The 123rd Annual PAMLA Conference's Digital Studies session examines how digital technologies shape human life, culture, the environment, and academia. The area remains interested in a broad range of work at the intersection of the humanities, the arts, and digital culture. However, in line with this year’s conference theme (“Our Ruling Classes: Class, Power, Conflict”), we are particularly interested in the power structures that shape how technologies are used, by whom, and to what ends. Who is included in the design and implementation of digital technologies, and who is left out? Who benefits, and who pays the greatest costs?

This session invites scholars, artists, and writers to present on a wide range of topics related to Digital Studies, including but not limited to: media and technology, digital storytelling and data visualization, digital identity, algorithmic culture, data surveillance and ethics, video games, the history and theory of new media, game design, electronic literature, locative media, user interfaces, interface aesthetics, the rhetoric of new media, cybernetics and cybercultures, virtual communities and social media, the psychosocial impact of digital media, historical and theoretical approaches to electronic media, queering digital culture, digital humanities and online archives, artificial intelligence and LLMs, cyberfeminism and posthumanism, and the intersections of literature and data.

We especially encourage work that pushes disciplinary boundaries and engages critically and creatively with the evolving landscape of digital life.

Conference details

PAMLA 2026 will take place in Seattle, WA at the Hyatt Regency Seattle, November 12-15. More information about the conference can be found at PAMLA's conference website:

https://www.pamla.org/pamla2026/

Submission details

Paper proposals for the Digital Studies session should be submitted by May 25, 2026 via PAMLA's online system:

https://pamla.ballastacademic.com/Home/S/19943

Any questions may be directed to the Digital Studies presiding officers Jon Heggestad (joheggestad@davidson.edu) and Sara Santos (sara.santos@stonybrook.edu).