International interdisciplinary conference Popular Culture at the Turn of the 20th Century

The turn of the 19^th and 20^th centuries is a period of modernization when changes in the public—the growing working-class and the appearance of a new urban middle-class—and in technologies increasingly enabled the mass production of the arts. Popular culture is not only the subject of historical research (the history of daily life, literature, or art, which has remained on the periphery, outside of the cultural canon), but also the subject of theoretical interest. It can be questioned from which century we can date the first occurrences of popular culture. Can we use the same vocabulary when discussing the late 19^th century popular culture that we use to speak about the 20^th century pop culture? What does the word ‘popular’ in ‘popular culture’ actually mean — mass appeal, broad distribution, or perhaps applicability and classification as ‘low brow’? We invite scholars to address these and other issues from the 1880s to the eve of the First World War. We anticipate presentations on various topics from the humanities and social sciences, where expressions of popular culture and its function are revealed in the context of the culture and milieu at the turn of the century. We invite you to address these and other topics:

• popular culture and gender/ the feminine and the masculine fields
• popular culture and literature / theatre / music / film / visual arts / advertisement / press and media at the turn of the century
• the problem of defining popular culture (mass culture, kitsch)
• interaction between the popular culture and the elitist culture
• popular culture and the cultural canon
• popular culture and the sociology of culture
• popular culture and daily life, the anthropology of food / dress
• popular culture and social change / social structures 

The conference is dedicated to the 150^th birthday of Latvian poet Eduards Treimanis-Zvārgulis (1866-1950) and will take place within the Zvārgulis Festival in Riga and Cēsis from 30 September to 1 October, 2016. Riga/Cēsis, Latvia, 30 September – 1 October 2016 Please send your submissions to zvargulafestivals@gmail.com by 15 May 2016. The submission must include the theme of your presentation, abstract (approx. 600 characters), academic degree and affiliation, contact information (phone number, address). www.lfmi.lu.lv www.facebook.com/lulfmi/