The 18th Century and Romantic Studies Colloquium brings together Princeton’s community of graduate students and faculty specializing in the long eighteenth century and Long Romanticism through a forum where we gather to discuss the current work being done in our field.  Though the colloquium has traditionally focused on British literature of the 18th century and Romantic periods, we have recently hosted scholars with trans-Atlantic interests during this time frame.  We invite speakers from around the country as well as international speakers, to share their research and answer questions in an environment that fosters engaged discussion.  Recent speakers include Frances Ferguson, Sandra Macpherson, Marshall Brown, Anahid Nersessian, Wendy Lee, Abigail Zitin, Margaret Doody, Stuart Sherman, Cynthia Wall, Duncan Wu, and Maureen McLane. 

The 20^th Century Colloquium gathers graduate students, faculty, and speakers from a diverse array of disciplines to discuss all manner of 20^th century Anglophone texts, including novels, poetry, film, critical theory, literary and cultural histories, and the like. We aim to foster a robust and engaged community of 20^th century scholars at Princeton. Our events include lectures; works-in-progress from graduate students, post-doctoral researchers, and faculty; graduate symposia; and Q&A sessions. We frequently invite visiting scholars from around the country to discuss their most recent or upcoming work. The broad scope of our colloquium allows us to host conversations about an extraordinary number of genres, geographies, and times, and we often collaborate with other colloquia to host scholars of mutual interest.

The Americanist Colloquium brings together graduate students and faculty interested in exploring topics in American literature and in American Studies in general. Our scope is wide, open to all categories of critical interest and ranging, historically, from pre-Colonial America to the present. Past events have addressed questions of sovereignty, settler-colonialism, cultural studies, speculative fiction, legal studies, and more. We organize a variety of events—talks, reading groups, workshops, mini-conferences, film screenings, and symposia—with the aim of building a community involved in the relevant issues of the field today. Recent guests of the colloquium include Karen Sanchez-Eppler, Jordan Stein, Mark Rifkin, David Kazanjian, and Edlie Wong.

The Graduate Colloquium on Contemporary Poetry brings together practicing poets and scholars from Princeton and beyond in a series of events aimed at exploring poetry in the present moment. We sponsor readings that include a question and answer session where the audience is able to engage in a dialogue with the featured poet. In past years, we have hosted poets such as Charles Bernstein, Timothy Donnelly, Ben Lerner, Jean Valentine, Tracy K. Smith, Lisa Robertson, Eduardo Corral, and Rosanna Warren. We also organize events that bring the creative and critical arts together in a necessary dialogue, including roundtable discussions by poets and scholars focusing on topics and issues in contemporary poetry. These have included a discussion of ‘Poetry and Pedagogy,’ a roundtable on the work of New York School poet James Schuyler, and an upcoming symposium on conceptualism and poetic freedom. As a colloquium, we are committed to providing a yearlong series of readings and events that celebrate the poetry community at Princeton while sustaining a dialogue about poetry in the twenty-first century.

The medieval colloquium is a graduate and faculty working group committed to enriching medieval studies at Princeton. Though we are mostly medievalists, we believe firmly that our field is enriched by discussion across periods and disciplines, and so we invite any and all interested people to attend our meetings. To this end, it is our hope to collaborate with other colloquia and organizations on Princeton’s campus and beyond. We invite speakers from institutions near and far, hoping to provide them with an environment in which they can share their work, receive feedback, and stir thought among all attendees. In recent years, we have hosted several esteemed medievalists, including, but not limited to, Eleanor Johnson, Mark Miller, and Emily Steiner.

The Postcolonial Colloquium is organized by graduate students of the Department of English at Princeton University as a forum for the study of the problem of postcolonialism. During the academic year, we host talks and discussions that reflect on the different kinds of subjects and forms of subjection that can be called postcolonial today.

An important function of the colloquium is to serve as a venue within the department for conversations about difference, especially racial and ethnic difference. We also seek to provide a space for conversations about theory and method, with a particular emphasis on the intellectual legacies of anti-colonial discourse and postcolonial studies.

The colloquium’s theme for 2017–2018 is the relationship between subjectivity and technology.

The Renaissance Colloquium is committed to providing a forum for graduate students, faculty, and visiting scholars to gather and discuss current topics in early modern studies. We invite speakers from neighboring institutions and further afield to present their research in a collegial setting that encourages questions and discussion. In recent years, we have hosted scholars including Colin Burrow, Richard Halpern, Victoria Kahn, Rhodri Lewis, Molly Murray, and numerous others.

The Theory Colloquium is an organization of graduate students that supports the discussion of cultural criticism, theories of literature and language, and critical traditions across disciplines. We invite scholars, writers, and teachers of literary theory and language to present the English Department with recent work; we also sponsor panels and the informal study of texts central to the field. In the past our programs have included talks on Jean-Claude Milner, Gilles Deleuze, and Paul de Man, as well as reading groups on Marx’s Capital and Sartre’s Critique of Dialectical Reason. The Theory Colloquium aspires to strengthen methodological commitments across the English Department and other disciplines. As part of our effort to serve the entire community, we are keen to coordinate with other colloquia, and we welcome the participation of all students and faculty, regardless of specialty. For a list of events from 2018-2019, please see below; to get involved, please contact Jessica Terekhov, Ali Mctar, or Russ Leo. 

The Victorian Colloquium is a group of Princeton graduate students and faculty working on the British nineteenth century and related fields. Our primary responsibility is to invite scholars from other universities (as well as Princeton-affiliated scholars) to share their work with us at formal talks, often followed by receptions and dinners that allow students the opportunity to speak more informally with our guests. Along with our neighbors at Rutgers, delegates from the Victorian Colloquium also organize a yearly symposium for graduate students at both universities; the 2017 theme was “The Un/natural Nineteenth Century.” Many members of the Victorian Colloquium are moreover active participants in the Long Nineteenth Century Workshop, an interdisciplinary works-in-progress group for graduate students working in the period. But beyond our purely academic initiatives, the Victorian Colloquium seeks to foster a close intellectual community of students (and faculty!) with shared interests. Happy hours and dinners give Princeton Victorianists a chance to connect across cohorts, and to share advice and experiences. The first events for 2017-18 will be announced in the summer. We hope to see you there next academic year.