"Crossing the Atlantic: Travel and Travel Writing in modern times" is the title of the 44th Walter Prescott Webb Lecture Series to be held March 12, 2009, at the University of Texas at Arlington. The lectures will explore travel and travel writing of Germans and Americans who crossed the Atlantic during the nineteenth and early twentieth century.
Speakers will include Dieter Buse (Laurentian University), Andrew Lees (Rutgers University), Nils Roemer (University of Texas at Dallas), and Thomas Adam (University of Texas at Arlington).

We invite students and scholars who work on the topic of travel and travel literature to submit essays in English or German of no more than 10,000 words plus endnotes. Travel accounts played an important role in the construction of geographic, social and cultural identities and in the creation of long-lasting images and stereotypes connected with the visited places. Cultural superiority of Old Europe and natural beauty of North America became stereotypes that dominated the minds of people in the transatlantic world. The study of travel reports, thus, helps us to understand the mindset of the traveler and of the culture he/she belonged to. We invite submissions on any aspect of travel between Europe and North and South America as well as on travel writing for the time period from 1800 to 1939.

The deadline for submissions is February 1, 2009.

Submissions should be send to Thomas Adam via email (adam@uta.edu)