On 17 November 2016, the Centre for Gender and Diversity hosted a conference organised by Christophe Van Eecke in collaboration with the Praemium Erasmianum Foundation. The theme of the conference was ‘alternative forms of life writing’ and the event came about as a follow-up to the Research Prize that the Foundation had awarded to Christophe’s dissertation on 9 May.

The aim of the conference was to explore unexpected ways in which people write and tell their life stories, looking beyond the well-known media of biography and autobiography. The presentations enquired into the performative character of biopics; the challenges of inter-country adoption for (re-)constructing a coherent life story; forms of life writing in film, in the visual arts, and in performance art; the articulation of collective memories in post-communist Romania; the challenges of articulating the self for people with autism or people suffering from dementia, and many other aspects of contemporary life writing.

The conference had an impressive company of speakers, with presentations from Christophe Van Eecke, Sandra Kisters, Louis van den Hengel, Maaike Meijer, Lies Wesseling, Codruta Pohrib, Leni van Goidsenhoven, and Aagje Swinnen.

This researcher is part of the Arts, Media and Culture research programme.