As the “Crisis in the Humanities” continues to witness a decline in all things humanities courses throughout post-secondary curricula under the echoing waves of COVID, teachers of English survey courses are left to do some cleaning up with regard to what we teach as far as the surveys go. In addition to the COVID slope, the number of English majors continues to wane, and some colleges are even restructuring semester scheduling. When the dust settles, where does that leave the last vestibule of the formal introductory map to English studies, the venerable “survey course” – the one, staunch and steadfast bastion of the once bustling English departments?

Call for Papers

ReFocus: The Films of John Singleton

Editor: Daniel Dufournaud

Discourse surrounding issues related to the transgender and feminist communities currently dominates contemporary cultural conversation globally. Against this backdrop, Femspec calls for submissions exploring speculative approaches to gender, and particularly to transgender identity and embodiment; the rise and use of what some liken to Orwellian doublespeak; and projections extrapolated from our present into the future. 

Femspec is an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed feminist journal dedicated to science fiction, fantasy, magical realism, surrealism, myth, folklore, and other supernatural genres.  

Call for Participation

Fan Studies Network North America Conference 2023 (virtual)

October 11-15, 2023

RE: FANDOM

Fan Studies Network North America 2023

The 2023 Conference

This special edition of Interdisciplinary Humanities will investigate how performance shapes our experience of the humanities. In the four decades since NYU offered the first degree in “Performance Studies,” the advent of the internet and social media has changed the way we study, create, teach, learn, and identify ourselves. Performance forms and platforms have multiplied and facilitated one of the most contentious political cycles in American history, public upheavals demanding social justice, and new thresholds of mis and disinformation. How are these performance platforms shaping our experience and understanding of the world?

Infobase, a publisher of databases for schools, universities, and public libraries, is seeking to hire a scholar for a project on contemporary African-American literature. Responsibilities will include writing an overview of the state of African-American literature in the 21st century; writing brief critical biographies of a selection of the most important African-American writers working today; and updating existing biographies of great living African-American writers. The work be prominently featured in a new topic center within Bloom’s Literature, Infobase’s premier literary database. This is a paid assignment. Interested scholars should contact executive editor Jeff Soloway at jsoloway@infobase.com.

The Western Literature Association permanent section invites proposals for in-person presentations at the 2023 meeting of the Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Association taking place in Portland, Oregon, from October 26-29. The conference’s theme this year is “Shifting Perspectives.” You can submit your abstract at https://pamla.ballastacademic.com/Home/S/18925; all submissions must be proposed via the pamla.ballastacademic.com submission system (email submissions will not be accepted).

Abstract:

CFP: GERMAN LITERATURE AND FILM

2023 MMLA Conference
Cincinnati, Ohio
November 2-5, 2023

Convention Theme Description: https://www.luc.edu/mmla/convention/callforpapers/

Topic: OPEN

We encourage submissions addressing German-language literature and film from any period and in any genre. Papers that engage with the Convention theme of “Going Public: What the MMLA Owes Democracy” are especially welcome. 

Please submit 250-word abstracts and a 50-word bio as email attachments to Bethany Morgan at bamorgan@iastate.edu by May 31, 2023. 

What does "too much" feel like? 

The slimy or gelatinous texture elicits a sense of disgust in some, while others experience pleasure and luxuriousness. Excess can also manifest as waste and pollution: the plastic gyre in the ocean's center; the sticky, musky sensation on one's skin amidst smog. The materiality of excess can also be defined by the marginalized, commodified bodies that become sites of extraction as their labor, organs, and corporeal bodies enter global capital circulation. This session invites papers exploring the materiality of excess – its affect, texture, aesthetics, and politics – to engage with the realm of otherness. 

Possible areas of investigation may include, but are not limited to:

Thicker than blood? Masculinities and Male Friendships in South Asia

Abstract: For the occident a surprising cultural norm in India is that of men holding hands. Seen as unconventional and in sharp contrast to the West, the phenomenon symbolic of India (in particular) and South Asia at large became a project in 2018 whereby photographer Vincent Dolman created a series depicting an organic and intimate aspect of male friendship. Appreciating such uninhibitedness in a country given to rampant homophobia and toxic masculinity Dolman in one of his interviews observes, how such practices hold a mirror to society and societal conventions of masculine constructions and performances.

If you would like to serve as a reviewer for the handbook please email me. Having reviewed three papers and provided detailed feedback, your name will be listed as a member of the Editorial Board at the front of the book on a conspicuous page.

The handbook has 47 prospective chapters now but there will be withdrawals and rejections before final completion. If you have a full paper to contribute between now and December 2023 please feel free to approach me at c-c.shei@swansea.ac.uk. We may still be able to use your paper.

Current table of contents:

The Routledge Handbook of the Sociopolitical Context of Language Learning

The call for papers for the next issue of the Australasian Journal of Popular Culture (ISSN 20455852 , ONLINE ISSN 20455860) is now open. 

The deadline for submissions of full articles (5-6k words) is 1 July 2023. The Journal is indexed in SCOPUS (among others), and its remit is broad and international. Please submit your articles for consideration (together with a short bio and institutional affiliation) to both editors: Professor Lorna Piatti-Farnell (lorna.piatti-farnell@aut.ac.nz) and Dr Ashleigh Prosser (ashleigh.prosser@murdoch.edu.au).

What Is Asia?

 The Inaugural Conference of the USC Asian Studies Group (GEAS-Silkway)

23-25 October 2023

Faculty of Philosophy

University of Santiago de Compostela, SPAIN

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