The 2015 ELLAK International Conference

"Spaces/Spatialities: Practices, Encounters, and Articulations"

December 10-12, 2015, Busan, Korea

Termed broadly the "spatial turn" in literary and cultural studies and critical theory, the past several decades have witnessed renewed interest in space/spatiality -- conceptualizations of space as both produced and producing, abstract and concrete, static and dynamic, material and discursive, and structured and processual. From physical setting (place, region, environment, locale, landscape) to socioeconomic and political geographies (slavery, occupation, colonialism, imperialism, globalization, militarism, tourism), to lived experiences and identity categories (private, public, gender, race, religion, sexuality, class), space as an organization of society embodies the overlapping, relational networks of human societies.

In the past half-century, our sense of space as physical space has been undergoing fundamental changes. National boundaries are destabilized by global forces such as terrorism, climate change, the eventual depletion of fossil fuels, and the volatility of the global economy. The increasing mobility of people and cultures destabilizes the connection between geographic space and cultural identity. The pervasive influence of technology (such as robotics and computer networks) destabilizes our very definitions of physical space and the environment that we inhabit. The time is right, therefore, to explore the ways in which we may re-imagine and re-define our spaces.

With the conference theme "Spaces/Spatialities: Practices, Encounters, and Articulations," we hope to explore space in its multiple, simultaneous, and plural manifestations -- histories of practices and encounters of/with/in space and the theoretical and aesthetic articulations, disillusioned and empowering, that are constructed and mobilized around space. We also welcome papers that explore the many ways in which works of literature and popular culture reflect changing perceptions and definitions of space. Potential vectors through which to consider the dimension of space include, but are not limited to:

- time-space compression
- spatio-temporalities
- Global North/South
- colonial/postcolonial, rural/urban, central/peripheral spaces
- old and new World geographies: globalization, transnationalism, neoliberalism
- gendered/classed/racialized spaces
- destabilization of national and cultural identities
- anxieties about environmental degradation and global crises
- paranoia about global and/or digital networks
- responses to migration and demographic change
- envisioning virtual realities and alternative worlds

Papers may discuss works of literature and popular culture from any historical period. Works produced at a time when people perceived their world in a different way can provide valuable insight into the instability and anxieties of our present. We welcome all theoretical and interdisciplinary approaches as well as papers that focus exclusively on the historical, conceptual, and theoretical understandings of space/spatiality.

Extended Deadline: Please submit 300-word proposals for 20-minute papers and CVs by 31 June 2015 to 2015ellakconference@gmail.com.