New Perspectives on Creature Features (additional chapters)
deadline for submissions:
September 30, 2026
full name / name of organization:
Fernando Gabriel Pagnoni Berns
contact email:
monstersfilms@yahoo.com
source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2026/07/24/new-perspectives-on-creature-features-additional-chapters
New Perspectives on Creature Features (additional chapters)
Edited by
Fernando Gabriel Pagnoni Berns (Universidad de Buenos Aires)
Once dismissed as lowbrow entertainment, creature features have proven to be one of horror cinema's most enduring and adaptable traditions. From giant insects, sharks, spiders, snakes, crocodiles, parasites, cryptids, and mythological beasts to genetically engineered organisms and hybrid creatures, non-human beings have long embodied cultural anxieties surrounding nature, science, technology, colonialism, environmental collapse, and the limits of the human. Recent scholarship in eco-horror, Animal Studies, Monster Theory, Environmental Humanities, Posthumanism, and the Blue Humanities has further demonstrated the richness of creature cinema as a subject of critical inquiry.
This edited collection, currently under contract and well underway for Peter Lang's New Perspectives series (edited by Simon Bacon), seeks additional chapters to complete the volume. We are particularly interested in essays examining creature-centred horror films from any period, country, or production context—from Hollywood blockbusters to regional, independent, exploitation, and cult cinema.
For the purposes of this collection, “creature feature” is understood in its broadest sense. We welcome studies of films featuring monstrous or threatening non-human creatures of any size, whether natural, supernatural, mythical, extraterrestrial, or artificially created. Our particular interest lies in horror films centred on dangerous animals, insects, reptiles, aquatic creatures, cryptids, folkloric beings, and other non-human entities. Creature features are not simply monster movies. They are films that imagine encounters between humans and threatening non-human beings, revealing changing anxieties about nature, ecology, technology, evolution, and the boundaries of the human.
Because the volume is already substantially developed, we are no longer accepting proposals on the Jurassic Park/Jurassic World franchise or kaiju cinema, as these topics are already well represented.
Contributions may examine films from any historical period, provided they offer original critical perspectives and engage with contemporary theoretical approaches. Comparative, transnational, interdisciplinary, and global perspectives are especially encouraged.
The collection welcomes proposals on topics including, but not limited to:
- Creature features and eco-horror
- Environmental crisis and the Anthropocene
- Animal Studies and non-human agency
- Posthumanism and the limits of the human
- Monsters and biodiversity
- Creature cinema and climate anxiety
- Sharks, crocodiles, snakes, spiders, insects, and other animal horrors
- Aquatic horror and the Blue Humanities
- Cryptids and folkloric creatures
- Mythological beings in horror cinema
- Parasites, mutations, and biological contagion
- Hybrid and genetically engineered creatures
- Alien life forms
- Folk horror and non-human beings
- Exploitation and B-movie creature features
- Cult and trash creature cinema
- Horror-comedy and creature features
- Creature franchises and remakes
- Global creature cinema
- Latin American, African, Asian, and Oceanian creature features
- Gender, race, colonialism, and creaturehood
- Queer readings of creature films
- Children, adolescence, and creature narratives
- Streaming-era creature horror
- Understudied creature films and forgotten national traditions
We are also open to proposals addressing other topics relevant to creature features.
Please submit a 300–500-word abstract together with a short biographical note (including current position, institutional affiliation, and contact details) in a single Word document to Fernando Gabriel Pagnoni Berns at monstersfilms@yahoo.com.
Deadline for abstracts: 30 September 2026.
Authors whose proposals are accepted will be expected to submit their completed chapters within three months of acceptance. Contributors should note that chapters are intentionally concise, approximately 3,000–3,500 words, in keeping with the format of Peter Lang's New Perspectives series.
Please circulate this call among colleagues who may be interested.
Acceptance of an abstract does not guarantee acceptance of the completed chapter.
