Violence surrounds us, sometimes visibly (in times of conflict and wars, directly or mediated through images), and sometimes invisibly, as part of a statistic. With the increasingly extremist rhetoric on parts of the US political spectrum, the so-called “culture wars,” violent hate crimes against LBTQ+ people have surged in recent years. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Pacific-Asians and Asian-Americans were targeted because of xenophobia and conspiracy theories. Similarly, the Black Lives Matter protests of 2020 were met with violent responses from authorities. Additionally, mass and school shootings hit an all-time high for two years in a row between 2021 and 2022.

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.

Conference online: 26-27 October 2023

CFP:

We invite submissions for an online conference that focuses on queerness in fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction or other mythopoeic work. This can be queer representation within the work or engaging with mythopoeia through queer theory. “Queerness” is an intentionally ambiguous term, demonstrating the diversity of queer experiences, and the necessity of situating queerness as a liminal, complex paradigm. Queer theory is wider than the study of gender identity or sexuality, extending to taking positions against normativity and dominant modes of thought, and engaging with the indefinite. 

Aspects of this topic might include but are certainly not limited to any of the following:

Tolkien at UVM 2024!

The Psychologies of Middle-earth

Saturday, April 13, 2024 (8:30-5:30)

University of Vermont, Burlington, VT 05401

(Hybrid Conference: In-person and virtual/ TEAMS)

This is our 20th annual conference. The theme is The Psychologies of Middle-earth. We are excited to have Dr Sara Brown as our keynote!

Abstracts can cover various applications of psychology including myth, religion, art, sexuality, world building, race and ethnicity, feminism,

queer theory, class consciousness, ideology, PTSD, trauma, desire, disability, and much more.  

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.

CALL FOR PAPERS

FLUID ENCOUNTERS | RENCONTRES FLUIDES

April 19-20, 2024

Brown University | Providence, Rhode Island

In Sylvie Germain's 1985 novel, Le Livre des Nuits, bodily fluids serve as potent metaphors for the transmission of trauma from parent to child. Tears, milk, and blood become powerful symbols of familial relations. The exchange of bodily fluids has long represented human relationships, where substances like breastmilk, saliva, and sexual fluids metonymically represent the bodies they originate from and the relationships they form and sustain.

Call for Papers, CEA 2024: Atlanta

March 21–23, 2024

Westin Buckhead Atlanta

The College English Association, a gathering of scholar-teachers in English studies, welcomes proposals for presentations on BRITISH LITERATURE OF THE 20th AND 21st CENTURY for our 53rd annual conference.

"Change was incessant, and change perhaps would never cease." –Virginia Woolf

We are especially interested in presentations that incorporate topics related to the conference theme of TRANSFORMATIONS, but we will consider all proposals.

From vampires to zombies, uncanny doubles to the demonically possessed, gothic tropes have played a significant role in shaping narratives of addiction in American culture. More recently, news stories have framed the opioid crisis and its impact on homeless populations in cities like Boston and Philadelphia as a “zombie apocalypse.” Such tropes can dehumanize already stigmatized populations, yet the gothic remains a mode uniquely suited for exploring concepts of addiction and the lived experiences of individuals, families, and communities affected by the condition.

MAPPING MEMORY: HISTORY, TEXTS AND CULTURES

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON MEMORY STUDIES

 (22 & 23 February, 2024)

DEPARTMENTS OF ENGLISH AND HISTORY

LORETO COLLEGE, KOLKATA

CONCEPT NOTE:

Civil Rights Act of 1964: Historical Significance, Impact, and Legacy

International Hybrid Conference
24-25 February 2024
University of Delft, The Netherlands

(In-Person/Physical Presence and Online Presentation sessions: 2 days)
(Virtual platform for pre-recorded presentations: 5 days)

 (More info: https://www.gires.org/activities/conferences/civil-rights-act-of-1964-historical-significance-impact-and-legacy/ )

Thematic Approach

Crossing Boundaries: Literary and Linguistic Intersections in Modernist Studies

Roma Tre University

Department of Foreign Languages, Literatures and Cultures

Sala Ignazio Ambrogio

Via del Valco di San Paolo, 19 – Rome

22-23-24 May 2024

Confirmed Keynote Speakers

Václav Paris (City University of New York)

Enrico Terrinoni (Università per Stranieri di Perugia)

Call for Papers

African American literature has always been under assault and faced threat of erasure. Yet, we are experiencing a heightened moment of attack, when political activists are using legislative action to attempt to eradicate Blackness, intersecting identities, DEI initiatives, and the history of race in America from public education and consciousness. Therefore, this is an important time for us to proactively discuss how we teach African American writing and its expressive power to help us understand our pasts, presents, and futures.