Cirrus@Austlit

'This paper presents a case study of videopoems made as a way to further understand translocal experiences, paying particular attention to the way the form can ‘travel’ between localities. The turn to the translocal is an endeavour to ‘deliberately confuse the boundaries of the local in an effort to capture the increasingly complicated nature of spatial processes and identities’ (Oakes and Schein 2005: 20). This paper explores the ways in which videopoetry as a form reflects the translocal process of ‘a simultaneous situatedness across different locales which provide ways of understanding the overlapping place-time(s) in migrants’ everyday lives’ (Brickell and Datta 2011: 4). Through layering poems, sound and moving images the videopoetry form has the potential to provide insight into the dislocating experience of living between localities. This paper analyses some videopoems and reflects on the relevance of the videopoetry form in the context of translocal poetry.' (Publication abstract)

'The writers of this article teach at different universities. Two are Writing and Literature professors, three historians, and within those disciplines, each has a different area of interest. What unites them is a shared belief in the importance of visiting the place they are writing about, and how they all used overseas study tours to give their students the same opportunity to see a place with fresh eyes and write about it with imagination and creativity.' (Introduction)