Critical Plant Studies, a book series published by Lexington Books, an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield, calls us to re-examine in fundamental ways our understanding of and engagement with plants, drawing on diverse disciplinary perspectives. A sampling of topics appropriate for this series includes but is not limited to:
• Representations of plants in literature, art, film, and popular culture
• Relationships between humans and plants
• Boundaries and distinctions between plants and animals
• Plants and the environmental crisis
• Phytosemiotics and plant communication
• Plant sensation and consciousness
• Vegetal agency

We are looking to round out our collected volume of critical essays in American popular culture from 1865-1940,  that examine how women vigilantes, anti-heroines and outlaws of this era were represented in movie serials, radio dramas, films, comics, theater, and pulp fiction.  We are seeking at least one additional chapter. The majority of the book is set, and we are in contract with a peer-review publisher.  We are on a tight deadline, so preference will be given to papers that are already in progress that are a good fit for this collection. 

CFP: Medievalism in Popular Culture

PCA/ACA 2024 National Conference

March 27-30, Chicago, IL (In-Person)

The Medievalism in Popular Culture Area (including Early to Later Middle Ages, Robin Hood, Arthurian Legend, Chaucer, Norse, and other materials connected to medieval studies) accepts papers on all topics that explore either popular culture during the Middle Ages or transcribe some aspect of the Middle Ages into the popular culture of later periods. These representations can occur in any genre, including film, television, novels, graphic novels, gaming, advertising, art, etc. For this year’s conference, I would like to encourage submissions on some of the following topics:

Call for Papers, CEA 2024: Atlanta

53rd Annual Conference | March 21–23, 2024

Westin Buckhead Atlanta

TRANSFORMATIONS

ABSTRACTS DUE: NOVEMBER 1, 2023

JOIN CEA IN ATLANTA!

Ninth Annual Post45 Graduate Symposium

Concordia University and McGill University

March 22nd-23rd, 2024

Submission deadline: December 1st, 2023

Keynote Faculty: Mary Esteve (Concordia) and Alexander Manshel (McGill)

Call for Papers

Cormac McCarthy Society

American Literature Association 35th Annual

Conference

May 23-26, 2024

The Palmer House Hilton
17 East Monroe Street
Chicago, IL   60603

The Cormac McCarthy Society welcomes proposals for papers on any topic related to Cormac McCarthy’s works

Due Date: January 1, 2024

Please send abstracts to Steven Frye at sfrye@csub.edu

Authorship in a Global and Transnational Context30-31 May 2024, KU Leuven (Belgium)

Spiritual Responses to American Literary Modernism~ Call for Chapter Proposals

At the end of 1920, F. Scott Fitzgerald’s first novel, This Side of Paradise, explored the crises of a new generation who had “grown up to find all Gods dead… all faiths in man shaken.” Scholars and theologians concur that American literature, like the culture at large, was undergoing a passage from a spiritual to a secular outlook throughout the 1920s and 30s. This transition was so dramatic and widespread that that the years between 1925-1935 have been termed “the American Religious Depression.” Indeed, many texts from these two decades present their own version of the larger cultural secularization thesis.

RISE: Creative Theoretical Approaches to Cultural Production, Then and Now Call for Papers

Howard University's Graduate English Student Association

Abstract Submission Deadline: January 18, 2024

In “The Race for Theory,” Barbara Christian writes: 

CFP: Visual and Material Culture at CEA 2024

deadline for submissions: 

November 1, 2023

full name / name of organization: 

College English Association

contact email: 

eja12@psu.edu

Call for Papers, Visual and Material Culture at CEA 2024

March 21-23, 2024 | Atlanta, Georgia

The Westin Buckhead Atlanta

The Department of Childhood Studies at Rutgers University-Camden seeks proposals for a multidisciplinary conference on Visions of Racial Justice and Childhood to be held in Camden, NJ, USA, on June 6 to June 8, 2024. This conference invites presentations that consider how different social actors and entities, including (but not limited to) governments, corporations, non- governmental organizations, and activist groups, have envisioned racial justice in relation to childhood and youth. What visions of racial justice are sustained, contested, and otherwise engaged across children’s literature, media, and popular culture?

“All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy.” Does play guarantee pleasure? Does work preclude pleasure? Do you have a guilty pleasure?

This interdisciplinary conference aims to explore the dynamic relationships between play and pleasure in various literary and cultural contexts, while critically examining the contemporary debates surrounding these themes. We encourage submissions that emphasise their interconnectedness rather than treating them as separate entities. In this light, we invite scholars to redefine, subvert, or “play” with these terms.

Time and again, Shakespeare demonstrates the frailty and contingency of the many historical and “imagined” communities (Anderson) that feature in his works. Many of his plays revolve around the conflict between individuals and society, depicting the bonds between friends, lovers, family members or even whole nations being put to the test by desire, jealousy, and ambition. If Shakespeare’s communities are unstable to begin with, then discussions of diversity bring to light that very instability even further. His works have been both hailed for showcasing the universality of human nature and critiqued for implicitly reinforcing a Western, Eurocentric world view.