Panel: Technoscience in Literature and Culture (special session)

The 123rd Annual Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Association (PAMLA) Conference will be held in person from Nov 12-15 in Seattle, Washington. This interdisciplinary special session invites papers that explore science and technology from social and cultural perspectives. We welcome papers that involve the natural or material sciences (such as biology, ecology, chemistry, physics, medicine, and engineering), engage with time (whether through a particular period or a long arc of development), and/or consider place (at the local or global scales). Such works can include, but are not limited to: 

• social studies of science and technology

• examinations of technoscience in narrative media

• critical analyses of systems

• explorations of materials used in science and technology

Papers that critique or challenge dominant narratives of technoscientific progress, whether through disciplines or methods, are especially encouraged. Proposals can directly engage with the 2026 conference theme, "Our Ruling Classes: Culture, Power, Conflict,” but are not required to do so.

Technoscience explores the ways with which science and technology shape social and cultural understandings of the world, whether embedded in everyday life or as large-scale systems that organize knowledge and resources. In doing so, technoscience approaches reveal that the productions of scientific knowledge and technological development are not neutral, but are meaningfully shaped by their social, political, and economic conditions. In hosting this session, we hope to have a conversation at PAMLA that continues to challenge the notion that the sciences and humanities are mutually exclusive, methodologically distinct, or ethically at odds, and especially to demonstrate the crucial importance of humanities approaches in understanding science and technology as social and cultural forces.

Please email the panel’s presiding officers, Jennifer Baker at jenba@uw.edu and Christina Shiea at cshiea@uw.edu, with questions or concerns. The deadline to submit abstracts for our panel is Fri, May 15. 

Submit proposals to the Technoscience in Literature and Culture panel here: https://pamla.ballastacademic.com/Home/S/20147.