Older women have traditionally been portrayed negatively in folklore, fairy tales, literature and film, for example. Images of witches, evil stepmothers, shrivelled, bitter 'spinsters', and vindictive, bullying women abusing positions of power are rife in Western culture. Yet, perhaps things are changing. A new emphasis on the need to discuss and understand the menopause seems to be at the heart of this. This conference examines historical representations of the 'crone' in relation to crime and Gothic narratives. But it also looks ahead and globally to examine other types of discourses and representations.

The Literary Encyclopedia at www.litencyc.com is looking for qualified writers to enhance its coverage of postwar and contemporary American poetry. Following is a list of poets and/or movements for whom/which we are seeking introductory essays of ca. 2500 words covering biography and historical context and giving a brief overview of relevant works. The list below is not comprehensive or final, and new proposals of writers/works/context essays that are not currently listed in our database are also welcome.

A key part of colonizing in the U.S. South depended on the rhetoric of health, such as Ponce de Leon’s mythical fountain of youth and nineteenth-century boosterism claiming Florida as the “winter sanitarium of the country” (qtd in Knight 5). The semi-tropical warmth of the South invited justifications for intrusion and settlement, and for the environmental destruction necessary to transform a place “heavy with the poisons of malaria” into something habitable for white Europeans. Yet, beneath this rhetoric, we find evidence that ties the South to a history of public health disasters, especially the mistreatment and abuse of people with disabilities.

DHSI Conference and Colloquium 2022

Proposals are now being accepted for presentations at the Digital Humanities Summer Institute (DHSI) 2022 – Online Edition Conference & Colloquium.

Since 2009, the DHSI Conference & Colloquium has been a valued part of the annual Digital Humanities Summer Institute. It offers an opportunity to present diverse, dynamic digital humanities research and projects within an engaging, collegial audience that actively fosters the ethos of the greater DHSI community.

Science fiction (and its cousin genres, fantasy and horror) have long explored what it means to explore the unknown. In particular, some of SF’s familiar narratives have pondered life beyond our world, grappled with the vast expanse of the universe and the many things to be discovered there, and tackled complicated meetings with other beings and other ways of life. Beyond the SF bubble, fantasy has imagined entire worlds and wondered at a cosmos of gods and magic; meanwhile, horror has teased at the edges of its genre cousins, offering disturbing visions of space and other forms of travel and exploration in which the unknown is often waiting with jaws wide open.

CFP: British Association for Victorian Studies - Annual Conference

1-3 September 2022, University of Birmingham

In 1931, Langston Hughes embarked on a tour of the southern United States, reading his poetry mostly at HBCUs in the age of Jim Crow. His goal was two-fold: he was both answering Mary McLeod Bethune’s suggestion that “people need poetry” and developing a formula for “making poetry pay.” As the Great Depression dragged on and the Scottsboro case lay heavy on his mind, Hughes understood the importance of art and the artist in providing perspective and spiritual strength to the community, but he also labored under hostile conditions that complicated every aspect of his journey.

The editors of Tinakori: Critical Journal of the Katherine Mansfield Society are seeking scholarly essays for publication in the sixth volume of the journal. Essays that address any aspect of Mansfield and her writing will be considered. Tinakori is committed to publishing innovative and rigorous research into one of the most significant women authors of the early twentieth century. It is an official online series recognised by the British Library with its own ISSN number: ISSN 2514-6106.

The Society for the Study of Southern Literature invites papers on the South and science fiction for a panel at the South Atlantic Modern Language Association’s 94th Annual Conference from November 11-13, 2022 in Jacksonville, FL. Papers may discuss any of the subgenres of science fiction, especially afrofuturism, post-apocalyptic, or alternate history, and may focus on any medium including video games, novels, movies, television, comics, etc. as long as the South or “Southern-ness” is a concern within the chosen text. We welcome presentations that offer to 'expand' the canon of southern literature and science fiction itself, especially papers that focus on works by BIPOC, AAPI, or LGBTQ+ writers.

Speculative fiction covers a broad range of narrative styles and genres.  The cohesive element that pulls works together under the category is that there is some “unrealistic” element, whether it’s magical, supernatural, or a futuristic/technological development: works that fall into the category stray from conventional realism in some way.   For this reason, speculative fiction can be quite broad, including everything from fantasy and magical realism to horror and science fiction—from China Miéville to Margaret Atwood to Philip K. Dick. This panel aims to explore those unrealistic elements and all their varied implications about society, politics, economics, and more. 

We have seen a rise in awareness campaigns and charities for mental health in the last decade: Calm, Let’s Get Men Talking, NHS’s recent ‘Help!’. Each speaks to the need to chip away at the stigma of being open about mental health. In particular, there has been a notable rise in campaigns approaching men’s mental health. Male suicide rates still account for three-quarters of the suicides in the UK. This one-day symposium seeks to engage with a range of interdisciplinary discussions on the link between gender, culture, and suicide. It aims to explore the ideas around gendered approaches to suicide, and how cultural frameworks and representations shape them.

https://alastriapress.wordpress.com/mpca-maca/

CALL FOR PAPERS, ABSTRACTS, AND PANEL PROPOSALS in CULTURAL GEOGRAPHY

Midwest Popular Culture Association/Midwest American Culture Association Annual Conference

Friday-Sunday, 14-16 October 2022

DePaul University, Chicago, IL

TCAF 2022 Academic Symposium Call for Papers

Charles Reznikoff: Inscriptions (1894-1976)
International Conference
Université Paris Nanterre, France
June 1st-3rd, 2023

Keynote speakers: Norman Finkelstein, Michael Heller.