Aims and Scope of the Publication 

The interdisciplinary book project offers an opportunity to reflect on a panorama of topics connected appertaining to gender in its various cultural representations and in relation to a double dualunderstanding of “landscape.” On the one hand, different media will be conceptualised as landscapes: as social and cultural spaces, a shared environment for self-expression, communication, exchange, and the reception of ideas. On the otherhand, we are also interested in literal landscapes: actual physical spaces which themselves can be “read,” analysed and interpreted once they have been mediated, and in terms of their connection to gender in its most inclusive sense, or even their own genderedness.  

While most of the areas of interest listed below could easily inspire separate volumes, our aim is to provide an overview of the current cultural momentfrom the perspective of (thinking about) gender, reflected in the scenery of multiple media. Marking the closing close of the first quarter of the 21st century, we hope to map out the recent past and the status quo of gender in the Western culture across various media and cultural landscapes. Following the spatial metaphor of landscape and adding to it the literary category of the horizon of expectations, we want wish toto ask inquire furtherabout the current topographyof gender equality. How much has shifted in our thinking about and understanding of gender?How is gender studied in contemporary academia? What gender issues preoccupy us (in academia and beyond) the most? What aspectsof gender are being neglected or understudied? How are do we positioning ourselves in these literal and metaphorical gendered spaces? What is our current location and what are our horizons?Finally, the volume will attempt to answer the question: What collective image emerges from the varied, multimodal academic reports from the gender-themed travels journeys across media landscapes in the early 21st-century Western culture? 

Gender 

We invite papers addressing (but, as always, not limited to) the following topics: 

• gender in literal landscapes: 

• gendered “nature” and interaction with “nature” 

• gendered cityscapes 

• gendered geographies 

• gender in metaphorical landscapes: 

• gendered cyberspace 

• gendered public (space) discourse and the space for gender in public debate 

• gender equalityrepresentations or construals 

• the #MeToo context: sexual violence, rape culture  

• gender and political correctness or hypercorrectness: What (language, depictions of social norms and roles, etc.) seems dated? What has (not) aged well? 

• gender and capitalism. 

Media Landscapes 

The proposed individual or interconnected interrelated topics can be addressed through the following media, from popular culture to “highbrow” art:  

• the Internet (social media, genres of the videoblog, videoessay, news reporting discourse, digital comments) 

• theatre and performance (from more traditional to experimental forms) 

• literature (all possible genres, including online genres) 

• graphic narratives 

• film (feature films, documentaries) 

• TV and streaming platforms (TV series, streaming platforms series, reality TV, standup comedy) 

• videogames / computer games 

• visual culture, semiotics, visual messaging in public spaces 

• advertising 

• material culture, street art. 

• Navigation Methods 

  We encourage a variety of approaches;proposed papers can be informed by one discipline or by various disciplinesone or more disciplines in dialogue with, or written from, pluralistic and hybrid perspectives. Suggested methodologies and disciplinary perspectives include sociology, linguistics, sociolinguistics, literary studies, media studies, theatre studies, performance studies,cultural studies, feminist theory, gender studies, transgender studies, women’s studies, masculinities studies, queer theory, gay and lesbian studies, disability studies, transnational studies, environmental studies, ecocriticism, ecofeminismand others. 

   

  Please send your250-wordabstract (clearly stating your thesis and methodology/gies; with 5-10 keywords) and a biographical note (100 words) to medialandscapes2025@gmail.com. 

  The deadline for abstract submissions is 30 September 2023. 

  Notifications about acceptance of paper proposalswill be sent by 20 October 2023. 

   

  The book proposal will be submitted to Brill, a leading international academic publisher in the Humanities. The deadline for completed 7000-word paper submissions will be 31 January 2024.Pending book proposal acceptance, the publicationis planned for early 2025. 

   

  Editors 

  Dr Aleksandra Kamińska (aleksandra.kaminska@uj.edu.pl) 

  Dr Ewa Kowal (co-editor of The Many Meanings of Home: Cultural Representations of Housing across Media, Brill: 2022) (ewa.kowal@uj.edu.pl) 

  Dr Olga O’Toole (olga.otoole@uj.edu.pl) 

  Institute of English Studies 

  Jagiellonian University in Kraków, Poland