Darkness has always been defined in binary opposition to light. As Toni Morrison puts it in Playing in the Dark (1992): “Whiteness, alone, is mute, meaningless, unfathomable, pointless, frozen, veiled, curtained, dreaded, senseless, implacable.” While darkness and light are mutually constitutive, the threshold between the two is ambivalent; it is blurry and changing. In addition to its symbolic dimensions, the darkness-vs.-light binary can also be taken literally: the early settlers feared the dark while electricity effectively banished darkness from cities, for example. The dark may be rife with danger, a metaphorical space of erasure, and a tool of obfuscation, but at the same time, the dark may provide protection, a space for subversion, and a place of beauty.
KEYNOTES: Noam M. Elcott (Columbia University), Kyle T. Mays (University of California, Los Angeles)
Registration for attendees open till September 3
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Organizing Committee Laura Álvarez Trigo, Paula Barba Guerrero, Michael Fuchs, Anna Marta Marini, Alejandro Rivero Vadillo
Assistant organizer Dina Pedro
If you have any doubt or inquiry, feel welcome to drop a line at popmec.darkness@gmail.com
