International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts

Fan Cultures and the Premodern World

History Faculty, University of Oxford, 5-6 July 2019

Following the success of the July 2018 colloquium, we are announcing a conference “Fan Cultures and the Premodern World” to be held at Oxford on 5 and 6 July 2019. We welcome proposals on various aspects of premodern (ancient, medieval, early modern) culture which can be better understood through the lens of the modern phenomena of fanfic, cosplay, celebrity studies, LARP, gaming etc. Questions discussed may include but are not limited to:

– Premodern authors as fanboys and fangirls

– Intersectionality and fandom

– The “dark side” of fandom – negative consequences of fannish devotion, including backlash to changes in canonical fan works

– Media as message(s) – the impact of media type on fandom and fan communities

– Game as a spiritual experience

– “Democratisation” of narrative

– Canon, fanon, sequels and adaptations

– Authorial self-inserts

– Theories of fanfiction and how they intersect or intervene in conversations around premodern texts, authorship and readership

– Scholars as fans

– Politics of co-opting another’s identity

– Readers as (re-)writers

– Cosplay as a part of ritual

Please send your proposals (of about 250 words) by 15 March to Juliana.dresvina@history.ox.ac.uk

For more information, please click here.

ACCSFF ‘19
Call for Papers

The 2019 Academic Conference on Canadian Science Fiction and Fantasy will be held Friday and Saturday, June 7-8, 2019, in Toronto, Ontario, at the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation and Fantasy, one of the most important collections of fantastic literature in the world.

We invite proposals for papers in any area of Canadian science fiction and fantasy, including:

-studies of individual works and authors;
-comparative studies;
-studies that place works in their literary and/or
cultural contexts.

Papers may be about Canadian works in any medium: literature, film, graphic novels and comic books, and so on. For studies of the audio-visual media, preference will be given to discussions of works produced in Canada or involving substantial Canadian creative contributions.

Papers should be no more than 20 minutes long, and geared toward a general as well as an academic audience. Please submit proposals (max. 2 pages), preferably by email, to:

Dr. Allan Weiss
Department of English
York University
4700 Keele St.
Toronto, ON M3H 3N4
aweiss@yorku.ca

Deadline: February 1, 2019

Glasgow International Fantasy Conversations

Mapping the Mythosphere

23rd-24th May 2019

In her novel The Game (2007) Diana Wynne Jones speaks of the ‘Mythosphere’, an expanding system of inter-related narratives ‘made up of all the stories, theories and beliefs, legends, myths and hopes, that are generated here on Earth […] constantly growing and moving as people invent new tales to tell or find new things to believe’. Fantasy as a mode or genre can be said both to draw on this organic system and to show an intense awareness of the links between its many roots and branches. Whether we approach the Fantastic through the study of written literature, the visual arts, games, journalism, internet culture or film and television theory, a close study of its workings enables us to better understand the dominant strands of Jones’s Mythosphere and to explore its rapidly widening outer limits. Sometimes refusing to endorse the subjective values and cultural commitments that sustain contemporary ideologies, sometimes imaginatively confirming them with its own misguided rebellions, the Mythosphere is an expanding web of intertextual narratives which we are all both producers and products of. Over the course of the 23rd and 24th of May 2019, Glasgow International Fantasy Conversations (GIFCon) seeks to celebrate all aspects of critical and creative work that help to map-out this intricate network of intersecting narratives.

Constantly disrupting genres and disintegrating the designations of canonicity, Fantasy delights in breaking down borders and defying expectations, a fact supported by numerous contemporary scholarly studies. For instance, Celtic mythology emerges transformed from the pages of twenty-first century children’s literature in the work of the University of Glasgow’s own Dimitra Fimi, while Darryl Jones points out that the Fantastic ‘slasher’ film’s obsession with violence and gore can be found in both classical sculpture and Christian artworks from as early as the twelfth century. As such writers have shown, Fantasy draws connections through history, geography and the full range of representational media, upsetting and questioning everything as it does so by exploring and reinventing every corner of our psyches, philosophies and societies. Driven by the desire to imagine the impossible, spurred on by radical shifts in politics, economics, technology and available means of communication, Fantasy has become the language of our time, the aptest means of tracing, altering and extending the contours of the myths and stories we live by.

GIFCon 2019 is a two-day symposium that seeks to examine and honour the relationships between the different strands of Fantasy and the individual Fantastic works that make up the Mythosphere, be they books, films, games or comics. We welcome proposals for papers relating to this theme from researchers and practitioners working in the field of Fantasy and the Fantastic across all media, whether within the academy or beyond it. We are particularly interested in submissions from postgraduate and early career researchers.

It is worth noting that GIFCon uses a broad definition of Fantasy, so if you are unsure whether your topic would be of interest to Fantasy scholars and academics, please do submit your abstract and we can help decide this. We will also offer workshops in creative writing for those interested in exploring the creative process.

We ask for 300-word abstracts for 20-minute papers, as well as creative presentations that go beyond the traditional academic paper. Suggested topics include, but are not limited to, the following:

The concept of ‘the mythosphere’ itself, its history or critical analysis
Intersections, connections, or relationships between Fantasy authors and/or Fantastic texts
Challenges to boundaries, whether of genre, canonicity, or narrative medium
Authors’ self-reflective theorising of Fantasy and the Fantastic
Fear of or hostility to Fantasy and the Fantastic
Mythology, folktales & legends, both traditional and in their more modern forms of expression such as games or comics
Fantasy narratives in games and the implementation of virtual worlds
Modern myths, urban legends etc.
Literary/artistic lineages
Translations, adaptations and adaptation theory (particularly adaptations from one media form to another)
Fantasy and the Internet (such as Creepypasta or the Slenderman mythos)
Speculation about what lies beyond the Mythosphere’s cultural, psychological or cognitive boundaries (i.e. the Unknown)
Geographies and politics of the Fantastic (such as in Discworld, Narnia or Middle Earth)
Fantasy literature/art as subversive (or, indeed, as restrictive)

Submission deadline is Monday, 14th of January 2019, at 23:00!

Click here for more information.

2nd Science Fiction and Communism Conference
American University in Bulgaria
1-3 March 2019, Blagoevgrad

The American University in Bulgaria is pleased to announce a call for papers for the second edition of the Science Fiction and Communism Conference. The conference will discuss science fiction (SF) in the context of the Communist regime and the Cold War and will focus on the ways political regimes on both sides of the Iron Curtain utilized the concept of the future.

TOPICS AND OBJECTIVES OF THE CONFERENCE:

The Second Science Fiction and Communism Conference will continue to explore the political and cultural importance of SF in film, literature, architecture, science and politics.

We would like to invite submissions on the following topics in particular:

• Utopia and communist ideology
• Ideological control and its utilization
• Cosmism and Communist rhetoric
• Political commentary in Sci Fi East and West
• Gender and emancipation
• Practices of distribution and transmission of cultural products

The conference is open to all disciplines, approaches and methods. We welcome researchers, practitioners and students.

SUBMISSION:

Please send your proposals for papers, panels and/or presentations (CV, abstract of 300 – 500 words) to Yulia Pechanova at yulia@aubg.edu.

The conference language for presentations and discussions will be English.

Presentations should last no more than 20 minutes and be open to discussion afterwards.

Deadline for application is Dec. 21, 2018.

The applicants whose papers were selected will be informed by Jan. 7, 2019.

Participants are responsible for their own traveling and accommodation arrangements.

Attendees who are not submitting papers are encouraged to register.

Transportation from Sofia to Blagoevgrad will be organized by the host.

Gothic Terror, Gothic Horror
15th conference of the International Gothic Association: IGA 2019
July 30 – August 2, 2019, Lewis University, Romeoville, Illinois, United States

Gothic writers from Ann Radcliffe to Stephen King have differentiated terror and horror: the former is intellectual, imminent, and escapable; the latter, visceral, immediate, and unavoidable. Terror excites the mind, while horror convulses the body. Terror elevates, while horror debases. The oppositional yet mutually constitutive relationship between Radcliffean terror and Lewisite horror joins a constellation of unstable binaries, including mind/body, high/low, and feminine/masculine, which have proven valuable for producers and consumers of the Gothic since the eighteenth century. Today, they offer us a potent theoretical framework within which to engage not only classical Gothic texts, but also contemporary ones ranging from political propaganda to body horror. With a focus at once sharp and wide, Gothic Terror, Gothic Horror will stimulate an eclectic and inclusive conversation about the essence of the Gothic.

We invite the submission of abstracts that explore the theme of Gothic Terror, Gothic Horror. We welcome proposed panels of three related papers. Since this IGA conference is the first to be held in the United States, we encourage proposals that consider the theme in relation to the American Gothic.

Topics may include—but are by no means limited to—the following.

Conceptual and creative distinctions and intersections between terror and horror across time periods, genres, geographies, media, etc.
Stimulating terror and horror in audiences
Masculine and feminine Gothic
Mind and body in the Gothic
Gothic propaganda
High and low Gothic
“On the Supernatural in Poetry,” Danse Macabre, and other critical approaches to terror and horror
Body horror
Terror and terrorism
Gothic subjectivity and objectivity
Torture porn
Ann Radcliffe and Matthew Lewis
Terror, horror, and the uncanny
Gothic veiling and unveiling
The Gothic sublime
Eco-Horror and Eco-Terror
Queering Terror and Horror
Deconstructing the Gothic

Please submit a 250-word abstract by January 31, 2019 to igalewis@lewisu.edu, including your name, a short biography, affiliation (if any), and contact details.

http://www.internationalgothic.group.shef.ac.uk/

IV INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE VISIONES DE LO FANTÁSTICO:
“Women Creators and the Fantastic”
Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
5, 6 and 7 of June 2019

​There is no doubt that an increasing number of women creators employ the fantastic as a form of expression, whether in literature, theater, film, TV, comics and other arts. This is opening new paths in the genre, including the development of themes and forms that are absent or little explored in the works by male authors.

However, at the same time it should also be noted that the presence of the women in the canons and academic studies on the fantastic is unsatisfactory (except for honorable exceptions), and aspect that negatively affects our understanding of the panorama of the fantastic and the cultural production carried out by women in general.

The main objective of this Conference is to highlight and make visible the work of the women creators (especially in genres apparently reserved for men, such as cinema, TV or comics), and to offer studies on the forms, themes, and styles of the multiple poetics of the feminine fantastic and their relationship with the fantastic in general.

Confirmed keynote speakers include five renowned specialists in the fantastic, gender studies, TV and comics: Carmen Alemany Bay (Universitat d’Alacant, Spain), Ana Merino (The University of Iowa, USA), Cecilia Eudave (Universidad de Guadalajara, Mexico), Concepción Cascajosa (Universidad Carlos III de Madrid, Spain) and Meri Torras (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Spain).

The Grupo de Estudios sobre lo Fantástico (GEF) invites submission of abstracts focusing on fantastic women creators of the 19th, 20th and 21st centuries, both in literature as well as theatre, cinema, comic, TV or videogames, in any language and from any country.

Main themes:
Theoretical perspectives on the feminine fantastic
The feminist fantastic: ideology, criticism and transgression
Fantastic and feminine identity
Rhetorics of Fear
Female monsters
Fantastic spaces
Fantastic bodies
Representations of sexuality in the fantastic and its neighboring forms (hybridizations with science fiction and the marvelous)

To participate

Abstracts of a maximum of 300 words (including title, author and affiliation) must be submitted to:

visionesdelofantastico@gmail.com

Deadline for submissions is January 15, 2019. The organizing committee will notify the reception of proposals, and those accepted will be contacted before February 15, 2019.

Presentations must not exceed 20 minutes and can be in Spanish, Catalan, Galician, English, French, Italian, and Portuguese.

Those researchers who want to have their papers published as part of the conference proceedings must send them within the deadline (TBA). The academic committee will evaluate the papers and select the best proposals for their inclusion in the proceedings.

Deadline Extended — Lost and Found (Again): Finding One’s Way There and Back Again

deadline for submissions:
November 2, 2018

full name / name of organization:
Signum University and Johnson C. Smith University

contact email:
matthew.deforrest@signumu.org

Magnolia Moot 2018

Speakers

Corey Olsen

UNIVERSITY PRESIDENT; BOARD MEMBER EX OFFICIO; LECTURER, Signum University

Matthew M. DeForrest

Board Member, Professor of English and Mott University Professor, JCSU

Date

November 10, 2018, 9:00 AM to 4:30 PM EDT

Address

Johnson C. Smith University

The New Science Center

100 Beatties Ford Road

Charlotte, NC 28216

Johnson C. Smith University, Signum University, and the Mythgard Institute are pleased to announce the inaugural MagnoliaMoot 2018, a symposium on the theme “Lost and Found (Again): Finding One’s Way There and Back Again.” A mixture of paper presentations, panels, and discussions will be offered along with a keynote address by guest of honor Dr. Corey Olsen, “The Tolkien Professor.”

Call for Papers

Lost and Found (Again): Finding One’s Way There and Back Again

“But without a feast we shan’t remain alive much longer anyway,” said Bombur, and Bilbo heartily agreed with him. They argued about it backwards and forwards for a long while, until they agreed at length to send out a couple of spies, to creep near the lights and find out more about them. But then they could not agree on who was to be sent: no one seemed anxious to run the chance of being lost and never finding his friends again. In the end, in spite of warnings, hunger decided them, because Bombur kept on describing all the good things that were being eaten, according to his dream, in the woodland feast; so they all left the path and plunged into the forest together.” (The Hobbit)

Tolkien’s work has an interest in finding one’s place, both figuratively and metaphorically, in the wider world. It is not enough to have a place, one must understand it and one’s relationship to it to come to a clear understanding of what it means to belong in and to a place. This concept is not exclusive to Tolkien, but is also present in many works of science fiction and fantasy literature, films, and television. MagnoliaMoot will take up this theme, as well as other topics relating to the works of fantastic literature, television, and film. Please submit all abstracts by November 2, 2018 to matthew.deforrest@signumu.org. Acceptance will be notified on a rolling basis.

Registration

Registration fee includes light breakfast and boxed lunch.

Schedule

More information on the schedule will follow once the Call for Papers has closed. However, please keep in mind that events are due to begin at 9am, and should conclude by 4:30pm. Dr. Olsen will give the keynote address just after lunch, around 1pm.

Area Information and Accommodations

Johnson C. Smith University

The New Science Center

100 Beatties Ford Road

Charlotte, NC 28216

Johnson C. Smith University (JCSU) is a private liberal arts university with proud HBCU traditions and a future aimed at diversity. Approximately 1,600 highly talented and motivated students from various backgrounds are enrolled at JCSU and its faculty and staff members are equally as unique, coming from all over the world.

JCSU has a limited number of suite-style rooms available in its Mosaic Village facility for those attending MagnoliaMoot. The closest hotel to the campus is the DoubleTree Hotel (Part of the Hilton Hotel Group). As a major business and banking center, there are a number of hotels and restaurants relatively close to JCSU’s campus.

Canadian Society for the Study of Comics Annual Conference

deadline for submissions:
December 31, 2018

full name / name of organization:
Canadian Society for the Study of Comics

contact email:
csscscebd+cfp2019@gmail.com

Call for Papers:

Annual Conference of the
Canadian Society for the Study of Comics

Appel à textes:

Conférence annuelle de la
Société canadienne pour l’étude da la bande dessinée

University of British Columbia
June 4–5, 2019

Université de la Colombie-Britannique
4–5 juin, 2019

La version française suit

The Canadian Society for the Study of Comics invites proposals for papers and pre-constituted panels on any and all aspects of comics, broadly conceived (including cartoons, comic strips, comic books, graphic novels, webcomics, picture books, and visual poetry) to be presented at our 2019 annual conference. For the first time ever, the CSSC/SCEBD conference will be held as part of the Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences.

The comics form has been theorized as an inherently hybridized mix of words and images. In keeping with the theme of this year’s Congress, Circles of Conversation, we are particularly interested in proposals that explore comics’ potential to communicate across boundaries. Potential topics include but are not limited to:

comics and intercultural dialogue
inter- and multi-disciplinary approaches to the study of comics from across the social sciences and humanities
diverse representations and authors
circulation, adaptation, and transmedia narratives
comics worlds and world comics
comics and fan cultures
creative communities and corporate culture, gatekeeping and backlashes
comics in professional practice (comics and education, graphic medicine, graphic justice, comics journalism, etc.)

Please submit a 200–300 word abstract, short biography, and contact information in a Word document to csscscebd+cfp2019@gmail.com by December 31, 2018.

Keynote Lecture:
“Latinographix: Taking a Can Opener to the History of Alternative Comics”

We are also pleased to welcome this year’s keynote speaker, Frederick Luis Aldama. Dr. Aldama is Arts & Humanities Distinguished Professor, University Distinguished Scholar, and University Distinguished Teacher at The Ohio State University. He is the award-winning author, co-author, or editor of 36 books, editor or co-editor of 8 academic press book series, and editor of the trade-press graphic fiction and nonfiction series Latinographix. He is founder and director of LASER, the Latinx Space for Enrichment & Research, and has been inducted into both the Academy of Teachers and the National Cartoonists Society.

About the CSSC/SCEBD

The CSSC/SCEBD is a national, bilingual scholarly association that promotes the academic study of comics. Founded in 2010, the CSSC/SCEBD is a venue for Canadian and international scholars to discuss all aspects of comics as an art form and cultural phenomenon. Please find information about the CSSC/SCEBD on our website: comics-scholars.com.

About Congress

The Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences is an annual umbrella meeting for over seventy Canadian scholarly associations. Each year, it meets on the campus of a different host university. In addition to the individual association conferences, a series of lectures, workshops and cultural events are organized by the host institution and the Canadian Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences. Information on the Congress and its constituent conferences may be found at congress2019.ca.

La société canadienne pour l’étude de la bande dessinée invite des propositions pour des présentations individuelles ou en groupe (panel de 3) sur tout aspect touchant à la bande dessinée-BD au sens large (caricatures, comic strips, comic books, BD numérique, livres d’images, et poésie visuelle) pour notre conférence annuelle en 2019. Pour la première fois, la SCEBD/CSSC aura lieu dans le cadre de la Fédération des sciences humaines (Congrès des sciences humaines).

La forme BD/comics a été théorisée comme étant intrinsèquement hybride résultant d’un mélange de mots et d’images. En gardant en tête le thème de cette année de la Fédération, « Cercles de conversation », nous sommes particulièrement intéressé/e/s par des propositions qui explorent les possibilités que les BD/comics ont de communiquer au-delà des limites et frontières traditionnelles. Les sujets potentiels incluent mais ne sont pas limités à:

BD et dialogue interculturel
Approches inter- et multiculturelles de l’étude des BD à travers les sciences humaines
Circulation, adaptation , et narration transmédiatiques
Les mondes de la BD et les BD mondiales/globales
BD et cultures de fans
Communautés créatives et culture entrepreneuriale, censure, « Gardiens des Temples » (gatekeepers), réactions et contre-réactions
BD dans les pratiques professionnelles: éducation, médecine, justice, journalisme, etc.

Veuillez soumettre un résumé de 200-300 mots, une bio-bibliographie et une adresse de contact sur un document Word à csscscebd+cfp2019@gmail.com avant le 31 décembre 2018.

Conférence plénière inaugurale:

“Latinographix: Ouvrir l’histoire de la BD alternative avec un ouvre-boîte”

Nous sommes heureux d’accueillir le conférencier de cette année, Frederick Luis Aldama. Dr. Aldama est Arts & Humanities Distinguished Professor à l’université de l’Ohio (OSU/Ohio State U.). Il est l’auteur, co-auteur et éditeur de 36 livres, éditeur et co-éditeur de 8 séries de presses universitaires, et éditeur de la série Latinographix par les presses commerciales de fictions et non-fictions graphiques. Il est aussi le fondateur et directeur de LASER/Latinx Space for Enrichment & Research, et fait partie de l’Académie des Professeurs et de la Société Nationale des Cartoonistes.

A propos de la SCEBD/CSSC

La SCEBD/CSSC est une association académique nationale bilingue qui promeut les études des BD/comics (et autres dénominations comme les mangas, fumetti, etc.). Fondée en 2010, elle est un lieu pour les chercheurs canadiens et internationaux pour discuter tous les aspects des comics/BD comme forme artistique et phénomène culturel. Veuillez trouver plus d’informations sur le site de la SCEBD/CSSC: comics-scholars.com.

A propos du Congrès:

La Fédération des sciences humaines organise une rencontre annuelle (Congrès des sciences humaines) qui abrite plus de 70 associations académiques canadiennes. Chaque année, elle est accueillie sur un campus universitaire différent. En plus des conférences des associations individuelles, elle offre une série de lecture, de séminaires et d’événements culturels co-organisés par l’université hôte et par la Fédération des sciences humaines. Visitez congress2019.ca pour plus de renseignements sur la Fédération et ses Associations.

CFP: SCIENCE FICTION RESEARCH ASSOCIATION ANNUAL CONFERENCE 2019
Friday, June 21 – Monday, June 24, 2019
Chaminade University, Honolulu, Hawaii

Conference Theme: Facing the Future, Facing the Past: Colonialism, Inidigeneity, and SF
Keynote Speaker: Nalo Hopkinson

The Science Fiction Research Association invites proposals for its 2019 annual conference, to be held on the campus of Chaminade University, Honolulu, Hawaii.

“I ka wā mua, ka wā ma hope” is a Hawaiian proverb that can be translated, “In the past lies the future,” or more literally, “In what is in front of you is found what is behind you.” In the Native Hawaiian way of thinking, according to scholar Lilikalā Kame‘eleihiwa, “The Hawaiian stands firmly in the present, with his back to the future, and his eyes fixed upon the past, seeking historical answers for present-day dilemmas.” Another way of interpreting this saying might be, you must face the past to prepare yourself for the future. Thinking about this Hawaiian proverb in the context of science fiction brings up questions about ways of knowing, ways of orienting ourselves in time and space, the relation of our notions of the possible to our understanding of history, the ethical and political obligations of our scientific-technological practice in relation to the past and the future, and our expectations of social change as well as our sense of how it comes about.

SFRA 2019 will meet in Hawai‘i, a set of islands that after two and a half centuries of Western contact has become the world leader in species extinction, while being transformed during the nineteenth century from a wholly self-sustaining civilization into a plantation economy dominated by export crops and ravaged by epidemics that reduced the Native Hawaiian population by 80% or more, and whose political sovereignty was stolen by the settler-controlled and US-military-aided overthrow of the monarchy in 1893. As we plan to meet on this occupied land with its long history of indigenous resistance to colonial incursion, we welcome papers and panels on the relation of science fiction to colonial history and its ongoing effects, to the contemporary ecological crisis, to issues of political and economic justice, and to past and ongoing visions of the future.

Topics related to the conference theme include the relation of SF to the following:

* indigenous futurism
* colonial fantasies & indigenous survivance
* explorers, settlers, and natives
* indigenization v. cultural assimilation of forms & genres
* the dynamics of recognition, versions of the colonial gaze
* the “post” in postcolonialism
* decolonial speculative fiction
* the symbiosis of colonialism & capitalism
* epistemology in the contact zone
* speculative technologies of resistance
* Native and regional disruptions of the colonial biopolitical order
* indigenous intellectual property in light of transgenics, genetic modification, & other man-made mutations
* biopolitical imperialism, biopiracy, bioprospecting
* food security, organic & smart farming
* ecocriticism & the anthropocene
* progress v. sustainability
* estranging empire, rethinking centers and margins
* world systems & world construction
* world, nation, & culture: imagined communities and communities of practice

We also welcome papers on topics relevant to science fiction research broadly conceived that are not specifically related to the conference theme.

Graduate students are encouraged to apply and attend; as with previous SFRA conferences, the first day of conference programming will include roundtables and workshops targeted at early-career teachers and researchers working in SF studies and in the study of popular culture more generally.

300-500 word abstracts should be sent to rieder@hawaii.edu by March 1, 2019. Notification of acceptance will occur by April 1, 2019. We also welcome submission of preconstituted panels and roundtables.

“Politics and Conflicts”: Some Global Accents

A call for papers & panels by the International Fantastic Division

of the International Association of the Fantastic in the Arts for the

International Conference on the Fantastic in the Arts #40

March 13-16, 2019

Orlando, Florida

CFP Deadline 10/31/18

Through Oct. 31, 2018, the International Fantastic Division of the International Association for the Fantastic in the Arts is soliciting proposals for ICFA 2019 papers, sessions, creative readings, and other panels about the GLOBAL FANTASTIC in any media and discipline.

Our Division encourages international research and art about spiritual, fabulist, weird, and experimental manifestations of the non-real/surreal/transreal throughout the world. We research and create narratives on how such speculative or fantastic expressions can engage:

· The global division of labor through the production of an international fantastic (for example, science-fiction animation made in one place but exported to another)

· Native/Aboriginal/First Nations/Indigenous speculative fictions of the world

· Diaspora, sojourners, and settlement: e.g., alien borders, migration, liminalities

· Literatures in translation including those that offer fabulist creoles, pidgins, and dialects created by cultural authors and artists

· (Post) colonialism and its monstrous/transgressive discontents

· Globalectic narratives that illustrate social relations between international (imagined or imaginary) communities

· Posthuman/dehumanized refugees; the estrangement of middle passages and immigrant detention centers

· Folklores about/of transnational families and laborers, myths and legends about/of local businesses and regional industries

· Fantastic literatures as cultural imperialism or as national literatures

· Global circuits, time-space compression, and speculative financial flows in the international knowledge economy

· Xenophobic superheroes; neo-Orientalism of the action genre’s War on Terror; Islamophobia and the fantasy narrative; and so on

· Zombie capitalism and the necrocultural alienation of the overseas worker

· Alternative or localized forms of sustainability, materiality, technological practice

· Syncretized/creolized/hybridized spiritualities and magicks of the world

· The imported (or exported) apocalypse

· Millennial SF/fantasy/horror signaling the “digital divide” between regions, classes, countries

· New international slaveries and speculative resistance

· The Global North’s “dronification” of state violence and imperial military work

· Continental, agricultural, island/insular, urban, and other SFnal ecologies

· Community engagements with “globalized” science and technology

We accept academic proposals about worldwide decolonial, and indigenous texts by university and independent scholars; by translators, librarians, scientists, and other researchers; and by graduate students in all fields. For questions, contact the IF Division Head at iafa.div.if@fantastic-arts.org. Artists of fantastic works may submit proposals to the ICFA Creative Track of writing, music, theater, film, and poetry sessions, as well as for panels on topics of interest to creative professionals. In March, we will meet at the Orlando Airport Marriott Lakeside to celebrate, debate, and deduce speculative fiction’s contributions to grasping the politics and conflicts of our past in their capacity to guide us toward more inclusive futures.

To submit proposals by 10/31, visit https://www.fantastic-arts.org/icfa-submissions/ and select the International Fantastic as the Division to which to forward your proposal.

For more on ICFA 40, see: https://www.fantastic-arts.org/annual-conference/. You can also contact the other IAFA Division Heads based on your subgenre/media of interest: https://www.fantastic-arts.org/about/governance/division-heads/.