Digital & Analog Cultures

Southwest Popular / American Culture Association (SWPACA)

2025 SWPACA Summer Salon

Proposals for papers are now being accepted for the SWPACA Summer Salon. SWPACA offers nearly 70 subject areas in a variety of categories encompassing the following: Film, Television, Music, & Visual Media; Historic & Contemporary Cultures; Identities & Cultures; Language & Literature; Science Fiction & Fantasy; and Pedagogy & Popular Culture. For a full list of subject areas, area descriptions, and Area Chairs, please visit https://swpaca.org/subject-areas/

Digital & Analog Cultures - Proposals for individual presentations and panels are now being accepted for the area of Digital and Analog Cultures at the Southwest Popular / American Culture Association Conference. Digital and Analog Cultures explore the values, beliefs, behaviors, creative application, methodologies and/or technologies that shape the way people interact with digital pasts, presents and futures as well as the ongoing relevance (and often resurgence) of analog media in a digital age.

Topics might include, but are not limited to:

• AI and society
• Analog pasts, presents and futures
• Big data
• Critiques of teleology and technological progress
• Data visualization
• Digital and/or analog art
• Digital and/or analog methodologies
• Digital and/or analog geographies
• Ethnographies of online communities & analog cultures
• Interfaces between analog and digital worlds
• Internet cultures
• Memes
• Piracy
• Resurgence of analog media in a digital age
• Security, privacy and surveillance
• Sensory, tactile, embodied and experiential aspects of analog technologies
• Social networks
• Virtual identities

Scholars, teachers, professionals, artists, and others interested in digital cultures are encouraged to participate. Graduate students are also particularly welcome.

Abstracts for the SWPACA Summer Salon are due April 15.

All proposals must be submitted through the conference’s database at https://swpaca.org/app

 For details on using the submission database and on the application process in general, please see the Summer Salon FAQs and Tips page at https://swpaca.org/faq-summer-salon/

Registration information for the conference will be available at https://swpaca.org/summer-salon/

Unfortunately, we are not able to offer any financial assistance for the Summer Salon.

 Individual proposals for 15-minute papers must include an abstract of approximately 200-500 words. Only one proposal per person, please; unfortunately, we cannot accommodate roundtables for the Summer Salon.  

 If you have any questions about the Digital & Analog Cultures area, please contact its Area Chair, Dr. Erik Stanley, Eastern New Mexico University, at erik.stanley@enmu.edu. If you have general questions about the conference, please contact us at support@southwestpca.org, and a member of the executive team will get back to you.

 We look forward to receiving your submissions!