This year’s Modern Language Association Annual Convention took place January 9–12 in Seattle, Washington. Participants were far from sleepless as they traversed Seattle’s downtown to catch up on the latest in literary trends, gossip, and fashion (by which I obviously mean methods, debates, and readings). Amid Pacific Northwest paneling, prepping, and partying, critics had plenty of affective, sociocultural, and spatiotemporal experiences upon which to remark.
1. Person 1: “There’s an angry lesbian trying to check in ahead of me.”
Person 2: “It has begun.”
2. “He was basically speaking in Comic Sans MS.”
3. “I’m not a doctor, I just play one at MLA.”
4. Person 1: “I wasn’t sure where I was going, but then I just followed a woman holding a Freud book.”
Person 2: “I followed the disheveled-looking folks.”
5. “We had to tiptoe all over Mark Twain’s house.”
6. “Are you gendering Seattle’s water?”
7. “We could go to a panel, or we could get high and see Cats.”
8. “Is there a conference grant to cover badge replacements?”
9. “This is peak rhizomatic.”
10. “So did you ever figure out what the digital humanities are?”
11. Person 1: “I’m pursuing the capitalist production of dairy-infused comestibles.”
Person 2: “Just say you’re going to the Cheesecake Factory.”
12. “It’s not gossip, it’s sociality.”
13. Person 1: “Have you checked out the Innovation Room?”
Person 2: “Is that a room from Schoolhouse Rock?”
Person 1: “… No.”
14. “Bodies are so inconvenient at conferences.”
15. Person 1: “There’s a high-concept drag show happening at a German leather bar.”
Person 2: “Isn’t that just MLA?”
