Englert “To travel is to see” notes Bernard... more
Fully open access: https://unipub.uni-graz.at/mcsj/periodical/titleinfo/6011478
Travel writing – on the interplay between text and the visual
Guest editors: Sandra Vlasta und Birgit Englert
“To travel is to see” notes Bernard McGrane, and writing about travels is thus the attempt to grasp what was seen – in words and/or in visual form. Accordingly “travel literature” not only deals with written texts, but also with visual elements, be it images, drawings, sketches, (out)looks, view points, or others, regardless whether they are drawn with words or also displayed visually. An arbitrary listing of some titles of travel writings (and travel blogs) underlines this: Pictures from Italy/Italienisches Bilderbuch/Sketches of Spain/ Impressions de voyage/ Reiseaufnahmen/ Blickgewinkelt. Illustrations like maps, sketches, drawings, photographs, and film which were produced on the road, as well as visual materials which were added later on, has been part of travel writing since the beginning of the genre. Visual material can serve to convey information that cannot be verbalised. The visual further may give authenticity to what was experienced and narrated and underlines the credibility of the traveller/narrator. At the same time, the visual guides the view of the reader and tends to strengthen certain viewpoints even more than texts do, although visual depictions only seem to be more realistic, as Giorgia Alù und Sarah Patricia Hill remind us: “[visual representation] distorts rather than reflects social reality”] . Illustrations in travel writing thus partake in the construction of difference, of images of the self and the other and consequently in the emergence of stereotypes and clichés.
This thematic issue of Mobile Culture Studies. The Journal >mcsj> is dedicated to the relation between text and the visual in travel writing. The latter is defined as narratives about travels which the narrators/authors have actually undertaken. We understand travel as a specific form of mobility which is characterised by certain elements and thus distinguishable from other forms of mobility – even though the exact delimitation may sometimes be blurred. In the context of Mobility Studies we are therefore also interested in the question how travel can be distinguished from other forms of mobility and how this is realised in the writings about it. Structural categories such as gender, generation, class, race and others have an impact on any form of mobility, thus also on travel. We look forward to analyses which deal with the repercussions of these categories on the experiences of travelling and their descriptions and draw on the historical as well as contemporary political, economic and social contexts of the respective cases.
Narratives about travel can take very different forms. We welcome contributions which focus on printed forms of travel writing that have generally also been edited (for example classic travelogues, graphic novels or illustrated books). Furthermore, we are also looking for analyses of formats such as the travel diary which in the last two decades has often been published in the format of blogs. Often, these are available instantaneously to a broad readership and have been authorised only by their writers. These examples also illustrate the broad timeframe of this issue which reaches up to the present.
We have a comprehensive understanding of “text” and “visual” – the focus is on the interplay between what is verbally formulated (text) and visually presented (e.g. sketches, drawings, images, maps, photos, films etc.) in travel writing. These two elements can obviously also overlap, for example in the form of ekphrasis or of texts which are inscribed into images such as in comics and graphic novels.
With contributions by:
Ana de Almeida
Birgit Englert
Holger Helm
Tanja Kapp
Jan-Hendrik Müller
Mirja Riggert
Anna Karina Sennefelder
Sigrid Thomsen
Erika Unterpertinger
Sandra Vlasta
Rhian Waller
Daniel Winkler
Christian Wimplinger
Travel writing – on the interplay between text and the visual
Guest editors: Sandra Vlasta und Birgit Englert
“To travel is to see” notes Bernard McGrane, and writing about travels is thus the attempt to grasp what was seen – in words and/or in visual form. Accordingly “travel literature” not only deals with written texts, but also with visual elements, be it images, drawings, sketches, (out)looks, view points, or others, regardless whether they are drawn with words or also displayed visually. An arbitrary listing of some titles of travel writings (and travel blogs) underlines this: Pictures from Italy/Italienisches Bilderbuch/Sketches of Spain/ Impressions de voyage/ Reiseaufnahmen/ Blickgewinkelt. Illustrations like maps, sketches, drawings, photographs, and film which were produced on the road, as well as visual materials which were added later on, has been part of travel writing since the beginning of the genre. Visual material can serve to convey information that cannot be verbalised. The visual further may give authenticity to what was experienced and narrated and underlines the credibility of the traveller/narrator. At the same time, the visual guides the view of the reader and tends to strengthen certain viewpoints even more than texts do, although visual depictions only seem to be more realistic, as Giorgia Alù und Sarah Patricia Hill remind us: “[visual representation] distorts rather than reflects social reality”] . Illustrations in travel writing thus partake in the construction of difference, of images of the self and the other and consequently in the emergence of stereotypes and clichés.
This thematic issue of Mobile Culture Studies. The Journal >mcsj> is dedicated to the relation between text and the visual in travel writing. The latter is defined as narratives about travels which the narrators/authors have actually undertaken. We understand travel as a specific form of mobility which is characterised by certain elements and thus distinguishable from other forms of mobility – even though the exact delimitation may sometimes be blurred. In the context of Mobility Studies we are therefore also interested in the question how travel can be distinguished from other forms of mobility and how this is realised in the writings about it. Structural categories such as gender, generation, class, race and others have an impact on any form of mobility, thus also on travel. We look forward to analyses which deal with the repercussions of these categories on the experiences of travelling and their descriptions and draw on the historical as well as contemporary political, economic and social contexts of the respective cases.
Narratives about travel can take very different forms. We welcome contributions which focus on printed forms of travel writing that have generally also been edited (for example classic travelogues, graphic novels or illustrated books). Furthermore, we are also looking for analyses of formats such as the travel diary which in the last two decades has often been published in the format of blogs. Often, these are available instantaneously to a broad readership and have been authorised only by their writers. These examples also illustrate the broad timeframe of this issue which reaches up to the present.
We have a comprehensive understanding of “text” and “visual” – the focus is on the interplay between what is verbally formulated (text) and visually presented (e.g. sketches, drawings, images, maps, photos, films etc.) in travel writing. These two elements can obviously also overlap, for example in the form of ekphrasis or of texts which are inscribed into images such as in comics and graphic novels.
With contributions by:
Ana de Almeida
Birgit Englert
Holger Helm
Tanja Kapp
Jan-Hendrik Müller
Mirja Riggert
Anna Karina Sennefelder
Sigrid Thomsen
Erika Unterpertinger
Sandra Vlasta
Rhian Waller
Daniel Winkler
Christian Wimplinger