Slayage 11 Announcement

The Association for the Study of Buffy+ has recently announced the dates for its upcoming conference, Slayage 11. Look to their official conference website for details at http://www.buffystudies.org/conference.html.

 

Dates Announced for NecronomiCon Providence 2026

The Lovecraft Arts & Sciences Council has recently announced the dates for the 2026 NecronomiCon Providence event. 

Further details and updates at https://necronomicon-providence.com/.

DC's Batman: The Doom that Came to Gotham

 Coming soon to home video based on the graphic novel series by Mike Mignola:

Universal's Renfield

 Coming soon to theaters--a new take on Bram Stoker's Dracula from Universal Pictures. 

Vampfest 2022 Updates

The schedules for both the Virtual Vampire Academic Conference (held online this week, 15-17 June 2022) and the International Vampire Film and Arts Festival (held in hybrid format next week, 22-24 June 2022, from Cardiff) have been set and can be accessed from the main Vampfest page at https://ivfaf.com/. 

Registration information can also be found an the event site. 

First Notice: NEPCA 2022 Virtual Conference CFP (8/1/2022; remote 10/20-22/2022)

NEPCA 2022 Virtual Conference CFP

Source: http://nepca.blog/2022/04/06/nepca-2022-virtual-conference-cfp/


The 2022 Northeast Popular Culture Association (NEPCA) will host its annual conference this fall as another virtual conference from Thursday, October 20-Saturday, October 22 in a similar structure to last year (Thursday evening, Friday late afternoon, Saturday morning).

We all want to be back together again face-to-face but without a campus to host us, we decided virtual would be ideal for access and affordability. We are looking forward to another engaging and rewarding conference for new and seasoned members alike. We are seeking proposals for panels and presentations for this year’s conference.

NEPCA prides itself on holding conferences that emphasize sharing ideas in a non-competitive and supportive environment. We welcome proposals from graduate students, junior faculty, and senior scholars. NEPCA conferences offer intimate and nurturing sessions in which new ideas and works-in-progress can be aired, as well as completed projects.

We have several dozen areas for you to submit your proposal to, so be sure to check out our Conference Areas to determine the best place for your proposal. If you have questions about a particular area, reach out and ask the appropriate Area Chair.

The call will be open until August 1, 2022. You can submit your proposal at this link, which will ask the following questions about your proposal:

• Proposal Type (Single Presentation or Panel)
• Subject Area
• Working Title
• Academic Affiliation (if any)
• Abstract (250 words)
• Short bio (50-200 words)

If you have any questions about the conference, please reach out to Lance Eaton, the Executive Secretary (northeastpopculture@gmail.com). 

NEPCA 2022 Advance Notice

The latest from NEPCA:

The 2022 Northeast Popular Culture Association (NEPCA) will host its annual conference this fall as another virtual conference from Thursday, October 20-Saturday, October 22. We will be announcing the CFP in early April.

We are looking forward to another engaging and rewarding conference for new and seasoned members alike. We are seeking proposals for panels and presentations for this year’s conference.

NEPCA prides itself on holding conferences that emphasize sharing ideas in a non-competitive and supportive environment. We welcome proposals from graduate students, junior faculty, and senior scholars. NEPCA conferences offer intimate and nurturing sessions in which new ideas and works-in-progress can be aired, as well as completed projects.

RIP Billie Hayes

Many performers have helped solidify the idea of the wicked witch in popular culture. Most might think of Margaret Hamilton from the Wizard of Oz or the Evil Queen from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, but others have also made an impact on the world.

One of these was Billie Hayes who passed away this week. (See her obituary from Variety.)

She was, perhaps, best known for her role as Witchiepoo in the Sid and Marty Krofft show H. R. Puffnstuff, entertaining generations of fans with her comic antics.

But Hayes also portrayed other witches over the years, including one on an episode of Bewitched. 

Buffy+

Following the recent/ongoing controversy over Josh Whedon, there's an inspiring post on the Facebook of the Whedon Studies Association regarding their evolution as a group and of their rebranded mission and journal, now to be titled Slayage: The International Journal of Buffy+. 

I'll update links to their sites as soon as the name changes are effective,

NecronimiCon Providence 2021 Updates

I just discovered some updates today on the NecronomiCon Providence event scheduled for August 2021.

At present, the convention is still scheduled as a face-to-face event, owing to its contract with the venue hotel, but it is possible that the convention will be postponed to 2022.

In related news, the academic track of NecronomiCon has been cancelled for 2021 due to travel restrictions.

Updated Thursday, 4 March 2020.

 

Review of Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones

The local news magazine The Smithfield Times recently included a review of the Lovecraft-inspired game Stygian: Reign of the Old Ones. The review by columnist Ron Scopolleti can be accessed at http://smithfieldtimesri.net/2018/03/game-preview-stygian-reign-of-the-old-ones/.

The official site for the game is http://www.stygianthegame.com/.

Gothic Nature: New Journal Launch/CFP

 A head's up from the IAFA news site:

NEW JOURNAL: Gothic Nature: New Directions in Eco-horror and the EcoGothic
https://www.fantastic-arts.org/2017/cfp-new-journal-gothic-nature-new-directions-in-eco-horror-and-the-ecogothic/

deadline for submissions:
April 15, 2018

full name / name of organization:
Gothic Nature: New Directions in Eco-horror and the EcoGothic

contact email:
gothicnaturejournal@gmail.com

We are seeking submissions for our new Gothic Nature journal, due out in 2018.

Further to the success of the November 2017 conference Gothic Nature: New Directions in Eco-horror and the EcoGothic, we will be producing a peer-reviewed journal devoted to the same themes.

The editorial board so far includes Dr Elizabeth Parker, Emily Bourke, Professor Simon C. Estok, Professor Andrew Smith, Professor Dawn Keetley, Professor Matthew Wynn Sivils, and Dr Stacy Alaimo. The inaugural issue will also feature an opening essay on eco-horror and the ecoGothic from Dr Tom J. Hillard.



‘Horror is becoming the environmental norm.’ —Sara L. Crosby

Gothic and horror fictions have long functioned as vivid reflections of contemporary cultural fears. Wood argues that horror is ‘the struggle for recognition of all that our society represses or oppresses’, and Newman puts forward the idea that it ‘actively eliminates and exorcises our fears by allowing them to be relegated to the imaginary realm of fiction’. Now, more than ever, the environment has become a locus of those fears for many people, and this conference seeks to investigate the wide range of Gothic- and horror-inflected texts that tackle the darker side of nature.

As we inch ever closer toward an anthropogenic ecological crisis, this type of fiction demands our attention. In 2009, Simon C. Estok highlighted the importance of ‘ecophobia’ in representations of nature, emphasising the need for ecocriticism to acknowledge the ‘irrational and groundless hatred of the natural world’ present in contemporary society. Tom J. Hillard responded to Estok’s call ‘to talk about how fear of the natural world is a definable and recognizable discourse’, suggesting that ‘we need look no further than the rich and varied vein of critical approaches used to investigate fear in literature.’ What happens, he asks, ‘when we bring the critical tools associated with Gothic fiction to bear on writing about nature?’

Gothic Nature seeks to address this question, interrogating the place of non-human nature in horror and the Gothic today, and showcasing the most exciting and innovative research currently being conducted in the field. We are especially interested for our inaugural issue in articles which address ecocritical theory and endeavour to define and discern the distinctions between ‘eco-horror’ and ‘ecoGothic’. We welcome academic articles from a variety of different subject backgrounds, as well as interdisciplinary work.

Subjects may include, but are by no means limited to:

1. Eco-horror and the ecoGothic: theory and distinctions

2. Ecocriticism and horror literature/ media

3. Ecocriticism and Gothic literature/ media

4. Gothic nature/ecophobia

5. Global eco-horror/global ecoGothic

6. Environmental activism and horror/ the Gothic

7. Human nature vs. nonhuman nature

8. Rural Gothic

9. Landscapes of fear

10. Legends of haunted nature/Gothic nature and mythology

11. Monsters in nature/natural spectres

12. Climate change and Gothic nature

13. Environmental apocalypse

14. Animal horror

15. Gothic nature in art through the ages

If you are interested in submitting a piece for our inaugural issue, please send an article of 6-8,000 words (Harvard referencing), along with a brief biography to gothicnaturejournal@gmail.com by April 15th, 2018. Please feel free to contact either Elizabeth Parker (parkereh@tcd.ie) or Emily Bourke (bourkee2@tcd.ie) with any informal queries you may have.

Please do get in touch, too, if you are interested in serving on the editorial board or contributing to the work on our website.

NecronomiCon Providence Featured on The Rhode Show

I need to watch more TV:

Events at last week's NecronomiCon Providence were featured on The Rhode Show with an interview with organizers Niels Hobbs and Carmen Marusich. You can view the segment at http://wpri.com/2017/08/14/necronomicon-returns/.