|
a service provided by www.english.upenn.edu |
FAQ changelog |
all recent posts
Panel: New Spanish/Latin American Cinema-Spanish Peninsular
Theme: Celebrating 25 Years of Twenty-First-Century Spanish Cinema
Rocky Mountain Modern Language Association (RMMLA) 2026
Conference Dates: October 8–10, 2026
Location: Marriott Courtyard, Ogden, Utah
Reinventing Borderlines in a Transnational World
April 10-11, 2026
Higher Institute of Human Sciences of Tunis- University Tunis El Manar
CALL FOR PAPERS:
Stevens and Fiction | American Literature Association 2026 | Chicago, IL | May 2026
Since 1975, pacificREVIEW: A West Coast Arts Review Annual (formerly Pacific Poetry and Fiction Review) has thrived as an experimental editorial cohort made up of driven, wily, undergraduates & graduate students in the department of english and Comparative Literature, san diego state university, san diego, ca 92182-6020. This year, we take on comix again!
Since its inception, Verge has championed the role of special issues in making visible key questions in Global Asias scholarship while also suggesting new possibilities in the field. Maintaining this commitment, we invite proposals from potential guest editors for issue 14.2, a special issue slated for publication in Fall 2028.
Bloomsbury - Trans Studies Book Series
CALL FOR CHAPTERS
Transgender Entanglements: The shape and limits of transgender
Edited by Levi C. R. Hord and Wendy Gay Pearson
The relationship between music, sound, and memory has become a focal point of scholarly inquiry in recent years, illuminating the intricate connections between auditory experiences, cognitive functions, and how these might be written down or discussed in a wider dialogue within culture. Researchers have begun to explore the way various musical elements, such as melody, rhythm, and harmony, can evoke specific memories and emotional responses, thereby influencing individual recollection and perception of past events.
CFP: The Medieval Comic
MEST Symposium, Indiana University Bloomington
March 6-8
Keynote from Dr. Albrecht Classen: "Laughter on the Stage, Laughter at Court, and Laughter in Public Spaces During the Middle Ages and Early Modern Time."
The Comic is a multivalent concept, which can pull or push scholarship in many directions. It has been at times described as a social balm, binding agent, and lubricant. This call for papers asks for submissions considering the various ways in which the Comic manifests in the medieval and medievalism, its implications, and importance.
Potential panels might consider:
Call for Papers from the Carson McCullers Society
American Literature Association Annual Convention, May 20-23, 2026, Chicago, IL
The Short Fiction of Carson McCullers: New Directions in Scholarship
"Speculative Cultures and the Metamodern Turn"
AmLit: American Literature Special Issue (October 2027)
Guest Editors
Vasileios N. Delioglanis (deliogla@enl.auth.gr)
Aylin D. Walder (aylin-dilek.walder@tu-braunschweig.de)
Bluesky: @invivoarts.bsky.social
Pour le français, voir ci-dessous / Para español, ver abajo
IN VIVO ARTS - CALL FOR PAPERS 3rd ISSUE
VIRTUALITIES
Society for the Study of Southern Literature Conference 2026
“Building Spaces of Freedom,” March 28th-31st at Fisk University, Nashville, TN
Panel: The Future of Southern Studies
Building on the 2026 theme, Building Spaces of Freedom, this panel seeks work that imagines where southern studies is going and who will help carry it forward. The Emerging Scholars Organization (ESO) invites papers from emerging scholars for an open-call panel that looks ahead toward the next questions, methods, and interventions shaping southern studies.
Society for the Study of Southern Literature Conference 2026
“Building Spaces of Freedom,” March 28th-31st at Fisk University, Nashville, TN
Panel: Building Emerging Spaces of Freedom
The Emerging Scholars Organization (ESO) invites papers that center emerging perspectives on SSSL’s conference theme, Building Spaces of Freedom. This panel foregrounds the ongoing labor of emerging scholars who navigate long histories of exclusion, gatekeeping, and uneven access while also reshaping southern studies through new interventions, methods, and archival practices.
“When Humans are On the Menu: Cannibalism and Modernity”
BAMS/MSA 2026
Loughborough, UK, 1-4 July 2026
I’m seeking abstracts for papers exploring representations of cannibalism in global modernist literature and culture for BAMS/MSA 2026. I’m planning this as an entirely virtual panel, but I am open to an in-person panel if that is everyone’s preference!
2026 Cultural Studies Association (CSA) Annual Conference: Oppositions
May 28 - 30, 2026
Fully Online
Deadline for Submissions: Friday, December 19, 2025
Astrology in Focus:
Navigating Art, Psyche, and Knowledge
A Transdisciplinary Conference
January 18-20, 2026
Format: Online
Fee: 100 GBP
Call for Papers:
“Astrology represents the sum of all the psychological knowledge of antiquity”, Carl Jung
The representation of fatness in media has long been a subject of scrutiny, often intertwined with discourses of desirability, stigma, humor, and social control. Whether in films, advertisements, cartoons, or social media, fat bodies are frequently portrayed through the lens of excess, deviance, or comic relief, shaping cultural perceptions and reinforcing existing hierarchies of appearance and worth. This issue seeks to explore the multiple ways in which fatness is constructed and negotiated across various media forms, interrogating its intersections with gender, sexuality, class, power, and social anxieties.
Apologies for crossposting.
Call for Papers: Performing Islam
Special Issue: 'Performing Islamophobia'
A Critical and Anthropological Study of Politics, Poetics and Representation in Europe
View the full call here>>
https://www.intellectbooks.com/performing-islam#call-for-papers
Call For Submissions
31st Annual Significations Graduate Student Conference
California State University, Los Angeles
Department of English
Conference Date: April 24, 2026
Submission Deadline: January 30, 2026
IN/ACTIVITY
Starting from a sense of our own activity as literary and cultural scholars, the organizers of Significations invite graduate students to share their work on the theme of In/Activity. We welcome submissions that interpret, examine, and analyze the theme broadly. Possible topics of discussion can include, but are not limited to, the following:
CFP | Pauline Elizabeth Hopkins Society (PEHS) session
American Literature Association Annual Conference, Chicago, IL, May 20-23, 2026
Hopkins’s America, Then & Now
This workshop of the annual conference of the French Society of Anglophone Studies aims to tackle the topic of emancipation in audiovisual productions of the English-speaking world. Emancipation, as a film subject, refers to narratives of liberation or liberating struggles against forms of oppression, beginning with historical films that depict the liberation of a people or identity group(s). In the U.S.
The Society for the History of Women in the Americas (SHAW) welcomes proposals for its annual conference, hosted by the University of Toulouse Jean Jaurès, France.
This year's conference invites papers on any topic relating to histories of women and gender non-conforming people in the Americas, but encourages proposals for papers, panels or roundtables that explore the subject of confinement.
CFP: Second Annual UNCG Game Studies Conference
Give and Take: Transactional Experiences in Gaming
Friday and Saturday, March 20-21, 2026
University of North Carolina at Greensboro
Abstracts are invited on, but not limited to, the following sub-themes:
• Digital Transformations in Literary Studies
• Artificial Intelligence and Literary Criticism
• Hybrid Genres, Graphic Narratives, and New Media
• Ecocriticism and Environmental Literature
• Trauma, Memory, and Narrative Representation
• Identity, Intersectionality, and Representation
• Postcolonialism, Neocolonialism, and Cultural Identity
• Tribal Literatures, Indigenous Knowledge Systems, and Forest Ecologies
• Dalit Literatures and Narratives of Marginality
• Language, Multilingualism, and Cultural Diversity
• Translation, Transculturation, and Cross-Cultural Mediation
After supportive discussions with Routledge, we are pleased to share the call for contributions to a proposed new edited collection. Planned for publication by Routledge in 2027, this new book is intended as a companion volume to Time and Performer Training (published by Routledge in 2019).
The book will be co-edited by Mark Evans, Libby Worth and Ranjana Dave.
Call for papers – Series of Workshops on Sacred Writing Traditions
The HaZen (Handschriftenzentrum) project, based at the Institute for Jewish Studies at Freie Universität Berlin, would like to invite international researchers to three workshops in Berlin.
We are pleased to announce that the IV SEDERI International Conference for Graduate Students of Early Modern English Studies will be held on 21, 22, 23 October 2026 at the University of Jaén (Jaén, Spain). This event is part of an initiative born within SEDERI, the Spanish and Portuguese Society for English Renaissance Studies, which seeks to provide a platform where students, PhD candidates and early career researchers from around the globe can gather to exchange different ideas, views, and opinions on the study of the English language and its literature, history and culture of the 16th and 17th centuries.
Confirmed Keynote Speakers
MARIA DE JESUS RELVAS (Universidade Aberta, Portugal)
Drama and theatre have long served as dynamic mediums through which societies narrate their myths, record their histories, and preserve traditions. The interplay of myth, history, and tradition shapes the content and form of dramatic expression, influencing storytelling techniques, character archetypes, and performance styles across different cultures and time periods.
The 37th Society for Animation Studies Conference will take place in the city of Pittsburgh (USA) from June 15 to 18, 2026 (with optional excursions to follow on June 19-20). It will be hosted by the Pennsylvania Expanded Animation Alliance (PA XAA), a consortium of faculty from local universities (including Carnegie Mellon University, Point Park University, Robert Morris University, and the University of Pittsburgh) in concert with the Children’s Museum Pittsburgh. The event will also be hybrid, with additional details to follow.
Plenary Lecture: Professor Daniel Cook (University of Dundee)
Artist’s Talk: Martin Rowson (in conversation with Brigitte Friant-Kessler)
Venue: St. Bride Library (London, U.K.)
Dates: 23–25 September 2026
Post-Fossil Fuel Futures
in Popular Culture
Ecology & Culture Area
Popular Culture Association 56th National Conference
Atlanta on April 8-11, 2026
Submissions open until November 30
Guest editor: Maxime Fecteau
Primordial and born of Chaos, Gaia wears many faces. In Hesiod’s Theogony she is a fertile, earth-bodied mother; she is also an insurgent force—ally to the Titans and to violent births. This constitutive ambivalence—nourishing ground and upheaval, regeneration and revolt—guides the 15th issue of MuseMedusa. We follow the figure to probe the regimes of time and action it exceeds, while noting how modern representational devices have narrowed its plurality of faces (Latour, 1991; 2015). In short, understanding Gaia today means holding Greek myth together with attention to planetary change.
The Asian Studies section is currently accepting paper and panel proposals for the 68th Annual Conference of the World Social Science Association. The conference will be held at the Clyde Hotel in Albuquerque, New Mexico, from March 25th through 28th, 2026.
The Asian Studies section welcomes research on the historical, cultural, social, and political aspects of the Middle East, South Asia, Southeast Asia, Pacific, and East Asia. Previous panels have explored Asian immigrant women’s participation management, governance in China, contemporary Japanese digital culture, and feminist readings of the Bhāgavata Purāṇa. We encourage innovative and critical approaches that address contemporary and historical issues.
Miloš Forman: Between Europe and Hollywood
Symposium organized by the Department of Theatre and Film Studies, Palacký University Olomouc, Czech Republic
Friday, April 24, 2026
Univerzitní 3, Olomouc, Czech Republic
Special Issue: 'Moving Violations: Asian Crime Films'
Special Issue Editors: Victor Fan, Kristof Van den Troost, and Earl Jackson
Explorations: A Journal of Language and Literature is a peer-refereed online journal published by the University of Opole, Poland (for more information and the current issue see http://www.explorations.uni.opole.pl).
Call for Papers
Midwest Winter Workshop 2026
Rhetoric Program
Indiana University Bloomington
Friday, February 6th – Saturday, February 7th, 2026
Call for Chapters
Feminine Rage: A Companion
I have a thing about feminine rage. I get a lot of [scripts of] men doing really terrible things and women sitting silently whilst one tear slowly falls. I’m like, ‘No, no, no, no, no. We get mad. And we get angry. – Anya Taylor-Joy
Call for Papers
Pets and Pet-Owner Relationships in Literary Texts of the Long Eighteenth Century
(Edited Collection)
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:
A Two-Day International Conference on Environmental Humanities: A Multidisciplinary Dialogue on Ecological Agency and Crisis
Organised by the Department of English, Women's Christian College, Kolkata (affiliated to the University of Calcutta),
in collaboration with the University of Notre Dame, Australia, Transilvania University of Brasov (Romania) & Spadina Literary Review (Canada)
DATES OF CONFERENCE: April 22, 2026 (WEDNESDAY) & April 23, 2026 (THURSDAY)
VENUE: WOMEN’S CHRISTIAN COLLEGE, KOLKATA, INDIA
MODE: HYBRID (both online and in-person)
CONCEPT NOTE
Today, all countries that were colonized by France have gained their independence, yet discussions about its legacy continue. Many films, documentaries, literary works, speeches, and critical writings contribute to the ongoing conversation about liberty and justice in relation to independence. A 2024 documentary produced by Wandrille Lanos, titled Haïti, la rançon de l'indépendance, explores how liberty and justice were interpreted during Haiti’s struggle for independence. From September 22 to 26, 2025, during the United Nations General Debate at the 80th Session, the current president of Ghana, John Dramani Mahama, argued that colonization should be recognized as one of the greatest crimes against humanity.
Call for Proposals: Fredric Jameson and the Future of Critical Theory
April 10–12, 2026
Duke University, Durham, NC, USA
Keynotes by Michael Denning, Jane Gaines, Achille Mbembe, Toril Moi, and Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak.
---
Fredric Jameson (1934–2024) insisted on “imagining a future which might be radically and constitutionally other.” The urgency of this task rested on his understanding of Critical Theory “as a way of keeping the negative alive in a period in which praxis, the unity of the negative and the positive, itself seems suspended.” We invite proposals for papers on Jameson’s work and its implications for the future of critical theory.
Today, Bollywood is not merely an industry of Indian films representing the national cinema but also a global cultural phenomenon. From the singsong dance sequences on YouTube to its widespread circulation on Netflix, Amazon Prime, and regional streaming platforms, Bollywood redefines South Asian identities and how they are consumed, contested, and celebrated globally. Moreover, the intertwining of questions on cultural appropriation, culturalized representation, caste, gender, and diasporic negotiations emerges with renewed urgency and visibility.
Epistemologies and Pathways to Truth
The University of Maryland’s Graduate English Organization (GEO) invites proposals relating to the theme of “Epistemologies and Pathways to Knowledge” for our 19th annual graduate student conference, to be held in person on Friday, March 27, 2026 at UMD, College Park.
Epistemologies and Pathways to Truth
The “Collecting and Collectibles Area” of the Popular Culture Association invites papers on “Collecting in/as Crisis” for the 2026 National PCA/ACA Conference to be held in Atlanta, GA, USA on April 8-11, 2026. We would especially like to encourage submissions that contribute new directions and calls to the existing scholarship on “Collecting in/as Crisis” and particularly address how collections/collectibles and their institutions and practices involve or respond to natural, cultural, economic, environmental, health, epistemic crises, etc.
Possible topics for presentations include but are not limited to:
· Collecting as systemic violence
· Collecting as cultural erasure
Memories & Dreams: Exploring Perspectives on Past, Future and Possibility in Materials for Young People
Call for Paper Proposals
Deadline for Submission: Friday, January 30th, 2026
A peer-reviewed graduate student conference on children’s literature, media, and culture.
University of British Columbia | Unceded traditional territory of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam) Vancouver, Canada | Friday July 17th & Saturday July 18th, 2026
"Just close your eyes and keep your mind wide open" - Katherine Paterson, Bridge to Terabithia.
Society for the Study of Southern Literature Conference 2026
“Building Spaces of Freedom,” March 28th-31st at Fisk University, Nashville, TN
Panel:
Medical Humanities Across Species
https://ucgradconference20.wixsite.com/utopian-impulses We are excited to share the CfP for this year’s interdisciplinary graduate student conference at the University of Cincinnati titled Utopian Impulses in the 2020s! We're also pleased to announce that Dr. Angela Laflen will be this year's keynote speaker. See bio below: "Dr. Angela Laflen is Associate Professor of English at California State University, Sacramento, and author of Critical Data Storytelling in the Composition Classroom (Utah State UP 2025).