Category: Call for Papers

CFP: react/review Volume 7

 Call for Papers for Volume 7: “Tending To…”

Deadline: Friday, October 9, 2026

In thinking through the theme of “tending to…” we repeatedly returned to, and wrestled with,  the terms associated with it. “Tend” has two historical origins: one from the Latin tendere “to stretch,” and the other from the Middle English attenden “to attend.” These definitions imply a sense of bodily orientation, a “tending towards” a particular focal point or directionality (Ahmed, 2006). Colloquially, “tending to” is synonymously used with “care,” both emphasizing attention. Yet, how do we choose what to care about or direct our attention to? How then can we consider what it means for ourselves to “tend to…” something? With this issue, we want to put pressure on the perception of care and also invite expansions of our understanding of it through both theory and praxis. To theorize and conceptualize the idea of ‘care’ is to work through a concept that can be easily dismissed, romanticized, or, at worst, not be placed under any pressure to unpack its complexity (Adams, 2014). This understanding of care as lacking depth may also show up in its relationship to tenderness: an action that, on its face, might equate with gentleness, but is itself revolutionary and a deliberate action of survival and collectivity (Lorde, 1984, 2007). But the topic of care and “tending to…” permeates our everyday relationships with one another, on social media, and politically. Through their repetitive use, these terms gain cultural relevance yet have the potential to lose impact and meaning over time.

The editors of react/review––a peer review, open-access digital journal dedicated to research by emerging scholars––seek essays for Volume 7 that consider these themes of “tending to…” and care. We invite submissions that consider how, as scholars and makers, we ‘tend to’ the very materials that constitute our intellectual and, at times, personal lives. With placing pressure upon the very act of ‘tending to…,’ we also want to consider the moments when that act is itself not cast in a positive light. Questions that guide this issue are, but not limited to: What are the limits of care? What are the possibilities of care? What does it mean to tend to/care about? How can care act as a methodology? How do people/institutions/practices choose what to care for/what not to care for? When does care/tending to become weaponized? Whose histories are protected/preserved/erased? What futures are being tended to? What are we continuing to nurture? 

We invite scholarship on any historical period and geographical focus that engages with the volume’s theme. While this journal is situated within the fields of art history, architectural history, museum studies, and visual studies, we welcome submissions from any advanced graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and early career contingent scholars in any field, whose work relates to the journal’s particular theme. 

The journal is currently open to submissions for all categories (see descriptions below). For focus and experimental articles, please submit a manuscript and 150-word bio to the journal’s page on eScholarship using the submit function, located at: https://escholarship.org/uc/reactreview. Please remove any identifying information from manuscripts, as submissions will be evaluated through a double-blind review process. 

Questions can be directed to the journal co-managing editors, Graham Feyl, Karla Mendez, and Kristin Yinger at reactreviewjournal@gmail.com. 

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

  • Affect + Affect Theory, Emotion
  • Curatorial practices and collections 
  • Conservation 
  • Stewardship 
  • Archives + archival work
  • Spaces of care (domestic, healthcare spaces, architecture, placemaking, etc.)
  • Relationships and relationality (friendships, sisterhood, communities, etc.) 
  • Welcoming + hospitality 
  • Networks and root systems 
  • Political and social actions
  • Caregiving (medical, political, emotional, etc)
  • Public + private role of care 
  • Futurity + the future of care 

Article categories available for open submission:

Focus articles: essays that emphasize the theme of the call for papers. 

Experimental articles: experimental articles are open-ended pieces that discuss new research findings, speculate on pressing research questions, or address methodological issues encountered in fieldwork or archival work. They differ from the more formal focus articles in that experimental pieces are more exploratory and flexible in nature. Experimental articles provide space for researchers to share works-in-progress, make connections between research and current events, or reflect on methodologies or the experience of conducting research or fieldwork. This section is also open to interviews or new translations of art and architecture-related texts accompanied by a brief translator note.

Focus and experimental article guidelines:

  • 1500-4000 words (excluding footnotes + bibliography)
  • Focus and experimental: may be accompanied by brief responses from members of the editorial staff in order to create a conversation and make connections across research specialties.

Book/exhibition reviews (750-1,000 words): Reviews on recent exhibitions, public art projects, or publications should touch on the theme of the current issue. To pitch a review, please send a ~150-word pitch and CV to co-managing editors, Graham Feyl, Karla Mendez, and Kristin Yinger, at reactreviewjournal@gmail.com with the subject line REVIEW by Friday, October 9, 2026.

Bibliography

Adams. Rachel. Love, Money, Duty: Stories of Care in Our Times. Columbia University

        Press, 2025. 

Ahmed, Sara. The Cultural Politics of Emotion. Routledge, 2004.

Ahmed, Sara. Queer Phenomenology: Orientations, Objects, Others. Duke University Press, 2006. 

Care Collective. The Care Manifesto: The Politics of Interdependence. Verso, 2020.

Collins, Lisa Gail. Stitching Love and Loss: A Gee’s Bend Quilt. University of Washington Press, 2023.

Evans, Catherine A. “Tender(ness): The Feminist Anthology as Carework.” 

ASAP/Journal, Volume 10, Number 3 (September 2025): 431-452. 

Ferrell, Elizabeth. About the Rose: Creation and Community in Jay DeFeo’s Circle. Yale 

        University Press, 2022.

Fink, Marty. Forget Burial: HIV Kinship, Disability, and Queer/Trans Narratives of Care. 

        Rutgers University Press, 2020. 

German, Vanessa and Deesha Philyaw, eds. TENDER: a literary anthology and book

        of spells: evidence. 1HOOD Media, 2019. 

Gould, Deborah B. Moving Politics: Emotion and ACT Up’s Fight Against AIDS. 

        The University of Chicago Press, 2009. 

Hobart, Hi‘ilei Julia Kawehipuaakahaopulani and Tamara Kneese. “Radical Care: Survival Strategies for Uncertain Times.” Social Text 38, no. 1 (2020): 1-16. 

hooks, bell. Soul Sister: Women, Friendship, and Fulfillment. South End Press, 2007.

Huberman, Anthony. “Take Care.” In Circular Facts, edited by Mai Abu ElDahab, Binna

        Choi, Emily Pethick. Sternberg Press, 2011. 

Lonetree, Amy. “A Heritage of Resilience: Ho-Chunk Family Photographs in the Visual Archive.” The Public Historian, vol. 41, no. 1 (February 2019): 34-50.        

Lorde, Audre. Sister Outsider: Essays and Speeches by Audre Lorde. Crossing Press, 1984, 2007.

Lugones, Maria C. in collaboration with Pat Alake Rosezelle. “Sisterhood and 

Friendship as Feminist Models.” In Feminism and Community, edited by Penny 

A. Weiss and Marilyn Friedman. Temple University Press, 1995. 

Ochoa, María. Creative Collectives: Chicana Painters Working in Community. University of New Mexico Press, 2003.

Sedgwick, Eve Kosofsky. “Paranoid Reading and Reparative Reading, Or, You’re 

        So Paranoid, You Probably Think This Essay Is About You.” In Touching Feeling:

        Affect, Pedagogy, Performativity. Duke University Press, 2003. 

Tepper, Allie. “She Said.” In Las Vegas Ikebana: Maren Hassinger and Senga 

        Nengundi, edited by Allie Tepper. Pacific and the Cooley Gallery, 2024. 

Tobin, Amy. Women Artists Together: Art in the Age of Women’s Liberation. Yale University Press, 2023. 

Tsinhnahjinnie, Hulleah J. “When Is a Photograph Worth a Thousand Words?” In Photography’s Other Histories, edited by Christopher Pinney and Nicolas Peterson, 40–52. Duke University Press, 2003.

Ukeles, Mierle Laderman. “Manifesto for Maintenance Art 1969! Proposal for an exhibition: ‘CARE,’ 1969.” October 1969. https://queensmuseum.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/Ukeles-Manifesto-for-Maintenance-Art-1969.pdf

Vesely-Flad, Rima. The Fire Inside: The Dharma of James Baldwin & Audre Lorde. North Atlantic Press, 2026.

Contact Information

Co-managing editors: Graham Feyl (UC Santa Barbara), Karla Mendez (UC Berkley), and Kristin Yinger (UC Santa Barbara(

Contact Email

reactreviewjournal@gmail.com

URL

https://escholarship.org/uc/reactreview/submissions

CFP: ‘Mickey and Minnie at 100’

To view the full call click here>>

https://www.intellectbooks.com/ijds#call-for-papers

Call for Papers – Special Issue for The International Journal of Disney Studies, which examines the Walt Disney Company, an international media conglomerate that impacts our global culture. This international, peer-reviewed journal draws from a variety of academic and industrial lenses, perspectives, methods and fields, while providing a space for scholars to present new research, review current research and comment on wider Disney commodities.

On 27 October 1954, Walt Disney opened the inaugural episode of Disneyland with this iconic quote: ‘I only hope we never lose sight of one thing: it all started with a mouse’. While the Disney Studio did not begin precisely with Mickey (the Alice Comedies and Oswald the Lucky Rabbit predate him), it was the mouse pair that reflected a crucial starting point for the Disney brand; Mickey and Minnie debuted together in 1928, co-starring in the landmark shorts Steamboat Willie and Plane Crazy and coincided with the arrival of sound and color in films, the rise of comic books in print media, and all manner of merchandising that kept the studio afloat during the worst of the Depression and war years. Together they became the most enduring and widely recognised animated characters in global popular culture.

On the other hand, Mickey Mouse has often been used derisively. For some, the character is safe, dull, even boring – emblematic of Disney playing it safe. Though mischievous in the early shorts (particularly in one his most famous roles as the ‘Sorcerer’s Apprentice’), Mickey’s ascendance as the corporate mascot of the Walt Disney Company (particularly after Walt’s death in 1966) has lent him both an instant recognizability but also a vested interest in keeping his image ‘clean’. Mickey has also been invoked pejoratively in the phrase ‘Mickey Mouse degrees’, demeaning the importance of degrees in fields such as media studies, despite the ongoing importance of the humanities writ large.

This special issue–which will be released in 2028, marking the centenary of Mickey and Minnie Mouse’s official debut–invites scholarly work on Mickey and Minnie Mouse across Disney texts, visual arts, and theme-park environments—canonical or lesser-known, produced by Disney Studios, its subsidiaries, or fans and artists wholly unconnected to the company. Primary sources may include an array of mediums, including comics, television, radio, animation, theme parks, video games and other forms of media. We encourage contributors to critically engage with Mickey and Minnie as cultural icons, commercial phenomena, artistic achievements and symbols of Disney’s evolving brand from interdisciplinary perspectives, including (but not limited to):

  • Historical and archival approaches to their creation, design evolution and early reception;
  • Transnational and transcultural perspectives on the figures of Mickey and Minnie (local adaptations, international reception and non-Western reinterpretations);
  • Gender, race, class and identity (and their intersection) in the representation and merchandising of Mickey and Minnie across decades;
  • Animation techniques, performance and character animation (from rubber-hose to digital eras);
  • Copyright, public domain and the legal and economic life of the characters;
  • Fan cultures, nostalgia, cosplay and participatory practices;
  • Mickey and Minnie as political and ideological symbols (propaganda, diplomacy, consumerism or resistance);
  • The evolution of Mickey and Minnie from role models of romantic courtship to companion-like partnership;
  • Mickey’s and Minnie’s relationship(s) and/or in comparison to other Disney characters;
  • The characters’ role in Disney corporate history and branding strategies;
  • Artistic legacies and appropriations by contemporary artists and designers.

We especially encourage submissions that move beyond canonical US American/Global North perspectives and explore Mickey and Minnie in global, comparative, or marginalised contexts.

Submission Guidelines

Full paper submissions will be expected by 1 May 2027 and should be submitted to the IJDSwebsite’s Pubkit system. When you submit, you will have the opportunity to specify that your piece is for the special issue ‘Mickey and Minnie at 100’. Please note that we are open to accepting Articles (6,000-8,000 words), Fresh Perspectives (1,000-3,000 words) and Reviews (1,000 words). The journal uses Harvard referencing and all images should follow copyright and/or fair use laws (as explained in the journal’s Notes for Contributors),

For queries or to discuss potential topics, please contact:

● Joel Gray – joel.gray@shu.ac.uk

● Dr. Peter Cullen Bryan – petercullenbryan@gmail.com

● Dr. Eva Van de Wiele – Eva.VandeWiele@ugent.be

Contact Information

Joel Gray – joel.gray@shu.ac.uk

Dr. Peter Cullen Bryan – petercullenbryan@gmail.com

Dr. Eva Van de Wiele – Eva.VandeWiele@ugent.be

URL

https://www.intellectbooks.com/ijds#call-for-papers

CFP: Seeking Case Studies

I am currently working on a book related to donor relations and gift-in-kind contributions as it relates to Galleries, Libraries, Archives, and Museums (GLAM). I’m looking for case studies to provide real world examples of what I’m discussing in the book. Case studies should be between 1500-2500 words and can include names of institutions and/or donors or be completely anonymous depending on the situation. I’m currently looking for case studies on the following topics:

  • Difficult donor situations – I’m looking for a successful case and a not successful case with outcomes – Specifically, I’m looking for cases where someone above you has decided that you should take a collection because money is involved. 
  • Gift-in-Kind success stories – you worked with a donor who had their collection appraised and successfully took a tax write-off due to your suggestion to do so (they otherwise were not planning to take a tax write-off).
  • Appraisals – a case study where you worked with a donor to get an appraisal for a collection where the appraisal came in much higher or lower than anticipated and their reaction. Did they donate or not as a result of the appraisal?
  • Sales of collections – your institution sold a collection or part of a collection that was donated. Was there any backlash, why or why not? Was it worth it? Did the sale ultimately benefit you or your work?
  • Conditional gifts or loans – were you involved in negotiating a conditional gift or loan agreement? Was it successful or not? Would you do it again, why or why not?

If you would like to contribute your case study, please fill out this GoogleForm and I will contact you if your case study is chosen.

Thank you in advance for your consideration! 

——————————
Christina Zamon
Assistant University Librarian for Special Collections
East Carolina University
Greenville NC

CFP: Creating, Narrating, Documenting, and Archiving Violence from Exile

Creating, Narrating, Documenting, and Archiving Violence from Exile 

Contemporary forms of violence affecting Southwest Asia (often referred to by the colonial designation “Middle East”), Africa, and Latin America raise fundamental questions about how asymmetrical violence produced by wars, genocides, political massacres, and conflicts linked to the extraction of natural resources can be documented, narrated, and archived (de Swaan, 2016). These situations are frequently characterized by the impossibility, or great difficulty, of accessing research sites, as well as by the destruction, confiscation, or absence of archives and testimonies, whether written, visual, or oral. At the same time, there is an urgent need to narrate, show, interpret, and render these forms of violence intelligible within Western institutional, media, and cultural spaces. This responsibility is often borne by diasporic communities, exiled people, or generations born in exile, who become privileged mediators of these narratives. As they enter these frameworks, such subjects may sometimes find themselves in the position of “bodies out of place” (“space invaders”), having to negotiate their legitimacy within Western institutions that may tend to fetishize or constrain their voices (Puwar, 2004). 

Faced with these constraints, exiled and diasporic communities develop practices of creation, documentation, and archiving from within spaces of exile. Today, these practices increasingly take place through social media, using smartphone images or born-digital archives. Yet these intrinsically volatile materials confront genuine “algorithms of oppression” (Noble, 2018), shaped by the logics of commercial surveillance and the invisible censorship of platforms that tend to erase traces of the violence endured. While these initiatives seek to counter such invisibilization by making exile a space of refuge and of alternative knowledge production, this dynamic nevertheless calls for a crucial conceptual distinction between the subjects who carry it forward. 

As Edward Said points out in Reflections on Exile (2000), whereas the diaspora often takes shape over the long term as a political and transnational collective endowed with a public voice, exile remains a raw, solitary, and incurable rupture linked to the immediate loss of one’s place of origin. Diasporic space must therefore be understood as a complex and heterogeneous cartography (Brah, 2005), traversed by relations of power and generational asymmetries. The emergence of forms of “postmemory” (Hirsch, 2012) among second generations raises profound ethical questions: it is necessary to examine the risk of a certain discursive hegemony or an idealization of narratives by Western diasporic spaces, to the detriment of the voices of recently exiled people or of those who remain within the actual geography of violence. 

In response to these issues, this study day approaches research-creation not as a mere mode of dissemination but, following Erin Manning and Brian Massumi (Thought in the Act, 2018), as a genuine methodology for producing situated forms of knowledge and “thought in the act.” In contexts where the field is confiscated or destroyed, artistic and speculative practices do not simply illustrate history: they actively contribute to bringing it into being by creating new concepts and new ways of documenting the sensible. This study day therefore proposes to examine the methodological, ethical, epistemological, and theoretical dimensions of these practices from the perspective of exile. 

Themes for Reflection 

Theme 1 — Documenting and Archiving Violence from Exile and Diasporas 
● How is it possible to produce, from exile or within diasporas, shareable forms of knowledge that are sensitive and capable of documenting ongoing violence? 
● To what extent do these practices of inquiry, creation, and documentation contribute to writing a history of the present from exile? 
● What tools, methods, and research-creation frameworks make it possible to document and archive violence through sensitive forms, particularly in the face of the volatility of digital archives? 
● What ethical and epistemological questions, linked to situated thinking in Donna Haraway’s sense (Situated Knowledges, 1988), emerge when research or creation is carried out from exile? What tensions or asymmetries of visibility arise between the direct biographical memory of exiled people and the “postmemory” of generations born in the diaspora? How can Western institutional structures be prevented from appropriating the voices of those working on the ground? 
  
Theme 2 — Creating and Narrating from Exile 
● How are deterritorialized experiences and memories of violence, shaped by exile, constructed and transmitted through artistic practices and research? 
● To what extent do artistic practices developed from within spaces of exile and diaspora displace, decolonize, or renew perspectives on contemporary forms of violence? 
● What relationships do creative works produced from exile or within diasporas maintain with situated narratives of violence? How do creative practices and forms of knowledge production emerging from these spaces interact, nourish one another, and contribute to narrating lived experiences and memories? 
● What connections can be established between creative works and knowledge production devoted to the colonial pasts of these three regions and the contemporary forms of violence that affect them? 

These avenues for reflection are not intended to be exhaustive, but rather to open up dialogue. We welcome original proposals exploring other questions related to the themes of this study day. 

Profiles and Disciplines Sought 

We welcome proposals from artists (visual arts, live arts, music, literature, etc.) whose work privileges investigative or research-creation approaches, as well as from researchers in the humanities and social sciences who work with artists or draw on practices from the field of art. We also encourage proposals from art historians, exhibition curators, anthropologists, sociologists, and other researchers analyzing artistic productions in relation to contemporary forms of violence in the three regions concerned. Proposals from master’s and doctoral students are warmly welcomed. 

Proposals situated within cultural and visual studies, memory studies, studies of mass violence, decolonial and postcolonial approaches, as well as any other theoretical perspective resonating with the issues addressed by this study day, are welcome. 
The proposed formats are deliberately hybrid and may take the form of an academic presentation, a performative lecture, a workshop (particularly one devoted to sharing tools or methodologies), an urban walk, or a research-creation project presentation. 

Timeline 

● Call for papers issued: September 1, 2026 
● Submission deadline: November 15, 2026, at midnight (Montreal time) 
● Notification of decisions: no later than December 15, 2026 
● Study day: February 23, 2027, in Montreal (UQAM) 

Submission Guidelines 

Proposals must include: 
● A title; 
● An abstract of no more than 300 words; 
● Three to five keywords; 
● A short biography of no more than 150 words. 

Proposals must be sent by November 15, 2026, to the following address: labard.axe1@gmail.com. Please indicate in your proposal the format envisaged for presenting your work.Artists working in visual and media arts, live arts, or music may, where relevant, include up to three images, a video link, or an audio link in addition to their proposal. 
Proposals may be submitted in French or English. The study day will be bilingual and will take place in a hybrid format (in person and online). 

A selection of contributions will be published in a peer-reviewed edited volume. Unfortunately, travel, transportation, and accommodation expenses cannot be covered. Lunch and coffee breaks will be provided to participants. 

Scientific Direction and Organization 

● Scientific direction: Professor Bahar Majdzadeh, as part of the 2027 exhibition-conference 
entitled “Know-How and Being: Strategies and Practices of Decolonial Research-Creation,” 
within the Decolonial Art and Research Laboratory (LabARD). 

● Organization: Clara Tabra Osorio and Ivette Doizi Cofre 

Selected Bibliography 

● BRAH, Avtar (2005). Cartographies of Diaspora: Contesting Identities. London, Routledge. 
● DE SWAAN, Abram (2015). The Killing Compartments: The Mentality of Mass Murder. New Haven: Yale University Press. 
● FIGUEROA-VÁSQUEZ, Yomaira C. (2020). Decolonizing Diasporas: Radical Mappings of Afro-Atlantic Literature. Chicago, Northwestern University Press. 
● HARAWAY, Donna (1988). “Situated Knowledges: The Science Question in Feminism and the  Privilege of Partial Perspective,” Feminist Studies, vol. 14, no. 3, pp. 575–599. 
● HIRSCH, Marianne (2012). The Generation of Postmemory: Writing and Visual Culture After  the Holocaust. New York, Columbia University Press. 
● MANNING, Erin and MASSUMI, Brian (2014). Thought in the Act: Passages in the Ecology of Experience. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. 
● PUWAR, Nirmal (2004). Space Invaders: Race, Gender and Bodies Out of Place. New York, Berg. 
● SAID, Edward W. (2000). Reflections on Exile and Other Essays. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. 
● SPIVAK, Gayatri Chakravorty (1988). “Can the Subaltern Speak?” In Cary Nelson and Lawrence Grossberg (eds.), Marxism and the Interpretation of Culture. Urbana: University of Illinois Press, pp. 271–313. 
● NOBLE, Safiya Umoja (2018). Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce 
Racism. New York, New York University Press.

Contact Information

LabARD

Contact Email

labard.axe1@gmail.com

URL

https://labard.uqam.ca

CFP: SHARP News Features

The SHARP News Features section is currently seeking proposals for written pieces in an array of categories that take a wide and creative approach to topics in book history, book studies, print culture, authorship and publishing studies, and media studies. These pieces can include articles, interviews, and reviews of games, books, or video media relating to the above topics.

Please submit your proposal via this Google form, or by emailing the Features editor Allie Alvis at news-features@sharpweb.org.

For more information about the Features section and submitting a proposal, check out this handy dandy PDF.

CFP: Nontheatrical Student Essay Award

In collaboration with AMIA (Association of Moving Image Archivists) and its journal, The Moving Image, the SCMS Nontheatrical Film and Media SIG is delighted to announce its fifth annual Nontheatrical Student Essay Award

Designed to recognize outstanding graduate student scholarship founded upon archival nontheatrical research, this award underscores both organizations’ commitment to mentorship and professional development, connecting award-recipients with mentors to guide them through the process of crafting journal-ready manuscripts. The award-winning essay will also be published (subject to revisions) in The Moving Image.

Our fourth award went to John Adrianfer Atienza (University of the Philippines Diliman), for his paper ‘Filipino Balik-titig and the American Liberator Narrative in United News Newsreels.’ Keep your eyes peeled for its publication in The Moving Image! In 2025, we also introduced an Honorable Mention. This time it was received by Will Hair (University of Chicago) for his paper ‘Local Haunts: Uncovering Blackness in the H. Lee Waters Film Collection.’

Eligibility

Applicants must be enrolled in a recognized graduate program at the time of entry.

Submission Criteria

  • Audience: essays should be broadly relevant to both media archivists and media scholars.
  • The winning scholarly essay will demonstrate original and critical analysis, clarity of argument and exposition, and engagement with varied source materials related to the study of nontheatrical media (e.g. science film, educational film, home movies, government films, etc.)
  • Students may submit their own paper, or they may be nominated by an advisor or professor with the author’s consent. In either case, the submitter should provide a short author’s CV.
  • Papers shall be submitted in English and may not have been published in part or in whole by the time of submission. The manuscript should be 4000-6000 words in length (double spaced, Times New Roman, 12 pt, with 1-inch margins, using the Chicago Manual of Style, 17th edition), including footnotes/endnotes but excluding bibliography.
  • Before the first-place essay is published in The Moving Image, its author will work with a faculty mentor and The Moving Image editors to revise the essay for publication, in keeping with the developmental editing procedures of the journal.
  • Submissions will be evaluated by the governing body of the Nontheatrical Film and Media SIG and editors from The Moving Image.

Submissions will be due 15 February 2027 and can be sent to nontheatricalessayaward@gmail.com. The award winner will be contacted in March 2027, and announced at the 2027 SCMS Annual Conference.

Download the Call for Submissions here.

CFP: Restorative Justice in Heritage Studies and Archaeology book series

Restorative justice in heritage and archaeology embraces initiatives for reconciliation of past societal transgressions using processes that are multivocal, dialogic, historically informed, community based, negotiated, and transformative. This series presents works that promote the active and often unconventional ways that archaeologists, historians, and heritage scholars are contributing to a process of remaking. Our authors work to define and illuminate the best practices for restorative justice in these fields and to identify how practitioners and their collaborators are working to redress, reconcile, and remake contemporary society.

Series Editors: Nedra K. Lee, PhD, Department of Anthropology, University of Massachusetts; Richard Paul Benjamin, PhD, University of Liverpool; and Christopher Fennell, PhD, Department of Anthropology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

Learn More: We welcome proposals for single-authored, co-authored, and edited volumes. Interested in proposing a book for this series? Contact one of us: Nedra.Lee@umb.edu, Richard.Benjamin@liverpool.ac.uk, cfennell@illinois.edu. General guidelines for authors are available from Routledge Press (Taylor & Francis). Routledge offers flexible approaches to publishing in print, ebook, and open-access formats.

We have multiple volumes published and in process, including —

“Grappling with Monuments of Oppression: Moving from Analysis to Activism”

“Combating Oppression with New Commemorations”  

“Monuments, Statues, and Commemorations of Women”

“Landscapes of Care: Heart-Centered Practice in Historical Archaeology”

Join our initiative! You can follow these projects through our website, and on social media.

http://faculty.las.illinois.edu/cfennell/RestorativeJusticeInHeritageStudies&ArchaeologyBookSeriesOverview.htm

https://www.routledge.com/Restorative-Justice-in-Heritage-Studies-and-Archaeology/book-series/RJHSA

Kind regards,
Chris Fennell

Contact Information

Christopher Fennell

University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

Contact Email

cfennell@illinois.edu

CfP for INTERFACE Issue 31: Rethinking Materiality in an Age of Digital Presence

Call for Papers for Issue 31 (December 2026)

Submission Deadline: October 31, 2026

Guest Editors:

Paweł Piszczatowski  (University of Warsaw)

Helga Müllneritsch (National Taiwan University)

Rethinking Materiality in an Age of Digital Presence

 “If matter itself is lively, then not only is the difference between subjects and objects minimized, but the status of the shared materiality of all things is elevated. All bodies become more than mere objects, as the thing-powers of resistance and protean agency are brought into sharper relief” (Bennett, Vibrant Matter, 2010, p. 13).

Over the past two decades, the concept of materiality has undergone a profound transformation across the humanities. Approaches such as New Materialism, Posthumanism, and Object-Oriented Ontology have challenged anthropocentric models of thought by emphasizing the vitality, agency, and relationality of both living and non-living matter. Rather than treating objects as passive entities defined solely by human perception and use, these perspectives foreground the active role of material forms in shaping human experience, cultural practices, and historical processes.

Yet questions surrounding materiality are far from new. Throughout history, philosophers, artists, writers, and cultural thinkers have explored the relationship between human beings and the material world. In the late eighteenth century, for instance, the German philosopher Johann Gottfried Herder argued that “sight reveals merely shapes, but touch alone reveals bodies” (Herder, Sculpture, 2002, p. 35), emphasizing tactility and embodiment as fundamental conditions of human experience. His reflections acquire renewed significance in the present moment, when increasing aspects of social interaction, creativity, labour, and intimacy are mediated through digital technologies.

The emergence of artificial intelligence, virtual environments, and digitally mediated relationships raises new questions about the status of the material in contemporary life. While digital technologies may appear to distance human experience from physical presence, they remain deeply embedded in material infrastructures, embodied practices, and affective relations. The rise of AI companions, virtual therapists, and synthetic forms of intimacy challenges established distinctions between human and non-human, physical and virtual, object and subject.

This special issue seeks to explore how materiality has been imagined, experienced, represented, and transformed across different historical periods and cultural contexts. Rather than understanding the digital age as a departure from material existence, we invite contributions that examine how new technologies, philosophical developments, artistic practices, and social transformations reshape our understanding of matter itself. How have concepts of materiality evolved across time? How do objects acquire meaning through their movement, preservation, and transformation? How might digital and technological developments alter, rather than diminish, our relationship with embodied existence?

We welcome interdisciplinary contributions from literary studies, history, philosophy, cultural studies, media studies, anthropology, art history, and related fields. Submissions may address any historical period or theoretical approach within literary and cultural contexts.

Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

Literary, Historical, and Philosophical Foundations

  • Philosophical approaches to being, matter, embodiment, and the material world
  • Historical transformations of concepts of materiality across cultures
  • The global circulation and intercultural adaptation of material concepts and practices
  • Handwriting as a form of embodied expression and the material trace of the self
  • Drawing, sketching, and visual practices as material expressions of thought
  • Material objects and their meanings across time and space
  • Objects as carriers of memory, emotion, and historical experience
  • Matter as palimpsest: accumulated layers of personal and collective histories

 Material Practices, Technology, and Intimacy

  • The movement of material practices across cultures and historical periods
  • Traditional Chinese Medicine in Europe and the transnational circulation of healing practices
  • Material and spiritual connections in practices such as ancestor worship
  • Bodies, prosthetics, and technological extensions
  • Understanding of materiality as a property of discrete objects or emerging through dynamic networks of human, non-human, and technological relations
  • Ethical questions surrounding AI-human interaction
  • Artificial intelligence, emotional attachment, and new forms of intimacy
  • Reshaping of our understanding of embodiment, relationality, and presence through digital objects, virtual environments, and algorithmic systems

 Cultural Representations and Imaginaries

  • Literary representations of artificial consciousness and synthetic emotions
  • Cinematic portrayals of human-machine relationships
  • Science fiction and speculative explorations of synthetic life
  • Representations of human and non-human agency
  • The role of objects and technologies in shaping identity and memory
  • Artistic engagements with virtuality, embodiment, and material presence

INTERFACE also invites papers not related to the Special Topic which will be published in a dedicated General Topic Section.

Papers should be submitted online at http://interface.org.tw/ no later than October 31, 2026; and should include an abstract of no more than 250 words.

All potential authors should consult our website for Author Guidelines (http://interface.org.tw/index.php/if/about/submissions#onlineSubmissions)

Contact Information

Paweł Piszczatowski  (University of Warsaw)

Helga Müllneritsch (National Taiwan University)

Contact Email

hmuellneritsch@ntu.edu.tw

URL

https://interface.org.tw/index.php/if/pages/view/CallforPapers31

CFP: Journal of New Librarianship

The Journal of New Librarianship is celebrating its 10th anniversary in the Spring 2027 issue. We invite submissions where authors reflect upon the last decade of librarianship and critically examine the changes, trends, and challenges of the past and the excitement, innovation, or concerns for the future. We are accepting submissions for Peer-Reviewed Articles, New Generation of Librarianship Column, Innovations in Librarianship Column, and Op-Eds or Essays. Authors who submit for Peer-Review, Op-Eds, and Essays may be asked to review other authors’ submissions, but is not required for submission. 

  • Peer-Reviewed articles: Although longer works may be considered, 3,000–6,000-word manuscripts are most suitable.
  • Columns, Op-Eds, and Essays: 1,500–3,000 words.
    • New Generation of Librarianship Column (1,500 words)
      • This column examines the issues faced by the new generation of librarians, across all fields of librarianship. “New generation” is broadly conceived to include any person who is new to the field, regardless of age, background, etc. Topics could include, but are not limited to: efforts advancing accessibility, equity, diversity, and inclusion; experiences of marginalized librarians; critical librarianship; international experiences and perspectives; succession planning, hiring, and retention; experiences and impact of early- and second-career librarians who have recently joined the profession. For potential inclusion in the Spring 2027 anniversary series, please consider these themes within the context of the CFP prompt above.
    • Innovations in Librarianship Column (1,500 words)
      • This column seeks authors who wish to share the details of how they have realized these innovations, defined as an “idea, practice, or object that is perceived as new by an individual or other unit of adoption” within their own praxis.For potential inclusion in the Spring 2027 anniversary series, please consider these themes within the context of the CFP prompt above.

JoNL is a free, open-access journal committed to equity, diversity, and plurality of opinions. In addition to making scholarship freely accessible to all readers, the journal publishes works created by authors from all backgrounds, drawn from all types of libraries and information centers. A central aim of the journal is to challenge long-held assumptions within the library and information science (LIS) field. To this end, authors are encouraged to submit works that meaningfully interrogate structures and practices to engender and advance a sense of equity, fairness, and justice within librarianship.

New librarianship commands a call to action and the JoNL provides an outlet that mixes both traditional and emerging forms of scholarly and professional communications that forge innovative paths shared and led by the LIS profession. Our goal is to provide a publishing venue for innovative and interdisciplinary scholarship that extends beyond the narrow scope of existing LIS journals.

JoNL uses an electronic submission and reviews process through OJS. See our website for additional information about the Review Process and our AI Policy. Submissions must be submitted using the preformatted JoNL Manuscript Template.

Key Dates:

Submission Deadline: October 1, 2026

Notification of Acceptance for Peer Review: October 18, 2026

Return of Peer Review manuscripts: November 23, 2026

Submission deadline for revisions: December 13, 2026

Publication: Spring 2027 

Contact:

Claire DL. Dunker, Communications Editor, newlibsjournal@gmail.com

CFP: TRANSPOSITIONES, Vol. 6, No. 2 (2027) Call for Papers: Earth / Sediment / Trace: Geologies, Material Memories, and the More-than-Living World

TRANSPOSITIONES

Journal for Transdisciplinary and Intermedial Culture Studies /
Zeitschrift für transdisziplinäre und intermediale Kulturforschung
ISSN 2749-4128 (print), 2749-4136 (online)

Vol. 6, No. 2 (2027)

Call for Papers

Thematic focus of the issue:

Earth / Sediment / Trace: Geologies, Material Memories, and the More-than-Living World

Across the environmental humanities, increasing attention has been devoted to the geological dimensions of culture and the cultural dimensions of the Earth. Geohumanities, critical mineral studies, energy humanities, environmental justice scholarship, and related fields have opened new perspectives on extraction, sedimentation, toxicity, waste, material memory, and deep time. At a moment marked by accelerating ecological transformations and growing awareness of the material infrastructures that sustain contemporary life, geological matter has emerged as a crucial site for rethinking history, memory, environment, and cultural imagination. Rather than treating the Earth as a passive backdrop to human activity, recent scholarship has approached rocks, minerals, soils, fossils, sediments, and other material formations as archives of planetary processes, environmental change, cultural memory, and political conflict. Questions of resource extraction, environmental justice, and slow violence increasingly intersect with inquiries into deep temporalities, material traces, sacred landscapes, and the long afterlives of human and more-than-human actions.

This issue invites contributions that explore how literature, art, media, philosophy, religion, and cultural practices engage with geological matter, deep time, sedimented histories, and the material conditions of planetary life. We especially welcome work that investigates the cultural significance of rocks, minerals, fossils, soil, waste, ruins, and other forms of more-than-living matter, while also addressing questions of environmental justice, resource extraction, toxicity, and slow violence. We welcome analyses of literary, philosophical, historical, and cultural texts from a wide range of regions and traditions, including comparative and transnational perspectives. Topics may include:

• geohumanities and geological imagination;

• earth, stone, sediment, dust, and soil;

• lithic ecologies and critical mineral studies;

• deep time, planetary temporalities, and environmental history;

• extractivism, mining, resource conflicts, and energy humanities;

• environmental justice and slow violence;

• toxic landscapes and contaminated environments;

• waste, ruins, landfills, and material afterlives;

• fossils, paleontology, and material histories of life;

• material memory, archives, traces, and sedimented histories;

• sacred geographies, holy mountains, stones, and pilgrimage landscapes;

• archaeology, antiquarianism, and the materialities of the past;

• textual strata, sedimented knowledge, and epistemic layers;

• geological trauma, memory, and post-catastrophic landscapes;

• petrofiction, climate fiction, and environmental storytelling;

• artistic and literary engagements with earth materials;

• relations between living and non-living matter;

• fungi, decomposition, and processes of material transformation;

• posthumanist, new materialist, and decolonial approaches to geology and the earth.

Proposals comprising a 250-word abstract in English or German and a brief biographical note should be sent to: transpositiones@uw.edu.pl by October 20, 2026.

A final decision regarding abstract acceptance will be made by October 31.

Deadline for submitting completed manuscripts: February 28, 2027.

The issue is expected to be published in the autumn of 2027.