CFP Medievalisms Area at SWPACA Summer Salon 2025 (4/15/2025; online 6/26-28/2025)

Medievalisms Area at SWPACA Summer Salon 2025

deadline for submissions: 

April 15, 2025

full name / name of organization: 

Southwest Popular/American Culture Association

contact email: 

adunai@tamuct.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/03/27/medievalisms-area-at-swpaca-summer-salon-2025.

Call for Papers

Medievalisms Area

Southwest Popular / American Culture Association (SWPACA)

2025 SWPACA Summer Salon

 

June 26-28, 2024

Virtual Conference

https://swpaca.org/

Submissions open on March 25, 2025

Proposal submission deadline: April 15, 2025

 

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/

 

The Medievalisms Area invites papers exploring constructions and representations of the medieval from any number of disciplinary and interdisciplinary perspectives. This area is broadly interested in how meanings, uses, and signifiers of the medieval are engaged and negotiated, both in specific instances and across time. Papers might approach medievalism with attention to media (e.g., literary medievalisms, cinematic medievalisms, etc.); historical, regional, and cultural contexts (among others); theoretical, methodological, and disciplinary approaches; and any other scholarly (including scholarly-creative and pedagogical) perspectives and topics.

 

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 Medievalisms area, please contact its Area Chair, Amber Dunai, at adunai@tamuct.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!

Last updated March 31, 2025

CFP MMLA 2025 Permanent Session: Old and Middle English Language and Literature (4/21/2025; online 11/14-16/2025)

 

MMLA 2025 Permanent Session: Old and Middle English Language and Literature

deadline for submissions: 

April 21, 2025

full name / name of organization: 

Midwest Modern Language Association

contact email: 

kathleen.burt@mga.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/02/25/mmla-2025-permanent-session-old-and-middle-english-language-and-literature.

Note: this conference has a hybrid format  (both virtual and in-person sessions). This session will be virtual.

The general call for this year, inviting “papers that explore the value of the Humanities in relation to a more hopeful future” in areas including but not limited to “languages, literature, pedagogy, writing studies, linguistics, folklore, film studies, the digital humanities, and library studies”, has broad possibilities within the languages, literatures, histories, and cultures related to Old and Middle English. This panel welcomes papers that address the presence, importance, and/or relevance of hope as a concept, mindset, language, and/or practice in Old and Middle English works of any kind, as well as explorations, arguments, or discussions of the relevance or importance or perceptions of these texts and ideas in both the medieval and the modern world.

Such considerations might take the form of (but need not be limited to) exploring any or all of the following: hope in, with, for, by humans and/or humanity; development of humanism as a literary, scientific, or historical or cultural movement; medieval literature/history/culture and medievalism as sources of study of or inspiration for hope; hopes for the field(s) now and in the future, and/or ways to cultivate such hopes.

 

Please send abstracts of approximately 350 words, along with a cv or brief biographical statement, to Dr. Kathleen Burt at kathleen.burt@mga.edu by no later than April 21, 2025.

Last updated March 24, 2025

CFP UVA Wise Medieval-Renaissance Conference XXXVIII (6/23/2025; 9/18-20/2025)

 

UVA Wise Medieval-Renaissance Conference XXXVIII (9/18-20)

deadline for submissions: 

June 23, 2025

full name / name of organization: 

University of Virginia-Wise Center for Medieval-Renaissance Studies

contact email: 

kjt9t@uvawise.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/03/07/uva-wise-medieval-renaissance-conference-xxxviii-918-20.

Sponsored by the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, the University of Virginia’s College at Wise Medieval-Renaissance Conference promotes scholarly discussion in all disciplines of Medieval and Renaissance studies. The conference welcomes proposals for papers and panels on Medieval or Renaissance literature, language, history, philosophy, science, pedagogy, and the arts.  Abstracts for papers should be 300 or fewer words.  Proposals for panels should include: a) title of the panel; b) names and institutional affiliations of the chair and all panelists; c) a 200-250 word description of the panel).  A branch campus of the University of Virginia, the University of Virginia’s College at Wise is a public four-year liberal arts college located in the scenic Appalachian Mountains of Southwest Virginia. 

Keynote Address

Frederick de Armas, University of Chicago  Cervantes’ Architectures: Windows, Holes, Corners and Fissures

Professor de Armas’ keynote address arises out of his study of the architectures in Cervantes’ works, especially depictions of smaller architectural elements such as rooms in the attic, shuttered windows and even keyholes. Professor de Armas will investigate other holes, along with corners and fissures, conjugating the apparent insignificance of some architectural features or flaws, with their inordinate consequences. Specifically, his address will discuss the three moments in the Don Quixote in which the story of Pyramus and Thisbe come into play and show how its cracks and fissures are spaces for innovation in Cervantes’ novel. 

Frederick De Armas received his PhD in Comparative Literature from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill (1969) and was awarded a doctorate Honoris Causa by the Université de Neuchatel (Switzerland) in 2018. He also received the Norman Maclean Faculty Award in 2023. Professor De Armas has taught at Louisiana State University, Duke University and Pennsylvania State University. He has been Andrew W. Mellon Professor and then Robert O. Anderson Distinguished Service Professor in Romance Languages and Comparative Literature at the University of Chicago (2000-2024). At Chicago, he has served as Chair of the Department of RLL and Director of Graduate Studies. He has been President of the Cervantes Society of America and President of AISO (Asociación Internacional Siglo de Oro). He is now Honorary President of AISO and of EMIT: Early Modern Image and Text Society.  He has been awarded several NEH Fellowships and has directed several NEH Seminars.

His interests include the politics of astrology; ekphrasis; the uses of architecture in early modern prose fiction; the relations between the verbal and the visual particularly between Spanish literature and Italian art; and the interconnections between myth and empire during the rule of the Habsburgs. He is the author of numerous books and edited volumes. Some of the more recent ones: 

Writing for the Eyes in the Spanish Golden Age (Bucknell UP2004);
Ekphrasis in the Age of Cervantes (Bucknell UP 2005);
Quixotic Frescoes: Cervantes and Italian Renaissance Art (Toronto 2006);
Ovid in the Age of Cervantes (Toronto UP 2010);
Don Quixote among the Saracens: Clashes of Civilizations and Literary Genres (Toronto UP 2011);
El retorno de Astrea: astrología, mito e imperio en Calderón (Iberoamericana 2016);
Women Warriors in Early Modern Spain (U of Delaware P, 2019):
Cervantes’ Architectures: The Dangers Outside (Toronto UP, 2022).He is also the author of several short stories and has published two novels: El abra del Yumurí (2016) and Sinfonía Salvaje (2019), both set in Cuba in the late 1950’s. Please submit abstracts of up to 300 words by June 23, 2025 to: https://www.uvawise.edu/webform/medieval-renaissance-proposals/ For more information, please visit our website: https://www.uvawise.edu/academics/department-language-literature/medieval-renaissance-conference/ or contact

Kenneth J. Tiller
Professor of English
Co-director, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies
UVA’s College at Wise
Wise, VA 24293
(276) 376-4587
kjt9t@virginia.edu  

Last updated March 14, 2025

CFP 2025 Annual Meeting of the Rocky Mountain Medieval and Renaissance Association (3/10/2025; Logan, UT 5/29-6/1/2025)

Sharing from email:

Dearest members and friends,


Just a reminder that the CFP is open for our 2025 conference through March 10. As we get more conference info, it will be posted on our conference website: https://rmmra.org/conferences


If you have any suggestions for keynote speakers, please reply with your ideas!


The CFP is as follows:


We are excited to announce that RMMRA 2025 will be held at Utah State University!!!

The conference will be hosted by the research library and will feature a special exhibit including materials from both Utah State and University of Utah as a part of the conference! (See page 6 for more information)

Call for Proposals

The 57th annual meeting of the Rocky Mountain Medieval and Renaissance Association will take place in Logan, Utah, May 29-June 1, 2025, hosted by Utah State University in a hybrid format. Participation is welcome both in person and online for all events.

The RMMRA is seeking proposals on any topic relating to the period 400-1700 CE in a variety of formats that address some aspect of medieval and early modern studies. We encourage proposals that are both within and across traditional disciplines, including (but not limited to) history, art, literature, architecture, art history, religious studies, history of science, politics, languages, and digital humanities. We also encourage proposals that move across or outside of the traditional academy, including (but not limited to) archival work, K-12 teaching, popular history, and other venues.

We welcome papers on any medieval or early modern topic ca. 500-1700, including pedagogy, medievalisms, revisions and reimaginings, and other related works. We are particularly interested in promoting scholarship that crosses traditional boundaries of time and space, including comparative work, focus on the global medieval/early modern and precolonial cultures, and work that crosses disciplinary boundaries.

All are welcome to submit proposals until March 10, 2025.

Participants are encouraged to propose any of the following with a 100-200 word abstract:

- a paper to be read in a typical panel;

- a full panel of papers linked by theme or approach;

- a work-in-progress for detailed workshop feedback;

- a moderated discussion panel.

All participants are also welcome to volunteer as readers for works-in-progress seminars, which will involve pre-reading submitted papers and offering critical feedback during the conference.

Visit www.memberplanet.com/s/rmmra/rmmra2025submissions to submit a proposal.


Rocky Mountain Medieval & Renaissance Association

Kristin M.S. Bezio, President

Jessica Brown, Secretary

Samantha Dressel, Treasurer

Vincent Patarino, Membership Officer

Alani Hicks-Bartlet, Affiliations Officer & Associate Organization Rep.

Corinne Wieben, Communications Officer

Charles Smith, Registered Agent

CFP 2026 Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting (Amherst, MA 3/19-21/2026)

2026 Medieval Academy of America Annual Meeting:

Consortiums and Confluences

Call for Papers

The 101st annual Meeting of the Medieval Academy of America will take place on March 19–21, 2026 on the campuses of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Amherst College, and will also include events at Mt. Holyoke College and Smith College. Hosted by the Five College Consortium, the theme of the meeting is “Consortiums and Confluences.” The program will bring together scholars from a wide range of disciplinary backgrounds addressing the medieval world and critical topics in Medieval Studies. Our plenary lectures will be given by Elly Truitt (Associate Professor of History and Sociology of Science at the University of Pennsylvania), Peggy McCracken (Incoming President of the Medieval Academy of America and Professor of French, Women’s Studies, and Comparative Literature at the University of Michigan), and Jesús Rodríguez-Velasco (Augustus R. Street Professor of Spanish & Portuguese and Comparative Literature at Yale University). We are excited to welcome you to Amherst, MA, and its environs, and look forward to meeting you, learning from you, and celebrating our shared commitment to Medieval Studies.

Click here for more information and the full Call for Papers.

NeMLA Sponsored Sessions March 2025

We are organizing the following sessions for the 56th Annual Convention of the Northeast Modern Language Association to be held in Philadelphia, 6-9 March. The full schedule is available online and registration is required to attend. 

Thursday, Mar 6 - Track 4 (02:15-04:15 PM)

4.12 Saving the Day for Medieval Studies: Using Comics for Teaching the Middle Ages (Roundtable)
Chair: Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College
Chair: Karen Casebier, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga
Location: 402 (Media Equipped)
Pedagogy & Professional & Cultural Studies and Media Studies

"The Medieval Comics Project: Ongoing Efforts to Expand the Field of Medieval Comics Scholarship" Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

"From Borders to Panels: Integrating Comic Books into Medieval Studies Pedagogy" Rachael Warmington, Seton Hall University

"Reshaping Literary Canon: Graphic Novels as the Future of Classics" Derek Castle, University of New Hampshire

"Marvel 1602 and its Connection to the Scientific Enlightenment" Madison Cothern, University of Memphis

Sunday, Mar 9 - Track 22 (08:15-10:15 AM)

22.20 (Re)Animating the Middle Ages: Adapting the Medieval in Animated Media (Seminar)
Chair: Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College
Chair: Karen Casebier, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga
Location: 410 (Media Equipped)
Cultural Studies and Media Studies & Interdisciplinary Humanities

"Animating Marie de France : Emile Mercier’s Bisclavret (2011)" Karen Casebier, University of Tennessee-Chattanooga

"Possibilities and Pitfalls in Arthurian Animation: An Exploration of the Darkstalkers Series (1995)" Michael Torregrossa, Bristol Community College

"The Black Knight: Women “Passing” as Knights in Children’s Entertainment" Megan Arnott, Lakehead University

"Cartoon Saloon's Wild Women: Monstrous Genders in Irish Animated Medievalism" Colin Wheeler, Kennesaw State University

"A Modern Look at Late Medieval Religion and Literacy in Obsidian Entertainment’s Pentiment" Olivia Mathers, Lehigh University

"Heresy and Crusades: How Modern Fascists Appropriated the Medieval Aesthetics of Warhammer 40k" William Weiss, Independent Scholar

CFP Tolkien and War! - Tolkien at UVM Conference (2/2/2025; Hybrid 4/5/2025)

Tolkien at UVM Conference

deadline for submissions:
April 5, 2025

full name / name of organization:
The Tolkien at the University of Vermont Conference

contact email:
cvaccaro@uvm.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/10/31/tolkien-at-uvm-conference

Tolkien and War! is the theme of the 21st annual Tolkien at the University of Vermont conference on April 5th. This is a hybrid event!!

We are excited to have John Garth as our keynote speaker, and we are encouraging all abstracts but will give priority to those on the theme. Possible topics include but are not limited to:

• War in Europe
• War in Middle-earth
• War and Tolkien's poetry
• Heroic battle poetry
• War and Tolkien's English
• War in the films/Tv shows
• Gender/Sexuality and War
• Psychology and War
• Religion and War

Please submit 200 word abstracts to cvaccaro@uvm.edu by Sunday February 2nd!


Last updated November 1, 2024

CFP Social Media and the Medieval - TSW Special Issue (2/28/2025)

Social Media and the Medieval - TSW Special Issue

deadline for submissions:
February 28, 2025

full name / name of organization:
The So What (Arthuriana's Public Humanities Project)

contact email:
thesowhatpub@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/12/02/social-media-and-the-medieval-tsw-special-issue

The So What welcomes proposals for short, public-facing pieces — whether critical, pedagogical, or creative — on social media accounts that engage with the medieval period for a special issue of TSW planned for on-line publication in 2025 or early 2026.



Whether it’s Instagram, Twitter (currently known as X), YouTube, TikTok, or other social media platforms, we’re interested in social media that engages with, or remediates, the medieval period on various subjects, including history, literature, manuscripts, animals, physical objects, etc. Some accounts may take a more straight forward, literal approach while others may utilize humor and parody. We are interested in pieces on any medieval-focused social media, with potential topics included, but not limited to:



- Intersections of social media and public humanities

- The role of social media within the digital humanities

- Social media and humor (obscure jokes, parody accounts, medieval camp, and more!)

- Social media’s role in academia

- Using social media in the classroom

- How social media does or does not expand the idea of the medieval beyond western Europe

- How social media reinforces and/or subverts periodization

- Intersection of social media and modern meme culture

- Critical readings of specific accounts and using medievalism to include or exclude

- Fama in the Internet Age

- Medieval (and Medievalist) Influencers



Full CFP also available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1i-E14ByShGSq2TQYRLWa4-695xsHo8H5/edi...



Last updated December 5, 2024

CFP Spanning the Globe: Thinking across Geographies in Medieval and Medievalism Studies (1/22/2025 Medieval and Renaissance Forum, Kenne NH 3/28-29/2025)

45th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum: Spanning the Globe: Thinking across Geographies in Medieval and Medievalism Studies

deadline for submissions:
January 22, 2025

full name / name of organization:
Medieval and Renaissance Forum

contact email:
mpages@keene.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/01/02/45th-annual-medieval-and-renaissance-forum-spanning-the-globe-thinking-across. 

45th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum:

Spanning the Globe: Thinking across Geographies in Medieval and Medievalism Studies

Keene State College

Keene, NH, USA

Friday and Saturday March 28-29, 2025



Call for Papers and Sessions



We are delighted to announce that the 45th Medieval and Renaissance Forum will take place in person on Friday, March 28 and Saturday March 29, 2025 at Keene State College in Keene, New Hampshire. This year's conference considers the Global Turn in all elements of our field—Medieval Studies, Renaissance/Early Modern Studies, Medievalism, and "Renaissance-ism." As always, we also welcome papers on any and every topic related to the Middle Ages or the Renaissance as well as papers on medievalism. We plan to hold the 45th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum in person with a limited number of virtual presentations.

We welcome abstracts (one page or less) from faculty, students, and independent scholars. If you are an undergraduate student, we ask that you obtain a faculty member's approval and sponsorship.



Graduate students are eligible for consideration for the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award upon submission of their essays by March 1, 2025. The winner of the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award will win $100 to be used for registration and/or travel expenses to the 46th Annual Medieval and Renaissance Forum (travel expenses including but not limited to transportation to and from the conference and accommodations while in Keene). The winner of the South Wind Graduate Student Paper Award will be announced at lunch on Friday, March 28, 2025.



Please submit abstracts and full contact information on the google form available at:



https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSfmaw5chDsckRFiAhXQVDA61v6uznfNjwVaEVHXZ4MWQT1xgg/viewform?usp=dialog



This year’s keynote speaker is Angela Jane Weisl, Professor of English at Seton Hall University, who will speak about "Spanning the Globe: Getting Global in Medievalism and Medieval Studies"

Angela Jane Weisl is Professor of English at Seton Hall University. A scholar of both Medieval Studies and Medievalism, she is the author of Conquering the Reign of Femeny: Gender and Genre in Chaucer’s Romance, The Persistence of Medievalism: Narrative Adventures in Contemporary Culture, and the co-author, with Tison Pugh, of Medievalisms: Making the Past in the Present. Her collection, Medievalisms in a Global Age, co-edited with Robert Squillace came out from Boydell and Brewer in 2024, and their co-authored project, tentatively titled Global Medievalisms and the Contest of Space, is under contract at Routledge. She is also the Executive in Charge of Presentations for the International Society for the Study of Medievalism. She played Mean Teacher and Zombie Chaucer in the Seton Hall University English Club Zombie Movie. From years of teaching History of the English Language, she is known around Seton Hall as the “Dr. of HEL.”

Abstract deadline: January 22, 2025



Presenters and early registration: March 15, 2025



As always, we look forward to greeting returning and first-time participants to Keene!




Last updated January 2, 2025

CFP ‘Getting Medieval’: Fantasy and the Middle Ages (2/3/2025; Spec Issue Messengers from the Stars)

Messengers from the Stars: On Science Fiction and Fantasy No. 8, 2025 [updated]

deadline for submissions:
February 3, 2025

full name / name of organization:
Messengers from the Stars

contact email:
mfts.journal@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/07/22/messengers-from-the-stars-on-science-fiction-and-fantasy-no-8-2025-updated

Messengers from the Stars is an international, peer-reviewed, open-access journal, offering academic articles, reviews, and providing an outlet for a wide range of creative work inspired by Science fiction and Fantasy. The 2025 issue will be dedicated to the following theme:

‘Getting Medieval’: Fantasy and the Middle Ages

Traditionally distinguished by the presence of supernatural or magical elements, otherworldly settings, epic quests and archetypal characters, Fantasy fiction has been an incredibly popular genre since its inception. Indeed, as highlighted by scholars like John Clute, much of world fiction “has been described, at one time or another, as fantasy” (337). Although Fantasy is sometimes perceived as a form of escapism and at other times as a legitimate fictional realm with its own internal logic, the influence of the Middle Ages has remained a constant element in the construction of Fantasy worlds. From the use of folklore, myths, medieval legends and sagas, different contemporary authors look to the past as a source of inspiration, adapting, transforming and rewriting narratives to not only suit contemporary tastes and ideals but also to mirror present-day anxieties and fears. The works of J. R. R. Tolkien, George R. R. Martin, Robin Hobb, Joe Abercrombie, Marion Zimmer Bradley or Juliet Marillier, among others, are good examples of how the Middle Ages have served to fire the imagination.

Bearing this in mind and acknowledging that Fantasy continues to expand and develop, offering a diverse array of narratives as well as endless possibilities for storytelling and creative exploration, in this number we are especially interested in how Fantasy fiction uses the medieval past to create storylines that resonate with contemporary audiences across geographic, linguistic, cultural and political boundaries. We consider Fantasy in broader terms, including literature, cinema, television, comics/graphic novels, video games, music, etc., and are especially interested in submissions that expand the fields of knowledge and landscapes represented in the journal.

Possible topics may include, but are not limited to:

• Arthuriana in Fantasy;
• Female Agency in Medieval Fantasy;
• Fantasy and the Global Middle Ages;
• Heroism and Monstrosity in Fantasy;
• Medieval Emotions in the Fantasy Genre;
• Medieval Spaces and Places in Fantasy;
• Medievalism, Neomedievalism and Fantasy;
• (Mis)Perceptions of the “Medieval” and the “Middle Ages” in Works of Fantasy;
• Which Middle Ages is it? – Identity in Fantasy.

Submissions, between 4000 and 6000 words in English, must be sent to mfts.journal@gmail.com by February 3, 2025. The authors will be notified by the end of March, 2025.

In addition, you can propose a book or film review. We welcome book and film reviews on current science fiction and fantasy research and PhD dissertations. Reviews should be between 500 to 1,000 words. Longer reviews, e.g. dealing with more than one book, must be agreed upon with the Editorial Board.

Books available for review:

Kotsko, Adam. LATE STAR TREK: The Final Frontier in the Franchise Era. University of Minnesota Press, 2025. ISBN 978-1-5179-1910-8
Lapoujade, David. Worlds Built to Fall Apart: Versions of Philip K. Dick. Trans. by Erik Beranek. University of Minnesota Press, 2024. ISBN 978-1-5179-1461-5.

If you wish to review a title which is not in the list, then please email the Editors directly with your suggestion, as we do consider all requests for recent and forthcoming titles, especially from publishers already listed. If the book or film you wish to review is more than 3 years old, then you would need to demonstrate its significance to its field for it to be considered.

All submissions must follow the journal’s guidelines available here: https://messengersfromthestars.letras.ulisboa.pt/journal/submission-guid....


Last updated January 14, 2025

CFP Robin Hood and Other Social Bandits in Folk and Popular Culture (3/31/2025; IARHS Conference 6/26-27/2025 Hybrid)

Robin Hood and Other Social Bandits in Folk and Popular Culture

HYBRID biannual conference of

the International Association for Robin Hood Studies

26-27 June 2025

The Jagiellonian University, Cracow (Poland)

(and ONLINE)

source: https://robinhoodscholars.blogspot.com/2024/04/biennial-iarhs-conference-cfp.html

The Robin Hood tradition has inalienably been a part of popular culture and some of its elements undoubtedly come from folk culture. Already Robin Hood ballads or rhymes, as they are also called, represented popular culture. The idea of a social bandit or a bandit rebel, understood by Eric Hobsbawm as the one who “challenges the economic, social and political order” (Bandits 7), is related to social justice and injustice, which has always been present in folklore. Not only the medieval and later Robin Hood can be defined as a social bandit, but such outlaws as Janosik and Ondrašek, provincial as they are according to Hobsbawm (Bandits 47), fulfill the criteria for it. The two lived respectively in the Slovakian and Polish mountains in the 18th and 19th centuries and in the legends they opposed both aristocracy and the Hapsburg rule that stood behind this aristocracy. In Australia Ned Kelly has its admirers, who relate him both to the class conflicts of the 19th-century Australia and to the social wrongs that supposedly affect some Australians at present.

Both folk and popular cultures have been open to the concept of social ills that outlaws may oppose, or at least such are the legends about them.



The topics related to this may refer to literary texts, films, graphic novels, and all the other material that represents popular and folk culture. The topics may include, for example:

-outlaws that opposed social injustice: the legend and the historical background

-reworking old myths into those that cater for the current needs

-ideologies behind the idea of social justice in the texts of culture about outlaws

-the concept of the law and justice in outlaw narratives

-popular reworkings of old myths about social bandits

-nationalistic and racist uses of the outlaw myths



All other topics related to this are also welcome.



Please send your 200-word abstract by March 31, 2025 to Dr. Anna Czarnowus at:

annaczarnowus@op.pl.

CFP Medievalism in Theory / Medievalism in Politics (Studies in Medievalism 35; 6/1/2025)

Sharing on behalf of the editor:

CALL FOR PAPERS

STUDIES IN MEDIEVALISM XXXV

MEDIEVALISM IN THEORY

At one time or another, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault, and many other stars of late twentieth- or early twenty-first-century theory built at least a portion of their approach on medieval examples. Indeed, quite a few of those scholars, such as Umberto Eco and Hans Jauss, began their career as students of the Middle Ages. We are therefore invited to ask why medievalism played such a prominent role in these developments. Of all the possible past and/or imaginary milieux on which these approaches could have been built, why the Middle Ages? And to the degree that these scholars have referenced specific aspects of that era, why did they do so? What did those particular references bring to theory and how have they impacted its development? Moreover, how has that development commented on those references and perhaps on the Middle Ages as a whole, not to mention Medieval Studies and Medievalism Studies? How has it informed our understanding of what we study and what we do? Studies in Medievalism, a peer-reviewed print and on-line publication, is seeking not only feature articles of 6,000-12,000 words (including notes) on any postmedieval responses to the Middle Ages, but also 3,000-word essays that respond to one or more of these questions. Applicants are encouraged to give particular examples, but submissions, which should be sent in English and Word to Karl Fugelso at kfugelso@towson.edu by 1 June 2025, should also address the implications of those examples for the discipline as a whole. (Note that priority will be given to papers in the order they are received and submissions that have not been translated into fluent English will not be considered.)

MEDIEVALISM IN POLITICS

Owing to multiple inquiries inspired by current wars and/or forthcoming elections, a new short-essay section has been added to SIM 35. As noted in previous CFPs and their results for SIM 29-31, professional politicians have often invoked the Middle Ages to justify their actions. But they are far from alone, for many of their constituents have also deployed medievalism for political purposes. Indeed, much of medievalism, not to mention the study of it, has revolved around politics of one kind or another. Thus, in addition to 3,000-word essays on medievalism “in theory” and to longer articles of 6,000-12,000 words on any postmedieval responses to the Middle Ages, Studies in Medievalism is seeking 3,000-word essays (including notes) on post-medieval ways the Middle Ages have been referenced for political gain. Applicants are encouraged to give particular examples, but submissions, which should be sent in English and Word to Karl Fugelso at kfugelso@towson.edu by 1 June 2025, should also address the implications of those examples for the discipline as a whole. (Note that priority will be given to papers in the order they are received and submissions that have not been translated into fluent English will not be considered.)

CFP More Perilous and Fair: Women and Gender in Mythopoeic Fantasy (3/31/2025; 8/2-3/2025)

 

OMS 4 - Online MidSummer Seminar 2025

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Online MidSummer Seminar 2025
More Perilous and Fair: Women and Gender in Mythopoeic Fantasy

August 2-3, 2025
Via Zoom and Discord

OMS Overview

OMS 4 Call for Papers

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ONLINE MIDSUMMER SEMINAR 2025
More Perilous and Fair: Women and Gender in Mythopoeic Fantasy
Celebrating the 10th anniversary of the publication of Perilous and Fair: Women in the Works and Life of J.R.R. Tolkien

Co-chairs: Cami Agan, Clare Moore, and Robin Anne Reid

Join us for an online conference that focuses on intersectional feminist approaches to women and gender in fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction, or other mythopoeic work and that will honor the first anthology on women and Tolkien, Perilous and Fair: Women in the Works and Life of J.R.R. Tolkien (2015), edited by Janet Brennan Croft and Leslie A. Donovan.

Intersectionality, or intersectional approaches, developed out of research and scholarship by Black women, highlighting how aspects of identity (such as race, gender, sexual orientation, or class) overlap and intersect. Since then, feminist scholars in a number of disciplines, including literary studies, have adapted intersectionality in their work.

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GUESTS OF HONOR: Janet Brennan Croft and Leslie A. Donovan, co-editors of Perilous and Fair

Janet Brennan Croft is an Associate University Librarian at the University of Northern Iowa. She is the author of the Mythopoeic Award winning War in the Works of J.R.R. Tolkien (Praeger 2004, reissued in paperback 2024), and has written on the Peter Jackson Middle-earth films, the Whedonverse, Orphan Black, J.K. Rowling, Terry Pratchett, Lois McMaster Bujold, The Devil Wears Prada, and other authors, TV shows, and movies. She is editor or co-editor of many collections of literary essays, the most recent being Loremasters and Libraries in Fantasy and Science Fiction, co-edited with Jason Fisher. She has edited the semi-annual refereed scholarly journal Mythlore since 2006, and is archivist and assistant editor of Slayage: The International Journal of Buffy+.

Leslie A. Donovan is Interim Dean and Professor for the Honors College at the University of New Mexico, in Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA. As a faculty member, she teaches varied interdisciplinary humanities courses for undergraduates, among which are six different versions of Tolkien courses. Her Tolkien studies publications include “The Valkyrie Reflex in J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings: Galadriel, Shelob, Éowyn, and Arwen” (republished several times), “Middle-earth Mythology: An Overview” (Blackwell 2022), and four entries for the J.R.R. Tolkien Encyclopedia (Routledge 2006). She edited Approaches to Teaching Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings and Other Works (MLA 2015). In addition, she is the Editor of Mythopoeic Press.

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CALL FOR PAPERS

The CFP deadline is March 31st, 2025.

Download the CFP in PDF format HERE.

The Mythopoeic Society invites paper submissions for an online conference that focuses on intersectional feminist approaches to women and gender in fantasy, science fiction, speculative fiction or other mythopoeic work. While the focus of this seminar is women and gender in mythopoeic works, we encourage proposals that acknowledge and analyze the intersectionality of gender with other aspects of identity, experience, and embodiment, including the non-human. Proposals should engage with developments in women and gender studies that both acknowledge and seek to move beyond the work of Perilous and Fair, drawing on theories and methodologies from recent years.

Aspects of this topic might include but are certainly not limited to any of the following:

• • Intersections of gender, class, race, ethnicity, sexuality, disability, or neurodiversity with female, asexual, agender, or nonbinary characters (mortal or immortal) in:
  • ⬞ Tolkien’s legendarium
  • ⬞ The works by other Inklings
  • ⬞ Works of contemporary mythopoeic fantasy in any medium
  
  
• • How mythopoeic fantasy texts engage with gender and its intersections with markers such as race, class, speciesism, or material culture, whether through character, structure, or other fantasy conventions such as magic/enchantment, Faerie, non-human and animal sentience, and worldbuilding/Sub-Creation in:
  • ⬞ Tolkien’s legendarium
  • ⬞ The works by other Inklings
  • ⬞ Works of contemporary mythopoeic fantasy in any medium

Papers, panels, and roundtables from a variety of critical perspectives and disciplines are welcome. We are interested in ANY form of media — text, graphic novels, comics, television, movies, music and music videos, games — as long as it can be described as fantasy or otherwise mythopoeic. We also welcome papers on the work of either of our Guests of Honor.

Each presentation will receive a 50-minute slot to allow time for questions, but individual presentations should be timed for oral presentation in 40 minutes maximum. Two or three presenters who wish to present short, related papers may also share one 50-minute slot.

Individual proposals (~200 words) with bios (150 words, maximum) should be sent to: oms-chair @ mythcon.org by March 31, 2025.

Group (two or three presenters) proposals should group the individual proposals together to send to: oms-chair @ mythcon.org by March 31, 2025.

Working bibliographies are welcome, but not required.

Participants are encouraged to submit papers chosen for the conference to Mythlore, the refereed journal of the Mythopoeic Society. All papers should conform to the 9th edition of the MLA Style Manual.

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About the co-chairs:

Cami Agan is Distinguished University Professor of English at Oklahoma Christian University, where she teaches British Literature, including a Studies in Tolkien course. Her Tolkien research concentrates on the First Age materials with a particular interest in cultural geography and the elegiac resonances of the lost Beleriand. Her recent publications include articles in Mythlore and Journal of the Fantastic in the Arts, a chapter in Robin Anne Reid’s forthcoming work on race, racisms in Tolkien, and the recently published Cities and Strongholds in Middle-earth (Mythopoeic Press).

Clare Moore is a Ph.D. student at the University of Glasgow. She holds an M.F.A. in Creative Writing and a B.A. in Politics, Philosophy, and Economics. Her research focuses on disability, gender, and race in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien and other fantastic literature and has appeared in Mallorn, Journal of Tolkien Research, and Mythlore. Her essay “‘A Song of Greater Power’: Tolkien’s Construction of Lúthien Tinúviel” won the 2022 Tolkien Society Award for Best Article.

Robin Anne Reid happily retired in 2020 to become an independent scholar. She is editing two anthologies for McFarland: one (co-edited with Christopher Vaccaro and Stephen Yandell) on queer approaches to Tolkien, and the other on race and racisms in Tolkien. She recently curated a collection of responses to a ground-breaking and posthumously published work on racism and The Lord of the Rings by Charles W. Mills (Mythlore #143, 2023). She is the editor for a new McFarland series, Studies in Tolkien, which opens for proposals in 2025. Somewhere in there, she’ll start working on her book about atheist, agnostic, and animist readers of Tolkien.

UPDATE CFP (Re)Animating the Middle Ages: Adapting the Medieval in Animated Media (10/15/2024; NeMLA Philadelphia 3/6-9/2025)

UPDATED DEADLINE

(Re)Animating the Middle Ages: Adapting the Medieval in Animated Media

Co-organizers Michael A. Torregrossa, Karen Casey Casebier, and Carl B. Sell

Sponsored by Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture

Call for Papers - Please Submit Proposals by 15 October 2024

56th Annual Convention of Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)

Philadelphia Marriott Downtown (Philadelphia, PA)

On-site event: 6-9 March 2025

Rationale

Our conception of the Middle Ages is usually formed by the versions of the medieval past we experienced as children, and, because they are considered suitable for young viewers, animated depictions of this world often represent our earliest exposure to the events, personages, and stories of this era. Consequently, the animated creations of the Walt Disney Company have played a huge part in shaping our collective image of the Middle Ages, but the corpus of medieval-themed animation is truly vast. It has been expanded greatly by the output of many other content producers across the globe through anime, cartoons, films, games, streaming videos, and theatrical shorts. (See our list of representative texts–at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP–for examples.)

Despite animation's important role in shaping how we perceive and receive the medieval past, the field of Medieval Animation Studies remains limited, especially compared to the fluorescence of Medieval Film Studies and Medieval Television Studies over the past four decades. In this panel, we seek in particular to build upon the pioneering work of medieval-animation scholar Michael N. Salda and provide additional insights into the ways medieval-themed animation has impacted our contemporary world. Presenters might explore anime, cartoons, films, games, shorts, and videos produced through traditional ink-and-paint, stop-motion, claymation, or computer-generated imagery. Selections should represent and/or engage with some aspect of the medieval, such as artifacts, characters, settings, themes, etc. These might be central to the narrative, tangential, or appearing solely as cameos. (For ideas and support, we have created a list of representative texts and a resource guide devoted to studies of medieval-themed animation. It can be accessed at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP.) 

Submission Instructions

In this panel, we seek in particular to build upon the pioneering work of medieval-animation scholar Michael N. Salda and provide additional insights into the ways medieval-themed animation has impacted our contemporary world. Presenters might explore anime, cartoons, films, games, shorts, and videos produced through traditional ink-and-paint, stop-motion, claymation, or computer-generated imagery. Selections should represent and/or engage with some aspect of the medieval, such as artifacts, characters, settings, themes, etc., presented as central to the narrative, tangential, or appearing solely as cameos.  

For ideas and support, please see our list of representative texts and resource guide devoted to studies of medieval-themed animation at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP. 

All proposals must be submitted into the CFPList system at https://cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/21105 by 15 October 2024. You will be prompted to create an account with NeMLA (if you do not already have one) and, then, to complete sections on Title, Abstract, and Media Needs. 

Notification on the status of your submission will be made by 16 October 2024. If accepted, NeMLA asks you to confirm your participation with the session chairs by accepting their invitations and by registering for the event. The deadline for Registration/Membership is 9 December 2024.

Be advised of the following policies of the Convention: All participants must be members of NeMLA for the year of the conference. Participants may present on up to two sessions of different types (panels/seminars are considered of the same type). Submitters to the CFP site cannot upload the same abstract twice.(See the NeMLA Presenter Policies page, at https://www.nemla.org/convention/policies.html, for further details,)

NeMLA offers limited funding for travel to graduate students and to contingent faculty, adjunct instructors, independent scholars, and two-year college faculty. Details can be found at the NeMLA Travel Awards page at https://www.nemla.org/awards/travel.html.  

Thank you for your interest in our session. Please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at MedievalinPopularCulture@gmail.com. 

For more information on the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture, please visit our website at https://MedievalinPopularCulture.blogspot.com/.  

Sponsored Session Medieval Monsters as Modern Monsters (virtual) (9/15/2024; ICMS Kalamazoo 5/8-10/2025)

 

Medieval Monsters as Modern Monsters: Exploring Continuums of the Monstrous (virtual)

Sponsored by Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture and Monsters & the Monstrous Area of the Northeast Popular Culture Association

Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa


60th International Congress on Medieval Studies

Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo, Michigan)

Hybrid event: Thursday, 8 May, through Saturday, 10 May, 2025

Please Submit Proposals by 15 September 2024

Full CFP at the Popular Prenaturaliana site: https://popularpreternaturaliana.blogspot.com/2024/08/cfp-medieval-monsters-as-modern.html.

CFP NVSA 2025: The Twentieth Century (10/15/2024; Boston 4/4-6/2025)

NVSA 2025: The Twentieth Century – 50th Anniversary Conference

deadline for submissions:
October 15, 2024

full name / name of organization:
Northeast Victorian Studies

contact email:
seckert@wesleyan.edu

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/08/07/nvsa-2025-the-twentieth-century-%E2%80%93-50th-anniversary-conference

The Northeast Victorian Studies Association 2025

50th Anniversary Conference

April 4-6, 2025

Keynote panel with Kristin Mahoney, Nasser Mufti, and John Plotz



View the full call here >> https://nvsa.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/call-for-papers-nvsa-2025-1.pdf



The Northeast Victorian Studies Association seeks proposals on the theme “The Twentieth Century” for its annual conference at Boston University. A product of the twentieth century, NVSA held its first official meeting on “The Victorian Family” at Assumption University in 1975. Fifty years later, we invite you to join us in celebrating an organization that has been a pillar of the field across the decades.



There is a paradox in a Victorianist conference organized around the twentieth century. How did the desires and needs of the twentieth century lead to the invention of our field of study? What got dragged, kicking and screaming, into twentieth century from the nineteenth? We welcome submissions that probe such contradictions and anachronisms: the lingering presence of one era in another, as well as more conceptual approaches to the idea of the literary period as such. Where do scholarly commitments to periodization stand now?



From work in reception history, adaptation studies, intellectual history, and disciplinary history, what versions of the Victorian have been mobilized, returned to, or remade in its wake? What supposedly “Victorian” ideas, concepts, and genres owe their origin to their close descendants? Does the line between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries feel harder or softer than it did for previous generations? And why do so many scholars of the Victorian period extend their interests forward rather than backward in time?



Submissions are also encouraged that consider both the afterlives and immediate adjacencies of the Victorian period. We invite papers that explore specific forms, authors, genres, media, movements, and ideas of modernity that emerge across and between the nineteenth and twentieth centuries: late Victorian realism and genre fiction, aestheticism, fin-de-siècle media (especially film and photography), imperial networks of circulation, and shifts in the conceptualization of national, ecological, aesthetic, colonial and biopolitical categories at the century’s turn.



Our hope is that scholars who have joined us before (in this century or the last) will return by one of two traditional paths: submitting an anonymous abstract for the consideration of the programming committee, or attending simply to enjoy.



Proposals (no more than 300 words) are due by Oct. 15, 2024(email only, in Word format). Submit them to Sierra Eckert, Chair, Program Committee: seckert@wesleyan.edu. Please note: all submissions to NVSA are evaluated anonymously. Successful proposals will stay within the 300-word limit and make a compelling case for the talk and its relation to the conference topic. Please do not send complete papers, and do not include your name on the proposal. Include your name, institution, email address, and proposal title in the body of the email. Papers should be 15 minutes long.



For more information on recommended topics, travel grants, and essay prizes please see: https://nvsa.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/call-for-papers-nvsa-2025-1.pdf



Last updated August 8, 2024

CFP Teaching the Middle Ages at the K-12 Level (10/1/2024; Symposium IMA 11/22/2024)

Teaching the Middle Ages at the K-12 Level

deadline for submissions:
October 1, 2024

full name / name of organization:
Illinois Medieval Association

contact email:
mwgeorge.51@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/08/02/teaching-the-middle-ages-at-the-k-12-level

Deadline for Proposals: October 1
Session: 2:00 pm (Central) November 22, online via Zoom

Medieval topics tend to intrigue elementary, middle-school, and high-school students. In a teaching environment where time is precious, how do teachers approach the Middle Ages? This session seeks papers addressing issues, opportunities, and innovations in the K-12 classroom to inform the larger community of K-12 teachers and post-secondary educators about how the topic is approached at the K-12 level.

Submit full session proposals or paper proposals (no more than 300 words) to mwgeorge.51@gmail.com no later than October 1, 2024.

Last updated August 8, 2024

CFP Teaching the Middle Ages: Issues, Opportunities, and Innovations (9/11/2024; Symposium IMA 10/18/2024)

Teaching the Middle Ages: Issues, Opportunities, and Innovations

deadline for submissions:
September 11, 2024

full name / name of organization:
Illinois Medieval Association

contact email:
mwgeorge.51@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/08/02/teaching-the-middle-ages-issues-opportunities-and-innovations

Deadline for Proposals: September 11
Session: 2:00 pm (Central) October 18

In the last few decades, courses on the Middle Ages and medieval studies programs have been either cut or severely restricted in the United States. In fact, recently a variety of humanities programs have been on the chopping block, forcing and providing an opportunity for specialists in medieval studies to integrate our specialties into other courses. This year’s Illinois Medieval Association Symposium seeks to explore issues incorporating medieval studies into our curricula. We seek papers that deal with problems/solutions, opportunities, and innovations. Single papers (20-minute length) and, especially, full sessions are encouraged.

The 2023-24 IMA Symposium is distributed throughout the academic year, with sessions occurring on specific Fridays beginning at 2:00 pm Central time. All sessions are online via Zoom, and presenters can share their screens.

This session a general session on the topic. Papers and full sessions that don’t fit with the later topics are welcome.

Submit full session proposals or paper proposals (no more than 300 words) to mwgeorge.51@gmail.com no later than September 11, 2024.


Last updated August 8, 2024

CFP Fantasy and the Middle Ages (Special Issue of Messengers from the Stars; 2/2/2025)

Messengers from the Stars: On Science Fiction and Fantasy No. 8, 2025

deadline for submissions:
February 3, 2025

full name / name of organization:
Messengers from the Stars

contact email:
mfts.journal@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/07/22/messengers-from-the-stars-on-science-fiction-and-fantasy-no-8-2025.

Messengers from the Stars is an international, peer-reviewed, open-access journal, offering academic articles, reviews, and providing an outlet for a wide range of creative work inspired by Science fiction and Fantasy. The 2025 issue will be dedicated to the following theme:

‘Getting Medieval’: Fantasy and the Middle Ages

Traditionally distinguished by the presence of supernatural or magical elements, otherworldly settings, epic quests and archetypal characters, Fantasy fiction has been an incredibly popular genre since its inception. Indeed, as highlighted by scholars like John Clute, much of world fiction “has been described, at one time or another, as fantasy” (337). Although Fantasy is sometimes perceived as a form of escapism and at other times as a legitimate fictional realm with its own internal logic, the influence of the Middle Ages has remained a constant element in the construction of Fantasy worlds. From the use of folklore, myths, medieval legends and sagas, different contemporary authors look to the past as a source of inspiration, adapting, transforming and rewriting narratives to not only suit contemporary tastes and ideals but also to mirror present-day anxieties and fears. The works of J. R. R. Tolkien, George R. R. Martin, Robin Hobb, Joe Abercrombie, Marion Zimmer Bradley or Juliet Marillier, among others, are good examples of how the Middle Ages have served to fire the imagination.

Bearing this in mind and acknowledging that Fantasy continues to expand and develop, offering a diverse array of narratives as well as endless possibilities for storytelling and creative exploration, in this number we are especially interested in how Fantasy fiction uses the medieval past to create storylines that resonate with contemporary audiences across geographic, linguistic, cultural and political boundaries. We consider Fantasy in broader terms, including literature, cinema, television, comics/graphic novels, video games, music, etc., and are especially interested in submissions that expand the fields of knowledge and landscapes represented in the journal.

Possible topics may include, but are not limited to:

• Arthuriana in Fantasy;
• Female Agency in Medieval Fantasy;
• Fantasy and the Global Middle Ages;
• Heroism and Monstrosity in Fantasy;
• Medieval Emotions in the Fantasy Genre;
• Medieval Spaces and Places in Fantasy;
• Medievalism, Neomedievalism and Fantasy;
• (Mis)Perceptions of the “Medieval” and the “Middle Ages” in Works of Fantasy;
• Which Middle Ages is it? – Identity in Fantasy.

Submissions, between 4000 and 6000 words in English, must be sent to mfts.journal@gmail.com by February 3, 2025. The authors will be notified by the end of March, 2025.

In addition, you can propose a book or film review. We welcome book and film reviews on current science fiction and fantasy research and PhD dissertations. Reviews should be between 500 to 1,000 words. Longer reviews, e.g. dealing with more than one book, must be agreed upon with the Editorial Board.

Books available for review:Carroll, Jordan S. Speculative Whiteness: Science Fiction and the Alt-Right. University of Minnesota Press, 2024. ISBN 978-1-5179-1708-1.
Lapoujade, David. Worlds Built to Fall Apart: Versions of Philip K. Dick. Trans. by Erik Beranek. University of Minnesota Press, 2024. ISBN 978-1-5179-1461-5.

If you wish to review a title which is not in the list, then please email the Editors directly with your suggestion, as we do consider all requests for recent and forthcoming titles, especially from publishers already listed. If the book or film you wish to review is more than 3 years old, then you would need to demonstrate its significance to its field for it to be considered.

All submissions must follow the journal’s guidelines available here: https://messengersfromthestars.letras.ulisboa.pt/journal/submission-guidelines.


Last updated July 22, 2024

CFP (Re)Animating the Middle Ages: Adapting the Medieval in Animated Media (9/30/2024; NeMLA Philadelphia 3/6-9/2025)

(Re)Animating the Middle Ages: Adapting the Medieval in Animated Media

Co-organizers Michael A. Torregrossa, Karen Casey Casebier, and Carl B. Sell

Sponsored by Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture

Call for Papers - Please Submit Proposals by 30 September 2024

56th Annual Convention of Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)

Philadelphia Marriott Downtown (Philadelphia, PA)

On-site event: 6-9 March 2025

Rationale

Our conception of the Middle Ages is usually formed by the versions of the medieval past we experienced as children, and, because they are considered suitable for young viewers, animated depictions of this world often represent our earliest exposure to the events, personages, and stories of this era. Consequently, the animated creations of the Walt Disney Company have played a huge part in shaping our collective image of the Middle Ages, but the corpus of medieval-themed animation is truly vast. It has been expanded greatly by the output of many other content producers across the globe through anime, cartoons, films, games, streaming videos, and theatrical shorts. (See our list of representative texts–at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP–for examples.)

Despite animation's important role in shaping how we perceive and receive the medieval past, the field of Medieval Animation Studies remains limited, especially compared to the fluorescence of Medieval Film Studies and Medieval Television Studies over the past four decades. In this panel, we seek in particular to build upon the pioneering work of medieval-animation scholar Michael N. Salda and provide additional insights into the ways medieval-themed animation has impacted our contemporary world. Presenters might explore anime, cartoons, films, games, shorts, and videos produced through traditional ink-and-paint, stop-motion, claymation, or computer-generated imagery. Selections should represent and/or engage with some aspect of the medieval, such as artifacts, characters, settings, themes, etc. These might be central to the narrative, tangential, or appearing solely as cameos. (For ideas and support, we have created a list of representative texts and a resource guide devoted to studies of medieval-themed animation. It can be accessed at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP.) 

Submission Instructions

In this panel, we seek in particular to build upon the pioneering work of medieval-animation scholar Michael N. Salda and provide additional insights into the ways medieval-themed animation has impacted our contemporary world. Presenters might explore anime, cartoons, films, games, shorts, and videos produced through traditional ink-and-paint, stop-motion, claymation, or computer-generated imagery. Selections should represent and/or engage with some aspect of the medieval, such as artifacts, characters, settings, themes, etc., presented as central to the narrative, tangential, or appearing solely as cameos.  

For ideas and support, please see our list of representative texts and resource guide devoted to studies of medieval-themed animation at https://tinyurl.com/ReAnimatingtheMiddleAgesCFP. 

All proposals must be submitted into the CFPList system at https://cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/21105 by 30 September 2024. You will be prompted to create an account with NeMLA (if you do not already have one) and, then, to complete sections on Title, Abstract, and Media Needs. 

Notification on the status of your submission will be made by 16 October 2024. If accepted, NeMLA asks you to confirm your participation with the session chairs by accepting their invitations and by registering for the event. The deadline for Registration/Membership is 9 December 2024.

Be advised of the following policies of the Convention: All participants must be members of NeMLA for the year of the conference. Participants may present on up to two sessions of different types (panels/seminars are considered of the same type). Submitters to the CFP site cannot upload the same abstract twice.(See the NeMLA Presenter Policies page, at https://www.nemla.org/convention/policies.html, for further details,)

NeMLA offers limited funding for travel to graduate students and to contingent faculty, adjunct instructors, independent scholars, and two-year college faculty. Details can be found at the NeMLA Travel Awards page at https://www.nemla.org/awards/travel.html.  

Thank you for your interest in our session. Please address questions and/or concerns to the organizers at MedievalinPopularCulture@gmail.com. 

For more information on the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture, please visit our website at https://MedievalinPopularCulture.blogspot.com/.