Today more and more literature is being transferred from the traditional print to the digital, and being produced solely for Web publication.

The West Virginia University Center for Literary Computing and the Electronic Literature Organization will host the 2012 Electronic Literature Organization Conference and Media Arts Show, “Electrifying Literature: Affordances and Constraints,” from June 20-23.

The Electronic Literature Organization, founded in 1999, promotes and fosters the reading, writing and teaching of literature as it develops and persists in a changing digital world. The organization has also partnered with the Library of Congress to start archiving electronic literature.

“They’re an organization that makes a conscious effort to cut across the divisions between academic and non-academic by including not only the writers, but also publishers,” said Sandy Baldwin, director of the Center for Literary Computing and associate professor of English at WVU. “It really is committed to bringing born-digital literature to a broader audience and making it accessible, as well as enjoyable.”

The conference portion of the event features more than 100 leading scholars from over a dozen different countries. Topics discussed at the conference include electronic literature, computer gaming, digital text, mobile media, new media art and more.

“We have a lot of students involved and parts of the conference are spread across Morgantown,” Baldwin said. “We also have an art gallery that will be featured well beyond the time of the conference.”

The Media Arts Show will feature 55 artists from nine countries. The pieces will be on display in five venues across the city, including the Monongalia Arts Center; the Arts Monongahela Gallery; the WVU Downtown Library; WVU’s Colson Hall; and the Hazel Ruby McQuain Ampitheatre.

“We’re hoping through all of this that we introduce electronic literature to the general public of Morgantown and to the students,” said Baldwin.

The Electronic Literature Organization is a 501©3 organization based at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

For more information on the conference, please visit http://el.eliterature.org
Contact conference organizer Sandy Baldwin at Charles.Baldwin@mail.wvu.edu.

-WVU-

ap/5/30/12

CONTACT: Rebecca Herod, Director of Marketing and Communication
304-293-7406, ext. 5251, Rebecca.Herod@mail.wvu.edu

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