Global Authoritarianisms and the Arts
12th Annual Shifting Tides Anxious Borders Conference
Hosted by the English Department, Binghamton University–SUNY

Date of Conference: April 29, 2023
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Jini Kim Watson, NYU

Since the beginning of the pandemic and following the eventful elections across the globe in the
last few years, we have seen a renewed debate about a number of issues that represent deep, existential
threats to civil discourse, bodily autonomy, socio-economic well-being, and ecological crisis as well as
participation in the democratic political process. Sweeping anti-democratic legal changes across the world
have undone the work of thousands of civil rights activists. These concerns have made themselves felt in
the spaces of popular culture, and politics, as well as approaches to education, curriculum, and
engagements with the past. Moral panics about race, class, caste, gender, and sexuality have materialized
in legislation banning these topics, effectively gagging critical engagements with issues that affect and
define the everyday experience of disenfranchised people. However, these moves and attitudes have been
met with resistance across the globe that’s both powerful and creative. Art and literature have specifically
played crucial roles in highlighting these complex phenomena, both at a macro level and at thinking
through their interpersonal aspects.
In light of these concerns, this year’s STAB conference aims to address the following questions:
- How have authors and scholars confronted conservative political formations historically?
- What are some creative ways in which social and political movements have addressed crises
historically?
- How might genre or the politics of form impact the ways in which scholars, historians, and
everyday people conceive of justice in precarious political and historical moments?
- What do contemporary conversations in critical theory such as postcolonial theory, transnational
studies, feminist studies, Black studies, and queer studies, among others, offer us by way of
approaching this political situation today?
- How does the ‘vampiric’ role that universities often play within local communities complicate
their role as ‘beacons of progress’?

Please submit abstract proposals of 200 words or less, along with an author’s bio (not more than 2 pages)
to stab.binghamton@gmail.com before February 28, 2023. Be sure to indicate any technical requirements
as well. For queries or further information contact Kaushik Tekur: ktekurv1@binghamton.edu