“Composed by an African”: Ignatius Sancho’s Country Dances Saturday, October 23, 2021 at 1 pm

Due to the high risk of Covid infection from the Delta variant, all of our Fall meetings will be held on Zoom.
Advance registration is required for all meetings.

Saturday, September 18, 2021 at 1:00 pm
“Composed by an African”: Ignatius Sancho’s Country Dances

Lisa Brown will give a test run of her AGM presentation. 

Ignatius Sancho was born on a slave ship during the long Middle Passage. He became an abolitionist, writer, and businessman; he was the first black person to vote in a British general election, and at his death in 1780, the first to have his obituary printed in British newspapers. He is well known in the U.K. today (though virtually unknown in the U.S.), but few British people have any idea he wrote exquisite country dances. After a brief biography, Sancho’s music, signature dance sequences, and a full dance will be demonstrated on video.

A decade ago, Lisa Brown moved to a new city for more frequent access to JASNA meetings and English country dances. She is Regional Coordinator of the Central and Western New York Region and is well known for her popular AGM workshops and fashion shows. During the pandemic, Lisa created Jane Austen Bingo and has been calling Zoom bingo for JASNA Regions across North America. She regularly gives presentations on the Georgian era and is proprietress of Regency Rentals, a costume rental business.

To register click here

 A Novel Weekend 

at Genesee Country Village & Museum 

featuring Emma

Saturday & Sunday, August 7 & 8

1813 - owned by the British Musem

Click here for more information.

Registration for each event opens during the early part of the month in which the event takes place 

May

Saturday, May 15, 2021 at 1:00 pm EDT

"Costuming the Regency from the 

Bennets to the Bridgertons"

Alden O’Brien is the Curator of Costume and Textiles at the DAR Museum in Washington DC. She has curated numerous exhibitions on quilts and clothing, including “Fashioning the New Woman,” “Eye on Elegance: Early Quilts of Maryland and Virginia,” and "’An Agreeable Tyrant’: Fashion After the Revolution,” which was on view during the Washington, DC AGM. A fan of period drama since her mother let her stay up late to watch Masterpiece Theatre in its earliest years, Alden has frequently lectured on period costume design, especially focusing on the Regency. 

Register here by Thursday, May 13, 2021

 at 11:59 pm.

 Registration for each event opens during the early part of the month in which the event takes place 

April

Saturday, April 17, 2021 at 1:00 pm

“Mansfield Park and the Sacred Landscape”

Mansfield Park is usually considered Austen’s most overtly religious novel. While previous discussions have focused on such issues as “ordination” and the work’s engagement with Evangelicalism, this talk adds a new dimension to the discussion of the novel’s religious content by examining the many allusions to medieval ecclesiastical buildings. What does Austen reveal about her religious commitments through her evocation of the past?

Professor Moore's attention to detail and sense of humor make him a very enjoyable speaker. He served as a plenary speaker at the 2019 AGM in Williamsburg, VA.

Please click here to register by 

Thursday, April 15 at 11:59 pm

Roger E. Moore is Associate Dean of the College of Arts and Science and Principal Senior Lecturer in English at Vanderbilt, where he has taught since 1995. He is responsible for advising undergraduate students on a variety of academic issues, from designing interdisciplinary majors to applying for leaves of absence from the University. He chairs the Administrative Committee, which considers all aspects of the academic records of Arts and Science students, including class promotion, probationary status, and student petitions for exceptions to faculty legislation.

A specialist in early-modern English literature and religion, he is the author of scholarly articles on Christopher Marlowe, Sir Philip Sidney, and Geoffrey Chaucer, among others, in SEL, Religion and Literature and Studies in Philology. His most recent work explores nostalgia for monasteries and the monastic life in England from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries, work that has inspired two articles on Jane Austen and his book, Jane Austen and the Reformation: Remembering the Sacred Landscape (Ashgate/Routledge 2016). The recipient of the Harriet S. Gilliam Award for Excellence in Teaching (2003) and the Ernest A. Jones Faculty Adviser Award (2008), Moore teaches courses in seventeenth-century literature and the English Reformation as well as introductory writing courses and surveys of British literature.

Dean Moore serves on the Board of Directors of the Nashville Ballet and is Senior Warden of the Vestry at Christ Church Cathedral (Episcopal).

 

Registration for each event opens during the early part of the month in which the event takes place 

March

World Premiere!

"The Early Life of Lady Catherine de Bourgh"

Saturday, March 20 at 1:00 pm EDT

Marianne Liotard holding a doll, c1775 by Jean-Etienne Liotard (1702-89)

JASNA CWNY's March meeting will be the world premiere reading of "The Early Life of Lady Catherine de Bourgh," a play adapted by Robert Moss from A. Marie Sprayberry's "Lady Catherine de Bourgh" backstory in the Austen Alliance ebook, What Jane Austen Didn't Tell Us!  The cast includes A. Marie Sprayberry, Jane Knoeck, Jameson S. Yu, Aniela Wolkonowski, and Robert Moss, as Actors One, Two, Three, Four, and Five, respectively. 

Among Janeites, Robert Moss may be best known for his readers' theatre adaptation of Lady Susan, which was performed at the Morgan Library in New York in conjunction with the 2012 JASNA Annual General Meeting in Brooklyn. He has been the artistic director of five theaters across New York State:  Edward Albee's Playwrights Unit,  Playwrights Horizons,  the Queen's Theatre in the Park, the Hangar Theatre in Ithaca, and Syracuse Stage.  Most recently, he has taught in Nazareth College's Theatre Department. 

A. Marie Sprayberry retired in 2020 after 36 years of telecommuting for Guilford Publications, which publishes texts in mental health, self-help, education, and other disciplines. "Lady Catherine de Bourgh" is her first published work of fiction. Marie was Regional Coordinator for JASNA Syracuse until the Syracuse and Rochester Regions were merged in 2015 to form JASNA Central and Western New York, and she continues to serve on the JASNA CWNY executive committee.

Click here to register.

The Austen Alliance ebook, What Jane Austen Didn't Tell Us! can be purchased from Amazon.

Registration for each event opens during the first week of the month in which the event takes place  

February

Q & A with Soniah Kamal

Author of Unmarriageable

A witty modern retelling of Pride and Prejudice set in Pakistan

Saturday, February 20 at 1:00 pm 

Register here by Thursday,

February 18 at 11:59 pm EST

Soniah Kamal is a lifetime member of the Jane Austen Society of North America (JASNA). She serves on the JASNA Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Committee (JEDI).  Soniah was a Featured Plenary Panelist at 2020 JASNA AGM and she was the 2020 Keynote Speaker at the Jane Austen Festival held by JASNA Louisville, Kentucky.

Soniah is an award-winning novelist, essayist, and public speaker. Her recent novel, Unmarriageable, is a Financial Times Readers’ Best Book of 2019, a 2019 Book All Georgians Should Read, a 2020 Georgia Author of the Year in Literary Fiction nominee and shortlisted for the 2020 Townsend Prize for Fiction. Her debut novel, An Isolated Incident, was a finalist for the KLF French Fiction Prize and the Townsend Prize for Fiction. Soniah’s TEDx talk is about second chances and ‘We are the Ink’, her  U.S. Citizenship Oath Ceremony address is about immigrants and the American Dream. Her work is in the New York Times, Guardian, Buzzfeed, Catapult, Normal School, Georgia Review, and more. 

Soniah was born in Pakistan, grew up in England and Saudi Arabia, and lived all over the US, and currently in Georgia.

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Registration for each event opens during the first week of the month in which the event takes place.

Abolition and the Female Consumer

 

William Wilberforce
a leader in the movement to abolish the British slave trade
By Anton Hickel - Image: Bridgeman Art Gallery; Portrait: Wilberforce House, Hull Museum

"But I do talk to him more than I used. I am sure I do. Did not you hear me ask him about the slave-trade last night?" Mansfield Park chapter 21

With 2020 behind us we can hopefully look forward to better things in 2021. Here is JASNA's Central and Western New York region we will begin the year with our Jane and Cassandra Austen Birthday celebration. We will continue to be virtual for awhile yet, but, perhaps by the fall we will be able to gather in person again.

Please join us to hear Tricia Matthew, University of Buffalo Scholar in Residence seek on "I hope white hands": Abolition and the Female Consumer. From the speaker:

"Based on my research trip to seven cities in the United Kingdom, this talk focuses on abolition, Josiah Wedgwood, and women as consumers. When we pay attention to the ways that the three intersect, we can better understand Regency-era culture and the rituals it taught women to follow as they participated more fully in public debates."

Details below:

Event:   JASNA CWNY (Virtual) Jane and Cassandra Austen Birthday Celebration

Topic:    "I hope white hands": Abolition and the Female Consumer

               A talk by University of Buffalo Scholar in Residence Tricia Matthew

When:    Saturday, January 16, 2021 at 1 pm EST 

Where:   Online through Zoom, pre-registration required

Note:      Enjoy birthday cake and/or popovers at home.

               Don't forget to have a suitable beverage on hand for the birthday toast!

Registration: Use the link below to fill out the registration form:

Registration Form

Link to registration form

https://forms.gle/zsycW3NXSmDcEt749