ecocriticism and environmental studies

“Italian Ecocriticism” Panel at the 2026 PAMLA Conference in Seattle, OR.12-15 November, 2026 in Seattle, OR.

“Literary texts are not, of course, merely passive conduits. They actively shape what the technologies mean and what the scientific theories signify in cultural contexts […] culture circulates through science no less than science circulates through culture.” (Hayles How We Became Posthuman 21) We can expand this view beyond science and technology. All aspects of human cultures circulate in artistic productions, most notably in prose fiction, and in return, fiction has the potential to influence cultures and to inspire innovations.

The Scottish Archipelago. Literatures and cultures of Scottish islands, of Scottish insularity, of Scotland as an island, or of islands of Scottishness around Britain and the globe: whether homogeneous or heterogeneous, chained together or scattered apart in diaspora.

Please write to Sam Baker at sebaker@utexas.edu with expressions of interest or full proposals (250 word abstract + short cv)

Call for - Literary Musings Online - 2584-1459 - July 2026

Academic Journal

Research Academy

Name of Organisation: Maheswari Publishers (The publishing unit of PANDIAN EDUCATIONAL TRUST- TN32D0026797)

Contact email: literarydruid@gmail.com  

Literary Druid is a journal that fosters research and creative writing in English. It welcomes all nationals to contribute for learning and research purposes. The perspective of Literary Druid is to create a niche platform for academicians and patrons to share their intellect to enrich the English language and Literature. I welcome all to learn and share.

**DEADLINE EXTENDED to 13 April 2026**

Call for Papers: 

Listening to Possible Worlds 

Sound and Music in Speculative Literature and Culture 

22-23 October 2026, Leiden University, the Netherlands (in-person) 

Confirmed keynote speakers are Anna Snaith (King’s College London) and Chris Tonelli (University of Groningen) 

Call For Papers

The 3rd International Conference on Global Plant Humanities

Botanical Life in Art, Science, and Imagination

Conference Dates:     8–10 May 2026 (Fri–Sun)

Mode:                         Hybrid (Physical & Virtual)

Host:                           Department of English, North-Eastern Hill University, Shillong, Meghalaya, India

In recent years, critiques of human exceptionalism and extractivism have prompted scholars to reconsider the role of translation as a communicative practice capable of engaging with nonhuman voices. Dominant strands of Western thought, from Descartes to Heidegger, have long reinforced the perceived superiority of humans over other forms of life and expression. Challenging this hierarchy requires not only rethinking human–nonhuman relations but also reconsidering how communication itself is understood within translation studies.

I am creating a panel for the OAH 2027 conference in San Francisco. Its focus will be women's engagement with the lived and natural environment, indigeneity, and ecofeminism. My paper will also include women's photography from México and the U.S. in the 19th century. I am open to any theory or topics while maintaining a focus on women and the environment. I'm presenting at OAH 2026 in Philly if you'd want to meet up and chat about 2027. tmorgan@ccp.edu

Association for the Study of Arts of the Present (ASAP) 17

October 15-17, University of Wisconsin, Madison

Panel title: Energy Activism and Activation

Rising water levels in oceans and rivers, streams with high flood waves, and torrential rains that turn puddles into lakes: houses that are currently exposed to such increasingly regular water events are becoming a problematic, if not catastrophic, environment. The protective function that the house is supposed to have according to its original idea and design is being compromised. While roofs and walls are supposed to keep out wind and water—and the traditional European gabled roof is primarily designed to divert water from above—in these extreme weather scenarios, basements are flooded, roofs are torn off, entire houses stand like islands in the water or are even swept away.

Special Session Proposal for the 2027 MLA Convention (Los Angeles, 7–10 January 2027).

This MLA 2027 special session, “Unfinished Histories: Literary and Cultural Acts of Hope,” explores radical hope as an emancipatory and dynamic framework for examining how literature, film, and art cultivate creative and relational modes of remembrance. Rather than approaching the past solely through paradigms of loss, grievance, or melancholia, the panel asks how cultural narratives open generative spaces for imagining unfinished futures.

“The poetry of witness reclaims the social from the political and in so doing defends the individual against illegitimate forms of coercion.”- Carolyn Forché

“But is it enough that a poem “remembers” when we are now entrenched in an era of total recall?”– Cathy Park Hong, “Against Witness“

Unearthed invites submissions for an upcoming issue devoted to witnessing in a time of social and ecological rupture. We welcome work that refuses to look away from injustice and chronicles radical resilience.

Speaking of the agency of nature is now common practice. The biosphere is recognised as being life sustaining and its vitality essential to human existence. Following thinkers such as Felix Guattari, nature has also been recognised has having subjective qualities, inseparable from the meaning and values humans attribute to life and the visions we conjure of what constitutes a just and habitable future. The philosophical legacy of Immanuel Kant looms large over this aesthetic terrain, notably his work on the beautiful and the sublime, which still compels us to consider the complex relationship between humans and life-world systems.