Welcome!

Welcome to the new website of the Burney Society (North America). We are (slowly) building our new site and much information remains on our site at McGill.

Burney Journal submission period now open

The editors welcome submissions for Issue 21 of the Burney Journal, which will be published on 13 June 2026 online and in print. Please see the Journal’s new website for Author Guidelines, submission instructions, and a checklist. The deadline for submissions is 1 November 2025.

Burney Society at ASECS 2026 Call for papers

Panel Title: “Burney(s) and Blue Studies: Sea and the City”
Chair: Francesca Saggini
Submissions via the ASECS website: August 4-September 22, 2025
Abstract: Frances Burney is part of a significant network of artists –from Hogarth to Gay, from Fielding to Boswell– who imagined strategies for representing and mediating, on paper and in artworks, the (psycho-)geographies, interactions, and landscapes that characterize the modern urban environment. While Burney’s engagement with the rural/urban framework has been extensively explored, the recent rise of Blue Studies, also known as Blue Humanities, makes the sea another
space within which to reconsider Burney’s modernity. We welcome reflections on this neglected aspect of Burney’s world and imagery: the sea and water. How do sea and maritime ecologies enter the text, and how can a shift in focus from the city to the sea contribute to our understanding of Frances Burney and her family? The seminar invites proposals that develop or simply move from the following topics to think how the sea and water shaped cultural practices, identities, and
narratives in Burney(s):

  • The maritime dimension in the life and work of Frances Burney and her family.
  • The sea and the city as backdrops and protagonists.
  • Expectations, prohibitions, ambitions, and desires on land and at sea.
  • Walkers, sailors, and their spatial and cultural encounters.
  • The sea, the city, and language: maritime and urban idioms.
  • The sea and the city as metaphors.
  • Networking on land and at sea.
  • Water-centric thinking in Burney(s).
  • Naval warfare, colonialism, and capitalist logic in Burney(s).