CFP Race & Ethnicity 2014 MPCA/MACA Conference

full name / name of organization: 
Midwest Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association
contact email: 

Call for Proposals:
RACE & ETHNICITY
2014 Midwest Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association Conference
Proposal Submission Deadline: April 30, 2014

Friday-Sunday, October 3-5th, 2014
Indianapolis, IN
JW Marriott Indianapolis
10 S. West St., Indianapolis, IN 46204, Phone: (317) 860-5800

The Race & Ethnicity Area of the MPCA/MACA requests 150-250 word proposals for papers to be presented at the 2014 Midwest Popular Culture Association Conference. Proposals for co-authored papers, complete panels (3-4 presenters), or nontraditional formats such as workshops, roundtables, open forums, and/or visual/artistic/creative approaches are also welcomed.

This is an effort to revive the Race & Ethnicity Area, which has not been part of the MPCA Conference for several years. To create a broadly-ranging discussion of race and ethnicity in popular culture, we would like to bring into conversation with each other topics that have tended to be subsumed under other genres or categories (e.g., SF/F, Film, Pedagogy), as well as those that focus on more traditionally-studied aspects of race and ethnicity.

Suggested topics and approaches include, but are not limited to, the following:
• Critical race theory;
• Critical and/or comparative ethnic studies;
• Critical whiteness studies;
• Analyses that address intersectional/co-constructed/multidimensional identities;
• Racialization and constructions of ethnicity in popular culture;
• Discussions about the intersections of race, ethnicity, popular culture, and academia;
• Considerations of the meaning of race and ethnicity in a "postracial" culture;
• Racial and ethnic "performance" in popular culture; and/or
• Mass culture or social media reactions to constructions of race and ethnicity in public discourse.

Please upload proposals on any aspect of Race & Ethnicity to the Race & Ethnicity area, http://submissions.mpcaaca.org/. Individuals may only submit one paper; please do not submit the same item to more than one Area. Please include name, affiliation, and e-mail address of each author/participant with the abstract. A preliminary version of the schedule will be posted on our website around August 2014. The final version will be distributed in hard copy at the conference. If you have any questions, please email Jessica Kaiser at kaiser2@purdue.edu.

More information about the conference can be found at http://www.mpcaaca.org/. Attendees are financially responsible for all costs related to their participation in the conference, e.g., transportation, lodging, meals, registration, membership, etc. Graduate students are invited to apply for competitively awarded travel grants from MPCA/MACA. Details are available at http://mpcaaca.org/conference/travel-grants/.

Special Notes Regarding Proposal Submissions: (1) MPCA/ACA can provide an LCD projector for presentations. You must ask for it at the time you submit your proposal. (2) If necessary, indicate and submit potential scheduling conflicts along with your proposal. (3) If you wish your presentation to be listed as MACA (rather than MPCA), please include this request with your proposal.