Students of English Studies Association (SESA) Call for Papers 2023

"Navigating the Environment: Adapting, Critiquing, and Reconstructing Our Surroundings"

This year's annual SESA Symposium engages critical discussions about the environment. We use the term environment in its broadest sense to include the current multivalent discussions about the natural and physical world as well as the critical discourses about our immediate surroundings. Although the environment is technically the physical space we inhabit, we intend to move beyond this popular construction of the term. We want to expand to the numerous environments we constantly operate and exist within including those that are social, economic, political, educational, and psychological.

Participants are encouraged to explore the multifaceted ways people are connected to their environment and the ways the environment connects to them. Examples of environments that participants can explore include natural, political, colonial, educational, and familial environments. Participants are also encouraged to identify specific themes about environmental justice, environments of prejudice, environments of acceptance, and diverse/open classroom environments. Proposals may take into consideration how different classroom environments impact learning, empathy, and understanding. Other important environments include historically marginalized communities/environments, environmental justice, climate fiction, and histories of environmental exploitation in colonial and other imperialist/capitalist spaces.

Some questions that intrigue us about the environment are: How does the environment we inhabit oppress us? How does our immediate environment differ from our city, state, or nation? How do classroom environments impact students of color? What changes can be made in K-12 classrooms? How have past environments impacted our contemporary space?

Papers might address topics such as:

• Classroom Environments 

• Environmental justice

• Environments of oppression

• Family environments

• Immigration, migration, and reform

• Marginalized communities

• Privilege

• Social class

• Social, political, and digital movements

• Mental health

• Trauma

• Eco-criticism

• Feminism

• Gender and queer studies

• Postcolonial environments (both nature and people)

• Rhetorical analysis of environmental topics

• Critical Race Theory

• Utopian studies

Dates and Information

• Priority deadline for abstracts is October 16, 2023. Late deadline is October 30, 2023

• Conference will be primarily in person on Thursday & Friday December 7-8 in the Fresno State Library room 2206

• We will make accommodations to presenters that are only able to present virtually, but there is limited availability

• Send your abstract (250-300 words) and a short bio (50-100 words) to sesa.fresno@gmail.com

• If you have any questions email sesa.fresno@gmail.com

• Event is free and open to the public 

We look forward to reading your submissions!