Ninth Annual Post45 Graduate Symposium

Concordia University and McGill University

March 22nd-23rd, 2024

Submission deadline: December 1st, 2023

Keynote Faculty: Mary Esteve (Concordia) and Alexander Manshel (McGill)

Post45 seeks graduate-level works-in-progress related to post-1945 literature, media, and culture. We welcome submissions that expand our conception of post-1945 literary and cultural histories, boundaries, and future trajectories, or place them in a comparative, transnational, or hemispheric frame. We also welcome contributions that generate traction on the urgency of intersections of race, gender, sexuality to post-45 studies, especially any engagements and conceptualizations with futurity (e.g. future of the fields, alternative futures, dystopia, utopia, gender abolitionism, afro-futurism, anxieties of the future, queer futures, digital futures, climate crisis, altered states of consciousness).

Works-in-progress may range from conference papers to articles or dissertation chapter drafts. We welcome works-in-progress from disciplines that don’t center the literary and also those that take non-traditional forms. All works-in-progress will be pre-circulated two weeks in advance of the conference date. This will allow participants to consider papers carefully and to generate thoughtful critical feedback—a benefit often absent in traditional conference formats. Each individual paper will also receive feedback from a faculty respondent and 30 minutes of discussion amongst all symposium participants. In addition to paper workshops, the symposium will feature a keynote address and a roundtable discussion concerning "the future of the field" led by Mary Esteve and Alexander Manshel.

As Concordia and McGill are both located in Montreal, we are delighted that ACLA’s annual conference will be held at the Palais de Congres, in Montreal March 14th-17th. We hope this allows participants to attend both the symposium and conference during the same stay.

Where participants are not able to secure adequate funding from their institutions, there will be some financial support for international travel that will be allocated based on need. While this support will not cover all related expenses, we are also hoping to establish a housing network of graduate students in Montreal who can host out-of-town participants.

Post45 is a collective of scholars working on American literature and culture since 1945. The group was founded in 2006 and has met annually since to discuss diverse new work in the field. The Post45 Graduate Symposium meets annually to discuss works in progress. Now in its ninth year, it has convened in the past at University of Washington, Northwestern, UC Irvine, Rutgers and Princeton University, Michigan State University and the University of Michigan, Yale University, UC Berkeley and Stanford University, and UNC Chapel Hill.

Submissions:

Those interested should submit 250- to 300-word abstracts through the following Google Form by December 1st, 2023: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/1200fyrKhBybTXvOpF4_XjYku-XFvOt68QxIW2juyVkY/edit

Note: the form will collect your name, academic affiliation, a brief academic biography, paper title, and an arbitrary four-digit code of your choosing (e.g., 6459). To facilitate the anonymized submission process, it will also require you to upload your abstract, titled only with the same four-digit code. This abstract should not include your name or your institution’s name. The form will also ask you to indicate your interest in the housing network and need for funding support.