CFP Supernatural Studies Conference Spring 2018 (expired; New York 3/23/2018)

Sorry to have missed this:
 
EXTENDED! Supernatural Studies Conference Spring 2018

deadline for submissions: 

January 9, 2018

 

full name / name of organization: 

Supernatural Studies Association

 

contact email: 

supernaturalstudies@gmail.com

 

The Supernatural Studies Association (www.supernaturalstudies.com) invites submissions for the inaugural Supernatural Studies Conference, to be held at Bronx Community College on Friday, March 23, 2018.

Call for submissions

The Supernatural Studies Association invites submissions for the inaugural Supernatural Studies Conference, to be held at Bronx Community College on Friday, March 23, 2018. Horror scholar and author of a series of zombie novels Dr. Kim Paffenroth of Iona College will deliver the keynote address.

The conference welcomes proposals on representations of the supernatural in any form of text or artifact, such as literature (including speculative fiction), film, television, video games, social media, or music. Submissions regarding pedagogy and supernatural representations will also be considered. There is no restriction regarding time periods or disciplinary and theoretical approaches (examples include literary, historical, and cultural studies approaches).

Abstracts of 300 words maximum should be sent to supernaturalstudies@gmail.com by January 9, 2018, and decisions regarding acceptance will be communicated by January 20, 2018. Faculty, graduate students, and independent scholars are welcome to apply.  Please note that, due to location and funding, we do not have an associated conference hotel and cannot offer travel support.

Last updated January 2, 2018
This CFP has been viewed 2,226 times. 

CFP From Carmilla to Drusilla: Vampires Across Popular Culture (2/15/2018; Romania 6/7-10/2018)

From Carmilla to Drusilla: Vampires Across Popular Culturehttps://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/11/08/from-carmilla-to-drusilla-vampires-across-popular-culture

deadline for submissions: 

February 15, 2018

full name / name of organization: 

Seton Hill University

contact email: 

arnzen@setonhill.edu

Call For Papers: International Vampire Film and Arts Festival  - 7-10 June 2018

The third annual International Vampire Film and Arts Festival will take place in Sighisoara in Transylvania, Romania, on June 7th-10th, 2018. To celebrate their popular fiction dual degree collaboration, WRITE TOGETHER--in which students earn an MA studying at Edinburgh Napier University for one year, then transition to a low residency program to earn their MFA from Seton Hill University--faculty from both universities are teaming up to curate this year’s exciting call for papers. 

Keynote Speaker:CHRISTOPHER GOLDEN (bestselling author of Buffy the Vampire Slayer - The Watcher's Guide, Of Saints and Shadows, Ararat, Seize the Night, & more)

Sponsoring Faculty: Dr. Michael Arnzen and Nicole Peeler (Seton Hill University)

Mr. David Bishop and Ms. Laura Lam (Edinburgh Napier University)

Conference Theme: From Carmilla to Drusilla: Vampires Across Popular Culture

The IVFAF, in association with Seton Hill University and Edinburgh Napier University, calls for papers by scholars interested in presenting their researched essays on vampire literature and film in the academic symposium that runs alongside the festival in Transylvania.

We will divide this year’s academic symposium into two days of programming:

• One day will be devoted to situating the vampire as a figure of fascination across popular culture.
• One day will focus on the vampires of Joss Whedon's Buffy the Vampire Slayer universe, including its many spin-offs and tie-ins and source materials.  

The significance of the "Buffyverse” (which in 2017 celebrated its 20th Anniversary since first airing on television) will be emphasized in this second day.  While drawing from an original 1992 horror comedy film, the quirky YA television series developed the characters and the supernatural world of Sunnydale into a long-running series (and a popular spin-off, Angel), generating a cult following that continues to this day in comics, novels, and more.

Both sessions invite papers in genre theory & history, popular fiction, media culture, television theory, adaptation, comic studies, the transformative arts and other areas of film, literary and cultural studies in order to explore and expand the significance of both the vampire, in general, as well as the "Buffyverse," in popular culture and around the world.   

Proposals for single 20-minute papers or pre-constituted panels (of 3 x 20-minute papers) on the conference theme are now welcomed from scholars.  Possible topics for the first day may include (but are not limited to) the following:

+The Impact of Popular Culture or Non‐Gothic Genres on Dracula, Varney, Carmilla and Other Classic Vampire Texts

+Vampire Fiction as Subgenre (Comedies, Romances, YA literature, Graphic Novels)

+The Vampire’s Role in Genre Evolution

+The Vampire as Metaphor

+Vampires as Signs of Cultural Change

+The Popular Vampire in the Literary Mainstream

+The Evolution of Sex and Religion in Vampire Literature

+The Influence of Cinema on Literary Vampires (and vice‐versa)

+Vampiric Tropes in Social Networking, Internet Memes and New Media Culture

+Popular Vampire Fiction/Film in the Non‐Western World

+Pedagogical Applications of Popular Vampire Texts

+Gender and the vampire and/or the vampire hunter

+Vampires and the depiction of alternative sexualities

+Other Cultural Studies Applications of the Vampire Icon

And possible topics for the second day may include (but are not limited) to the following:

+ The Impact of historical vampire literature (Dracula, Varney, Carmilla etc.) on the Buffyverse.

+ Cultural themes in Joss Whedon's work.

+ Buffy's influence on contemporary vampire cinema or YA literature.

+ Gender issues and sexuality  in Joss Whedon's Buffyverse.

+ Spike, Angel and vampiric masculinity.

+ Fan Culture and the Buffy series.

+ Buffy in Social Networking, Internet Memes and New Media Culture

+ Teaching with Buffy

+ Generation X and Millennial Audience Receptions of Buffy

+Is Buffy feminist?

A particular desire will be to select papers that examine the vampire in Young Adult literature and teen dramas, which would offer a wider context for situating Buffy scholarship or otherwise expanding our scholarly understanding of the appeal of the vampire in youth culture. We also want to support undergraduate scholarship: any current UG students interested in attending IVFAF would be eligible for special, 10-15 minute presentation panels to facilitate their participation in an international conference at the undergraduate level. 

Submit abstracts (500 words maximum) via email only to arnzen@setonhill.edu no later than February 15th, 2018.  If submitting a full panel proposal, include all three proposals along with a summary statement (50 words maximum) of the panel's title and central topic written by the moderator.  Acceptance of a proposal is a commitment to present a finished written paper in a talk lasting approximately 20 minutes.  Accepted submitters must confirm their commitment to travel, attend and present their own original work at the conference in Sighisoara, Romania. Presenters must register by purchasing an Academic Delegate ticket.

For more information on conference registration and location, visit http://ivfaf.com

Last updated November 8, 2017
This CFP has been viewed 2,684 times. 

CFP In the Shadows: Illuminating Monstrosity in Children's and Young Adult Literature and Culture (2/28/2018; British Columbia 5/11-12/2018)

In the Shadows: Illuminating Monstrosity in Children's and Young Adult Literature and Culture
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2018/01/29/in-the-shadows-illuminating-monstrosity-in-childrens-and-young-adult-literature-and

deadline for submissions: 

February 28, 2018

 

full name / name of organization: 

University of British Columbia Master of Arts in Children's Literature program

 

contact email: 

ubc.conference.2018@gmail.com

 

In the Shadows:

Illuminating Monstrosity in Children’s and Young Adult Literature and Culture

Call for Paper Proposals

Deadline for submission: February 28th, 2018 

A peer-reviewed graduate student conference on children’s literature, media, and culture

University of British Columbia - Friday May 11th - Saturday May 12th, 2018 

In the Shadows: Illuminating Monstrosity in Children’s and Young Adult Literature and Culture is a two-day conference on May 11th - 12th 2018 showcasing graduate student research in children’s literature. You are invited to submit a proposal for an academic paper that contributes to research in the area of children’s and young adult literature, media, or cultural studies. Submissions of creative writing for children and young adults are also welcome. We are particularly interested in research and creative work that draw on the broadly interpreted theme of monstrosity--including research on narratives that feature monstrous figures and the monstrous side of humanity.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:

• Literature from the genres of horror, gothic, mystery, or science fiction
• Post-humanism/trans-humanism
• Narratives of physical or emotional trauma, scars, disfigurement, etc.
• Themes of fear, captivity, empathy/apathy
• The uncanny and the sublime
• Narratives focussing on the duality of human nature
• Themes of survival, lost innocence, or childhood innocence
• Experiences of marginalized groups, otherness, and social outcasts
• (Mis)representations of people as “monsters”
• Government atrocities, tragedies, and other perspectives on historical events
• Analyses of monstrosity from critical or theoretical perspectives (e.g. psychoanalysis, post colonialism, feminism, etc.)
• Adaptations, bringing a narrative to life in a new story or medium
• Stories of real-world monsters, such as bullies or personal, inner demons
• Narratives featuring monsters, vampires, werewolves, zombies, ogres etc.
• Villains and beasts from fairy tales, folktales, or mythology
• Friendly monsters or imaginary friends (e.g. Pokémon, The BFG, Monsters Inc.)
• The allure and romanticism of monsters (e.g. Twilight)
• Papers related to Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein, in honour of the 200th anniversary of publication 

The topics above are a guideline for the proposals we would like to see, but we are eager to receive paper proposals on any facet of monstrosity in children’s and young adult texts. 

Academic Paper Proposals
Please send a 250-word abstract that includes the title of your paper, a list of references in MLA format, a 50-word biography, your name, your university affiliation, email address, and phone number to the review committee at submit.ubc.conference@gmail.com. Please include “Conference Proposal Submission” in the subject line of your email. 

Creative Writing Proposals
Submissions of creative writing for children and young adults in any genre are welcome, including novel chapters, poetry, picture books, graphic novels, scripts, etc. Please send a piece of work no longer than 12 pages double-spaced. (Anything shorter is welcome-- poetry, for example, might only be a page). The submission should include the title of your piece, a 150-word overview of your piece (describe age group, genre, and links to the conference theme), a list of references in MLA format (if you have any), a 50-word biography, your name, your university affiliation, email address, and phone number. Please send your submission to the review committee at submit.ubc.conference@gmail.com. Please put “Creative Conference Proposal Submission” in the subject line of your email.

Out of Province/Country Submissions
For those who may need extra time to plan their travels please put “Travel” in the email subject line and we will get back to you as soon as possible.
 

For more info, please contact ubc.conference.2018@gmail.com or visit https://blogs.ubc.ca/intheshadows/.  Join our mailing list at http://eepurl.com/dht7_z.

Thank you and we look forward to seeing you this spring!

Last updated January 31, 2018
This CFP has been viewed 252 times. 

CFP Monsters and Monstrosity in Nineteenth-Century Anglophone Literature (1/15/2018)

Call for Submissions: Monsters and Monstrosity in Nineteenth-Century Anglophone Literature
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/12/07/call-for-submissions-monsters-and-monstrosity-in-nineteenth-century-anglophone

deadline for submissions: 

January 15, 2018

 

full name / name of organization: 

Anglistik: International Journal of English Studies 

 

contact email: 

literary.monsters@gmail.com

 

Call for Papers

Anglistik: International Journal of English Studies

Special issue on “Monsters and Monstrosity in Nineteenth-Century Anglophone Literature”

Guest editors: Gero Guttzeit and Natalya Bekhta

Anglophone literature in the nineteenth century abounds in monsters that continue to horrify even in the present: vampires, mummies, doppelgangers, ghosts, and zombies as well as Frankenstein’s monster, the Jabberwock, Helen Vaughan, and the Invisible Man. Our aim in this special issue of Anglistik is to remap this monstrous abundance in light of the emerging field of monster studies (Mittman 2016). Monster studies, also termed ‘monster theory’ (Cohen 1996) or ‘teratology’ (Picart and Browning 2012), “use[s] the monsters themselves as theoretical constructs” (Mittman 2016, 9), conceptualizes “monstrousness […] as a mode of cultural discourse” (Cohen 1996, viii), and understands monstrosity as an imposed narrative rather than an intrinsic feature of certain social appearances and behaviours (Wright 2013, 3). Since the nineteenth century has been crucial to the development of monster studies, particularly with regard to the monstrous body (Youngquist 2003), the vampire (Auerbach [1995] 2006) and Frankenstein’s creature (Baldick 1987), a dedicated publication on “Monsters and Monstrosity in Nineteenth-Century Anglophone Literature” will bring together fresh considerations of this historical period and the theory it inspired.
We aim to reconsider monsters and monstrosity within nineteenth-century literary narratives as well as to rethink monstrosity through nineteenth-century literature. Such a project might draw on a variety of influential theoretical approaches connected to the field of monster studies (Kristeva [1982] 2010; Haraway 1992; Carroll 1990; Halberstam 1995; Cohen 1996; McNally 2011; Mittman 2016). We are looking for contributions that revisit but also go beyond the traditional pinnacles of the 1816 Lake Geneva ghost story writing contest and the fin-de-siècle Gothic to ask the interconnected questions as to why the nineteenth century has such a peculiar affinity with monsters and monstrosity and which new impulses it can give monster studies today.

Issues and questions to be discussed include but are not limited to:

Periodization and historicization: Can events such as the “sudden population explosion of monsters” in the Romantic period (Burwick 2015, 176–77) be used to periodize the nineteenth century? Is a chronological structuring in monster studies “messy and inadequate” because a narrative of progress is unsuitable for describing monsters (Cohen 1996, ix) or do monsters have a recurring representational purpose and, like Gothic productions, mark comparable historical moments in the cycles of capitalist accumulation (Shapiro 2008, 30-31)?

Nation and disability: How can we extend and critique contemporary ideas of monstrosity from Britain, the US, and other Anglophone countries such as Emerson’s description of “[t]he state of society [as] one in which the members have suffered amputation from the trunk, and strut about so many walking monsters” (Emerson 1971, 53)? Can genres such as nineteenth-century Gothic sustain a critique of the monstrosity of impaired bodies (Anolik 2010)?

Gender and sexuality: While popular conceptions of monstrosity in early modern England very often took the shape of monstrous female bodies (Brenner 2009, 165), what can the relative marginality of female monsters in the monstrous pantheon of the nineteenth century tell us about redefinitions and readjustments of gender conceptions in the period? Which metaphors other than spectrality (re)define emergent notions of homosexuality (Castle 1993)?

Class and race: What can “capitalist monsterology” (McNally 2011, 2), which focuses on the monstrous forms of the lived experience of capitalism, tell us about the period when the current world-economy established itself? How do monsters such as Frankenstein’s creature and the zombie reinforce or rewrite experiences of slavery and categories of race (as suggested by Young’s (2008) work on black Frankenstein)?

Intertexuality, intermediality, and metaliterary meanings: What can different intermedial versions of monsters, for instance Frankenstein’s creature, tell us about the system of nineteenth-century literature and other media? What is the specificity of nineteenth-century variations of older, mythological monsters such as Alfred Lord Tennyson’s “The Kraken” (1830)? How does monstrosity work as an instrument of the metaphorization of literature and its production, distribution, and reception, as present, for instance, in Henry James’s early twentieth-century dismissal of certain nineteenth-century novels as “large loose baggy monsters” (James 1909, 477)?

‘Monstrous theory’: How can nineteenth-century monsters be used to rethink assumptions in what might be termed today’s “monstrous theory” connected, for instance, to the spectral turn, the posthuman turn, and the animal turn? What are conceptual alternatives to the so-called “anxiety model” of the Gothic as critiqued by Baldick and Mighall (2000)?

Anglistik: International Journal of English Studies (ISSN: 0947-0034) is the journal of the German Association for the Study of English (Anglistenverband). Further information on the journal can be found here: https://angl.winter-verlag.de/ Full contributions of 5,000 to 7,000 words with MLA formatting will be due by October 1, 2018, and the final issue will be published with open access in late 2019.
Please submit a 500-word abstract (excluding bibliography) with a brief biography to the guest editors Gero Guttzeit and Natalya Bekhta at literary.monsters@gmail.com by January 15, 2018.

Last updated December 8, 2017
This CFP has been viewed 2,007 times. 

Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference Schedule Online

From the official Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference site:
http://stokercon2018.org/the-convention/ann-radcliffe-academic-conference/

The Second Annual Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference will be presented at the Third Annual StokerCon, March 1 – 4, 2018 held at the historic Biltmore Hotel in Providence, Rhode Island (http://www.providencebiltmore.com/). We are pleased to announce here the full conference program, and we hope to see you in Providence!

StokerCon info and tentative schedule at:  http://stokercon2018.org/.

Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference Schedule

Thursday, March 1, 2018

Panel 1: Gender Studies / 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM

• Bridget Keown, “The Symptoms of Possession: Gender, Trauma, and the Domestic in Novels of Demonic Possession”
• Elsa Carruthers and Rhonda Joseph, “When We Are the Monsters: Female Monsters and the Subversion of Patriarchy”
• Maya Thornton, “’1, 2 … Freddy’s Coming for You’: Freddy Krueger as Manifestation of Teenage Societal Anxieties”
• Holly Newton, “Coming Out and Coming Home: Reading Silent Hill Homecoming’s Alex Shepherd as Queer”

Panel 2: Monster Studies, Eurasia / 11:45 AM – 1:15 PM

• Emily Anctil, “‘Not a Bedtime Story’: Investigating Textual Interactions Between the Horror Genre and Children’s Picturebooks”
• Naomi Borwein, “Monster Studies, Monster Anthropology, and Australian Aboriginal Horror Literature”
• Frazer Lee, “Koji Suzuki’s Ring – A World Literary Perspective”
• Amanda Trujillo, “Contagious Curses: Identifying the Characteristics and Origins of a Horror Trope”

Panel 3: Horror Studies / 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM

• Khara Lukancic, “Ethics in Horror Movies: An Analysis of The Bye Bye Man”
• Nicholas Diak, “Lost Nights and Dangerous Days: Unraveling the Relationship Between Stranger Things and Synthwave”
• Daniel Holmes, “Horror, Terror, and the Homeric Uncanny”
• Caitlin Duffy, “This Mansion of Gloom’: Visualizing Edgar Allan Poe’s Atmospheres of Horror”

Panel 4: Myth and Monsters / 3:45 PM – 5:15 pm

• Anthony Gambol, “The Genesis of Myth”
• Mathias Clasen, “Fear for Your Life: Evolution and Horror Fiction”
• Shawn Pendley, “Modal Confusion Meets Moral Insensibility in Fox’s Lucifer
• Michele Brittany, “Mummies in Comics 101”

Friday, March 2, 2018

Panel 1: Gender Studies / 10:00 AM – 11:30 AM

• Deirdre Flood, “Under the Mask: Slasher Villains in Pre and Post 9/11 Horror”
• Rocky Colavito, “Trans Fatal(e): Body Horror, Trans(un)fixion, and Walter Hill’s The Assignment”
• Jennifer Loring, “The Dark Heart of Human Nature: The Necessity of Extreme Horror”
• Johnny Murray, “’Gelatinous Green Immensity’: The Sublime – Grotesque in Weird Fiction”

Panel 2: Gothic, Folklore & Villains / 11:45 AM – 1:15 PM

• Danny Rhodes, “’When the Cage Came Up There Was Something Crouched A-Top of It’: The Haunted Tales of LTC Rolt – A Contextual Analysis”
• Michelle Reinstatler, “Western Culture’s Adversarial Relationship with the Revenant: Tragedy and the Haunted in Dead Crossroads”
• Douglas Ford, “Of All Nights in the Year: Walpurgis Night and Young Goodman Brown”
• Erica McCrystal, “Jekyll and Hyde Everywhere: Inconsistency and Disparity in the Real World”
• Renee DeCamillis, “The Power of Sympathetic Villains of Literature and Screen Pulses Through Music”

 Panel 3: Zombies, Ghouls and Other Monsters / 2:00 PM – 3:30 PM

• Michael Torresgrossa, “Arthurian Monster Mash: The Undead in Camelot from The Awntys off Authure to the Fiction of Today”
• Kevin J. Wetmore, Jr., “Night of the Living Dead, or Endgame: Samuel Beckett and Zombies”
• Kent Pettit, “Medieval and Modern Godfathers of Ghouls: William of Newburgh and George A. Romero as Subversive Sages for Turbulent Times”
• Allison Budaj, “Melancholy and The Walking Dead”

Panel 4: 20^th Century Horror Literature / 3:45 PM – 5:15 PM

• John Tibbetts, “The Mystery of Marjorie Bowen”
• Adam Crowley, “Roadway to Hell: The Divided Line and the Concept of Evil in H.P. Lovecraft’s The Colour Out of Space”
• Gavin Hurley, “Richard Laymon’s Rhetorical Style: Minimalism, Suspense, and Negative Space”
• James Anderson, “Four Quadrants of Success: The Metalinguistics of Author Protagonists in the Fiction of Stephen King”

Organizing Co-Chairs

Michele Brittany & Nicholas Diak
Email: AnnRadCon@gmail.com

About the Ann Radcliffe Conference and Stokercon

The Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference is part of the Horror Writers Association’s Outreach Program. Membership to the Horror Writers Association is not required to submit or present, however registration to StokerCon 2018 is required to present. StokerCon registration can be obtained by going to www.stokercon2018.org. There is no additional registration or fees for the Ann Radcliffe Academic Conference outside StokerCon registration. If interested in applying to the Horror Writer’s Association as an academic member, please see www.horror.org/about/ .
StokerCon is the annual convention hosted by the Horror Writers Association wherein the Bram Stoker Awards for superior achievement in horror writing are awarded.

Joshi's Driven to Madness with Fright

I've been drifting in and out of Lovecraft country since the summer collecting books that appear to offer some overviews. Lovecraft and weird fiction scholar S. T. Joshi offers this interesting, self-published collection of his recent essays and reviews. It is a very informative collection with much insight into contemporary weird fiction.


Driven to Madness with Fright: Further Notes on Horror Fiction
Paperback – December 1, 2016
by S. T. Joshi (Author)

For more than 30 years, S. T. Joshi has been a pioneering critic of fantasy, horror, and supernatural fiction. This new collection of his essays and reviews covers the entire range of weird fiction, from Romantic poetry to the work of Ambrose Bierce, Ray Bradbury, and Shirley Jackson. Particularly insightful are Joshi's assessments of such contemporary writers as Ramsey Campbell, Caitlin R. Kiernan, Thomas Ligotti, and Reggie Oliver. Joshi, the leading authority on H. P. Lovecraft, also provides pungent analyses of recent works of Lovecraftian fiction by such figures as W. H. Pugmire and Darrell Schweitzer, as well as incisive reviews of recent works of Lovecraft scholarship. All in all, this book will engage, entertain, and inform all devotees of weird fiction.

For purchase at Amazon.com at https://www.amazon.com/Driven-Madness-Fright-Further-Fiction/dp/154077080X/.

CFP Summer 2018 issue of Supernatural Studies (4/1/2018)

Summer 2018 issue of Supernatural Studies seeks submissions
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2018/01/17/summer-2018-issue-of-supernatural-studies-seeks-submissions

deadline for submissions:
April 1, 2018


full name / name of organization:
Supernatural Studies Association


contact email:
supernaturalstudies@gmail.com




Supernatural Studies

Call for Papers, Spring 2018 Issue

Supernatural Studies is a peer-reviewed journal that promotes rigorous yet accessible scholarship in the growing field of representations of the supernatural, the speculative, the uncanny, and the weird. The breadth of “the supernatural” as a category creates the potential for interplay among otherwise disparate individual studies that will ideally produce not only new work but also increased dialogue and new directions of scholarly inquiry. To that end, the editorial board welcomes submissions employing any theoretical perspective or methodological approach and engaging with any period and representations including but not limited to those in literature, film, television, video games, and other cultural texts and artifacts.



Submissions should be 5,000 to 8,000 words, including notes but excluding Works Cited, and follow the MLA Handbook, 8th ed. (2016); notes should be indicated by superscript Arabic numerals in text and pasted at the end of the article. International submissions should adhere to the conventions of U.S. English spelling, usage, and punctuation. Manuscripts should contain no identifying information, and each submission will undergo blind peer review by at least two readers. Contributors are responsible for obtaining any necessary permissions and ensuring observance of copyright. Submissions should be emailed to supernaturalstudies@gmail.com as an attached Microsoft Word file. The deadline for guaranteed consideration for the Spring 2018 issue is 1 April 2018.



www.supernaturalstudies.com



Last updated January 17, 2018

Playing Dress-Up: Scooby-Doo 2017

More items from Hallmark's Halloween 2017 product line. These feature characters from Scooby-Doo as dressed as monsters, Scooby as a witch and Shaggy as a vampire.


itty bittys® Scooby-Doo Stuffed Animal (https://www.hallmark.com/gifts/stuffed-animals/itty-bittys/itty-bittys-scooby-doo-stuffed-animal-1KID3376.html)

itty bittys® Shaggy Stuffed Animal (https://www.hallmark.com/gifts/stuffed-animals/itty-bittys/itty-bittys-shaggy-stuffed-animal-1KID3375.html)

 

Playing Dress-Up: Peanuts 2017

Halloween is a great time to find your favorite characters disguised as monsters, including these products featuring Snoopy from the Peanuts as a vampire. Both items are part of Hallmark's Halloween 2017 product line.


Peanuts® Snoopy and Woodstock Candy Corn Halloween Card (https://www.hallmark.com/cards/greeting-cards/peanuts-snoopy-and-woodstock-candy-corn-halloween-card-299IEH8094.html)


(click link above for image)


Peanuts® Vampire Snoopy Medium Halloween Gift Bag, 9.5" (https://www.hallmark.com/gift-wrap/gift-bags/peanuts-vampire-snoopy-medium-halloween-gift-bag-9.5-199HGB1809.html)

Horrors at Hallmark

Hallmark always has great stuff for Halloween, including the following items for this year.


itty bittys® The Walking Dead Plush, Collectors Set of 4 (https://www.hallmark.com/gifts/stuffed-animals/itty-bittys/itty-bittys-the-walking-dead-plush-collectors-set-of-4-1KDD1306.html)

and

itty bittys® Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas Jack Skellington and Sally Stuffed Animals, Set of 2 (https://www.hallmark.com/gifts/stuffed-animals/itty-bittys/itty-bittys-tim-burtons-the-nightmare-before-christmas-jack-skellington-and-sally-stuffed-animals-set-of-2-1KDD1366.html)

CFP Breaking out of the Box: Critical Essays on the Cult TV Show Supernatural (10/2/2017)

Sorry to hvave missed this earlier. I wish them well.
 
UPDATE: CFP Breaking out of the Box: Critical Essays on the Cult TV Show Supernatural
Discussion published by Dominick Grace on Saturday, September 2, 2017
https://networks.h-net.org/node/13784/discussions/193064/update-cfp-breaking-out-box-critical-essays-cult-tv-show

Type: Call for Papers
Date: October 2, 2017
Subject Fields: Cultural History / Studies, Popular Culture Studies, Theatre & Performance History / Studies, Humanities, Film and Film History


Lisa Macklem and Dominick Grace seek proposals for a refereed collection of essays on the CW cult horror show Supernatural, to be published by McFarland.

“What’s in the box?” Dean Winchester asks in “The Magnificent Seven,” episode one of the third season of Supernatural, to the befuddlement of his brother Sam and their avuncular mentor Bobby Singer, but to the delight of fans who revel in the show’s wry meta elements. Dean is of course quoting Detective Mills, Brad Pitt’s character in the thriller Se7en (1995), directed by David Fincher. Throughout its twelve-year run (to date), Supernatural has revelled in breaking out of the limitations usually implied by a television show, breaking out of the box in numerous ways. Acknowledging the popularity of the meta-play in the show, current showrunner Andrew Dabb promised the most meta-finale ever for the season twelve finale. One of the most noteworthy examples of this predilection is the extensively meta elements of the season five apocalypse plotline, which featured the character Carver Edlund (his name derived from series writers Jeremy Carver and Ben Edlund) in several episodes. Edlund is a novelist who has written supposed works of fiction that in fact document Sam and Dean Winchester’s lives, thoroughly breaking the fourth wall. Edlund is the pseudonym of Chuck Shurley—who turns out to be God, making one of his rare mainstream television appearances. However, this meta plot element represents only one of the myriad ways Supernatural has broken out of the box. Season five, episode eight (“Changing Channels”), transports Sam and Dean into the worlds of several television shows, while season six, episode fifteen, “The French Mistake,” carried the conceit further, having Sam and Dean visit the “real” world, in which they are characters in the TV show Supernatural. Season eight and nine feature as main villain the appropriately-named Metatron, the scribe of God trying to write himself into the position of God—in effect plotting in both senses of the word. Season eight also featured, in episode 8 (“Hunteri Heroici”), Warner Brothers style cartoon gimmickry, and the upcoming season thirteen promises an animated crossover episode with Scooby Doo. Season ten’s 200th episode is yet another recursive metanarrative, featuring a highschool student trying to mount a musical adaptation of the Carver Edlund novels. In short, despite its horror trappings, Supernatural has been decidedly postmodern in its liberal use of pastiche, meta, intertextuality, and generic slippage. This collection is interested in exploring the ways Supernatural breaks boundaries. Topics of potential interest include but are not limited to

• Explicitly meta elements in Supernatural
• Supernatural and fandom: interpenetrations
• God, Metatron, and other Supernatural authors
• Role and role-playing
• Generic slippage (comedy; found footage; the musical episode)
• Allusion and intertext in Supernatural
• Canonicity
• Non-Supernatural (e.g. the episodes with no fantasy elements)
• Supernatural and genre TV
• reality and retcon: how the show has shifted and redefined its own rules
• casting and self-consciousness (e.g. the use of celebrity guest stars such as Linda Blair, Rick Springfield, etc.)
• Importance of music throughout the show

Proposals of 300-500 words should be submitted to Lisa Macklem (lmacklem1@gmail.com) or Dominick Grace (dgrace2@uwo.ca) by October 1 2017. Completed papers are also welcome. Final papers should be between 5,000 and 7,000 words long and written in conformity with MLA style and will be due by May 1 2018.

Contact Info:

Dominick Grace

1285 Western Rd

London On

N6G 1H2

Contact Email:
dgrace2@uwo.ca

CFP Trump-Era Horror Book (Last Call for Abstracts) (9/30/2017)

Trump-Era Horror Book (Last Call for Abstracts)
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/09/07/trump-era-horror-book-last-call-for-abstracts

deadline for submissions: September 30, 2017

 contact email: v.mccollum@ulster.ac.uk



Title: Make America Hate Again: Trump-Era Horror & the Politics of Fear

Collection Editor: Dr Victoria McCollum (Ulster University)

Deadline for Abstracts: September 30, 2017

Contact: v.mccollum@ulster.ac.uk

Publisher: Routledge

Summary: Make America Hate Again: Trump-Era Horror and the Politics of Fear explores the intersection of film, politics, and American culture and society through a bold critical analysis of popular horror films/TV produced in the Trump era, such as Green Room (2015); The Witch (2015); Don’t Breathe (2016); The Purge: Election Year (2016); American Gods (2017); American Horror Story (2017); Get Out (2017); and The Handmaid’s Tale (2017). This collection of essays will explore how popular horror scrutinises and unravels the events, anxieties, discourses, dogmas and socio-political conflicts of the Trump years.

Lots of additional information/inspiration can be found here: https://popcultstudies.wordpress.com/

Last updated September 7, 2017

CFP Monstrous Monarchs/Royal Monsters (11/1/2017; Las Vegas 4/12-15/2018)

Monstrous Monarchs/Royal Monsters
https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/09/03/monstrous-monarchsroyal-monsters

deadline for submissions: November 1, 2017

full name / name of organization: MEARCSTAPA

contact email: tmtomaini@gmail.com



MEARCSTAPA

Call for Papers

Medieval Association of the Pacific

Annual Conference in Las Vegas, NV

“Memory and Remembrance in the Middle Ages and Renaissance”

12-15 April 2018



Monstrous Monarchs/Royal Monsters


Medieval and early modern societies defined monstrosity in a multitude of ways, assigning the term to figures representing the supernatural “other” and to those representing human alterities. Monsters filled the national consciousness of societies throughout the medieval and early modern worlds. Indeed, the monster became an allegory for a society’s relativisms and fears. So, what happens when the monster is the monarch him or herself—or when the monster is a member of the royal family? How might the term be defined differently or specifically for the sake of this unique person? What special circumstances might be attached to the term and its parameters when the monarch and his or her relationship to the State and its people is concerned? Monarchs of the medieval and early modern periods were deeply concerned about their legacies, and prioritized the public memory of their reigns and dynasties very highly. Similarly, literary and artistic representations of royalty and monarchs often showcase the concerns of dynasty, heredity, and reputation. How is public memory affected when the monarch, or a member of a royal dynasty, is remembered as monstrous for posterity? Moreover, how is royal legacy affected when the term “monster” becomes attached to the monarch while he or she is still living?

MEARCSTAPA invites proposals in all disciplines of the humanities and for all nations, regions, language groups, and cultures of the medieval and early modern periods globally. Please send proposals of 250 words maximum to Asa Mittman asmittman@csuchico.edu, Thea Tomaini tmtomaini@gmail.com, and Ilan Mitchell-Smith Ilan.mitchellsmith@csulb.edu by 1 November 2017.


Last updated September 7, 2017

CFP Monsters and Monstrosity, A Special Issue of The Popular Culture Studies Journal (12/1/2017)

CfP: Monsters and Monstrosity, A Special Issue of The Popular Culture Studies Journal
Posted on September 5, 2017
https://www.fantastic-arts.org/2017/cfp-monsters-and-monstrosity-a-special-issue-of-the-popular-culture-studies-journal/ 

Call for Papers: Monsters and Monstrosity A Special Issue of The Popular Culture Studies Journal

Thanks to Norma Jones for supporting special issue. Please consider submitting and share widely.

Call for Papers: Monsters and Monstrosity
A Special Issue of The Popular Culture Studies Journal
Guest Editor: Bernadette Marie Calafell, University of Denver

Scholars, such as W. Scott Poole and Kendall Phillips, have argued that monsters, particularly those in horror, reflect or correspond to the cultural anxieties of a society. These cultural anxieties are often connected to struggles for power around race, class, gender, sexuality, and ability. Thus, historical context and power are central to studies of monstrosity. Given that we are immersed in what may be considered a horror renaissance, both in film and television, increasing violence against people of color in the U.S., and dangerous and toxic performances of white femininity and masculinity, this is a ripe moment to explore the relationship between monstrosity and popular culture, both literally and figuratively. Thus, this special issues solicits manuscripts that take interdisciplinary approaches to explore the theoretical and methodological possibilities of monstrosity. What can employing monstrosity as a theoretical framework or analytical tool contribute to the study of popular culture? Key questions driving this special issue include: What can monstrosity teach us about Otherness? How can it be used resistively? Conversely, how can monstrosity be used as a tool of oppression? In what ways we can be unpack figures, such as Donald Trump, through the lens of monstrosity? What constitutes monstrosity? How might we understand history differently through the construct of monstrosity? What are the necessary future directions for the study of monstrosity and popular culture? Critical rhetorical, critical qualitative (including critical auto-methodologies), and performative approaches to monstrosity are welcomed.

Potential areas of interest include, but are not limited to:

• Twin Peaks and monstrosity
• Monstrosity and comics
• David Lynch’s uses of monstrosity
• NBC’s Hannibal
• Adult Swim
• Monstrous remakes
• History and monstrosity
• Afrofuturism and monstrosity
• Monstrosity and agency
• Monstrous bodies
• Monstrous consumption
• Monstrosity and adolescence
• Monstrosity, menstruation, or menopause
• Fatness and monstrosity
• Excess and monstrosity
• Chicanxfuturism and monstrosity
• Celebrity culture and monstrosity
• Performance and monstrosity
• Wrestling and monstrosity
• Intersectional approaches to monstrosity
• Feminist possibilities of monstrosity
• American Horror Story
• Queerness and monstrosity
• Monstrosity and sports
• Disability and monstrosity
• Class and monstrosity
• Game of Thrones
• Monstrous politicians and politics
• The 2016 U.S. Presidential election
• Autobiography and monstrosity
• Monstrous methodologies
• Hybridity and monstrosity
• White femininity and monstrosity
• Monstrosity and military culture
• Monstrosity and toxic masculinities
• Monstrosity and white masculinity
• Monstrosity and religion
• Monstrosity and temporality
• Chicana feminism and monstrosity
• Monstrosity and Orientalism

Questions can be directed to Bernadette Calafell at Bernadette.Calafell@du.edu. Please electronically send submissions (three documents, MS WORD, MLA) to Bernadette Calafell via email at Bernadette.Calafell@du.edu by December 1, 2017.

1) Title Page: A single title page must accompany the email, containing complete contact information (address, phone number, e-mail address).

2) Manuscript: On the first page of the manuscript, only include the article’s title, being sure not to include the author’s name. The journal employs a “blind review” process, meaning that a copy of the article will be sent to reviewers without revealing the author’s name. Please include the works cited with your manuscript.

3) Short Bio: On a separate document, please also include a short (100 words) bio. We will include this upon acceptance and publication.

Essays should range between 15-25 pages of double-spaced text in 12 pt. Times New Roman font, including all images, endnotes, and Works Cited pages. Please note that the 15-page minimum should be 15 pages of written article material. Less than 15 pages of written material will be rejected and the author asked to develop the article further. Essays should also be written in clear US English in the active voice and third person, in a style accessible to the broadest possible audience. Authors should be sensitive to the social implications of language and choose wording free of discriminatory overtones.

For documentation, The Popular Culture Studies Journal follows the Modern Language Association style, as articulated by Joseph Gibaldi and Walter S. Achtert in the paperback MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (New York: MLA), and in The MLA Style Manual (New York: MLA). The most current editions of both guides will be the requested editions for use. This style calls for a Works Cited list, with parenthetical author/page references in the text. This approach reduces the number of notes, which provide further references or explanation.

For punctuation, capitalization, hyphenation, and other matters of style, follow the MLA Handbook and the MLA Style Manual, supplemented as necessary by The Chicago Manual of Style (Chicago: University of Chicago Press). The most current edition of the guide will be the requested edition for use.

It is essential for authors to check, correct, and bring manuscripts up to date before final submission. Authors should verify facts, names of people, places, and dates, and double-check all direct quotations and entries in the Works Cited list. Manuscripts not in MLA style will be returned without review.

We are happy to receive digital artwork. Please save line artwork (vector graphics) as Encapsulated PostScript (EPS) and bitmap files (halftones or photographic images) as Tagged Image Format (TIFF), with a resolution of at least 300 dpi at final size. Do not send native file formats. Please contact the editor for discussion of including artwork.

Upon acceptance of a manuscript, authors are required to sign a form transferring the copyright from the author to the publisher. A copy will be sent to authors at the time of acceptance.

Before final submission, the author will be responsible for obtaining letters of permission for illustrations and for quotations that go beyond “fair use,” as defined by current copyright law.

CFP Horror Area (10/1/2017; PCA 2018)

Horror Area
http://pcaaca.org/horror/

All Proposals & Abstracts Must Be Submitted Through The PCA Conference Submission page
Please submit a proposal to only one area at a time. Exceptions and rules


CALL FOR PAPERS

The Horror Area co-chairs of the Popular Culture Association invite interested scholars to submit proposals for papers or complete panels on any aspect of horror in fiction, cinema, television, gaming, theory, and culture.

Your paper proposal should include:

1) 100- to 250-word abstract, including paper title;
2) a notification of any audio-visual needs.

Your panel or roundtable proposal should include:

1) suggested panel/roundtable title;
2) 100- to 250-word abstract identifying the theoretical framework, or guiding questions and thesis of your panel/roundtable;
3) 100- to 250-word abstracts, including titles, for each of your presenters’ papers;
4) a list of presenters and their affiliations;
5) a notification of any audio-visual needs.

Please note that proposals that are overly general are difficult to review; accordingly, your abstract should outline your main argument or research questions, your thesis and main points, and your projected conclusions.

Submitting the same or various proposals to different subject areas of the PCA is not allowed. Presenters are, however, permitted to submit proposals for both a roundtable discussion and a panel presentation. Acceptance of your paper obligates you to present the paper at the conference. You must also be present at the conference to present your own work—no “readings by proxy” are allowed.

Important: All presenters 1) must be registered members of the PCA or ACA and 2) must register for the conference. Information on how to access membership and registration forms will be sent to you upon acceptance of your presentation. Or, go now to the PCA/ACA website: http://pcaaca.org/national-conference-2/instructions-for-the-submission-database/.

Deadline: Submit your paper proposal/abstract through the PCA/ACA submission page by October 1st, 2017, to be considered for the 2018 PCA/ACA Annual National Conference in Indianapolis, Indiana.

Please send all inquiries to:

Jim Iaccino
The Chicago School of Prof. Psychology
pcahorror@gmail.com

Tiffany A. Bryant
pcahorror@gmail.com

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/.

CFP New series from MIP: Monsters, Prodigies, and Demons: Medieval and Early Modern Constructions of Alterity (open)

My thanks to Barbara Tepa Lupack for the head's up on this:

New series from MIP: Monsters, Prodigies, and Demons: Medieval and Early Modern Constructions of Alterity – Call For Proposals

https://anzamems.org/?p=8083

(official site at https://arc-humanities.org/series/mip/monsters-prodigies-and-demons/)

New scholarly book series from Medieval Institute Publications:

Monsters, Prodigies, and Demons: Medieval and Early Modern Constructions of Alterity
This series is dedicated to the study of monstrosity and alterity in the medieval and early modern world, and to the investigation of cultural constructions of otherness, abnormality and difference from a wide range of perspectives. Submissions are welcome from scholars working within established disciplines, including—but not limited to—philosophy, critical theory, cultural history, history of science, history of art and architecture, literary studies, disability studies, and gender studies. Since much work in the field is necessarily pluri-disciplinary in its methods and scope, the editors are particularly interested in proposals that cross disciplinary boundaries. The series publishes English-language, single-author volumes and collections of original essays. Topics might include hybridity and hermaphroditism; giants, dwarves, and wild-men; cannibalism and the New World; cultures of display and the carnivalesque; “monstrous” encounters in literature and travel; jurisprudence, law, and criminality; teratology and the “New Science”; the aesthetics of the grotesque; automata and self-moving machines; or witchcraft, demonology, and other occult themes.

Geographical Scope: Unrestricted
Chronological Scope: Late Medieval, Renaissance, and Early Modern
Further Information: For questions or to submit a proposal, please contact the acquisitions editor, Erika Gaffney (Erika.Gaffney@arc-humanities.org) or visit our website: www.mip-archumanitiespress.org.

For more information, please download the Monsters, Prodigies, & Demons series flyer

This entry was posted in cfp on 10 July 2017.

CFP Gothic Animals: Uncanny Otherness and the Animal With-Out (edited collection) (11/7/2017)

An intriguing theme:

Gothic Animals: Uncanny Otherness and the Animal With-Out (edited collection)

https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/08/01/gothic-animals-uncanny-otherness-and-the-animal-with-out-edited-collection

 

deadline for submissions: November 1, 2017

full name / name of organization: Ruth Heholt and Melissa Edmundson

contact email: me.makala@gmail.com

 

Gothic Animals: Uncanny Otherness and the Animal With-Out

'The boundary between the animal and the human has long been unstable, especially since the Victorian period. Where the boundary is drawn between human and animal is itself an expression of political power and dominance, and the ‘animal’ can at once express the deepest fears and greatest aspirations of a society' (Victorian Animal Dreams, 4).

'The animal, like the ghost or good or evil spirit with which it is often associated, has been a manifestation of the uncanny' (Timothy Clark, 185).

In the mid nineteenth-century Charles Darwin published his theories of evolution. And as Deborah Denenholz Morse and Martin A. Danahay suggest, 'The effect of Darwin’s ideas was both to make the human more animal and the animal more human, destabilizing boundaries in both directions' (Victorian Animal Dreams, 2). Nineteenth-century fiction quickly picked up on the idea of the 'animal within' with texts like R.L. Stevenson's Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde, Oscar Wilde's The Picture of Dorian Gray and H. G. Wells's The Island of Doctor Moreau. In these novels the fear explored was of an unruly, defiant, degenerate and entirely amoral animality lying (mostly) dormant within all of us. This was our animal-other associated with the id: passions, appetites and capable of a complete disregard for all taboos and any restraint. As Cyndy Hendershot states, this 'animal within' 'threatened to usurp masculine rationality and return man to a state of irrational chaos' (The Animal Within, 97). This however, relates the animal to the human in a very specific, anthropocentric way. Non-humans and humans have other sorts of encounters too, and even before Darwin humans have often had an uneasy relationship with animals. Rats, horses, dogs, cats, birds and other beasts have, as Donna Haraway puts it a way of 'looking back' at us (When Species Meet,19).

Animals of all sorts have an entirely different and separate life to humans and in fiction this often morphs into Gothic horror. In these cases it is not about the 'animal within' but rather the animal 'with-out'; Other and entirely incomprehensible. These non-human, uncanny creatures know things we do not, and they see us in a way it is impossible for us to see ourselves. We have other sorts of encounters with animals too: we eat animals, imbibing their being in a largely non-ritualistic, but possibly still magical way; and on occasion, animals eat us. From plague-carrying rats, to 'filthy' fleas, black dogs and killer bunnies, animals of all sorts invade our imaginations, live with us (invited or not) in our homes, and insinuate themselves into our lives. The mere presence of a cat can make a home uncanny. An encounter with a dog on a deserted road at night can disconcert. The sight of a rat creeping down an alley carries all sorts of connotations as does a cluster of fat, black flies at the window of a deserted house. To date though, there is little written about animals and the Gothic, although they pervade our fictions, imaginations and sometimes our nightmares.

This collection is intended to look at all sorts of animals in relation to the Gothic: beasts, birds, sea-creatures, insects and domestic animals. We are not looking for transformative animals – no werewolves this time – rather we want essays on fictions about actual animals that explore their relation to the Gothic; their importance and prominence within the Gothic. We invite abstracts for essays that cover all animal/bird/insect/fish life forms, from all periods (from the early Modern to the present), and within different types of media – novels, poetry, short stories, films and games.


Topics may include (but are not bound by):

• Rats (plague and death)
• Dogs (black and otherwise)
• Killer bunnies
• Uncanny cats
• Alien sea creatures
• Horses
• Bulls
• Cows (perhaps with long teeth)
• Killer frogs
• Beetles, flies, ants, spiders
• Worms
• Birds
• Snakes and toads
• Whales/Dolphins
• Animals as marginalised and oppressed
• Animals in peril
• Animal and human intimacies and the breaking of taboos
• Exotic animals/animals in colonial regions (Africa, Australia, Canada, the Caribbean, India)
• Demonic animals
• Dangerous animals (rabid dogs, venomous snakes, wolves)
• Invasive animals
• Animals and disease
• Domestic animals
• Uncanny animals
• Animals connected to supernatural beings (Satanic goats, vampire bats)
• Witchcraft and familiar spirits/animal guides
• Rural versus urban animals
• Sixth sense and psychic energy

Please send 500 word abstracts and a short bio note by 1 November 2017 to: Dr Ruth Heholt (ruth.heholt@falmouth.ac.uk) and Dr Melissa Edmundson (me.makala@gmail.com).

The collection is intended for the Palgrave MacMillan 'Studies in Animals and Literature' series. Completed essays must be submitted by 1 July 2018.

Last updated August 4, 2017

CFP PCA/ACA Vampire in Literature, Culture, and Film Area (10/1/2017)

The Vampire in Literature, Culture, and Film

https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/07/28/the-vampire-in-literature-culture-and-film

deadline for submissions: October 1, 2017

full name / name of organization: Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (PCA/ACA)

contact email: lnevarez@siena.edu

The Vampire in Literature, Culture, and Film Area is seeking papers for the national joint Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association (PCA/ACA) meeting to be held March 28-31 in Indianapolis, Indiana.

We welcome papers on vampires in literature, culture, and film for presentation at the conference.

Topics that are of particular interest include, but are not limited to:

• Vampires and music
• The international vampire
• Twilight and its legacy (2018 marks the 10-year anniversary of the film Twilight and the publication of Breaking Dawn)
• Werewolves and vampires
• The work of Nina Auerbach
• The return of Anne Rice’s vampire Lestat
• Social justice and vampires
• The literary vampire
• The vampire on television (ex: The Vampire Diaries, The Originals, The Strain, The Passage)
• Pedagogy
• Vampire subculture and lifestyle

Please submit abstracts of 250 words by October 1, 2017 to the PCA/ACA database: https://conference.pcaaca.org/

We welcome the submission of complete panels of 3-4 presenters.

Responses/decisions regarding your proposals will be provided within two weeks of your submission to ensure timely replies.

For further information, please visit: http://pcaaca.org/the-vampire-in-literature-culture-film/ or contact the area co-chairs: Mary Findley (findley@vtc.edu) or Lisa Nevarez (lnevarez@siena.edu).

Last updated July 28, 2017

CFP Oh, The Horror: Politics and Culture in Horror Films of the 1980s (expired)

Sorry to have missed posting this sooner:

Oh, The Horror--The 1980s

https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2017/06/07/oh-the-horror-the-1980s

 

deadline for submissions: 

August 1, 2017

 

full name / name of organization: Kevin M. Scott and Connor M. Scott

contact email: ohthehorror80s@gmail.com

Call for Paper (June 7, 2017)
Oh, The Horror: Politics and Culture in Horror Films of the 1980s

Kevin M Scott (Albany State University)
Connor M Scott (Georgia State University)

Contact email: ohthehorror80s@gmail.com

In the 1980s, a decade significantly known for Ronald Reagan, the Moral Majority, and the ascendance of the corporation as an aesthetic, Hollywood recovered from and reacted to the director-centric 1970s by reasserting studio control over mainstream cinema. With notable exceptions, the films of the 1980s were constructive—supporting a neater and more optimistic view of history and American culture—as opposed to the deconstructive films of the prior decade, challenging and, often, fatalistic. A simple review of Oscar nominees for the 1980s, compared to those of the 1970s, demonstrates that the capitalistic desires of the studios aligned neatly with an increasingly self-congratulatory culture and the fantasy of a return to an earlier, simpler, more conservative, whiter, United States.

By nature, however, the horror genre retains a bleaker view of society. In the 1980s, horror subverted corporate influences more often that other mainstream genres and did so both in covert support and critique of politics and values of the era. Because horror films were (and remain) lower budget productions and, hence, lower risk for studios, filmmakers enjoyed a greater degree of freedom. Some filmmakers used that freedom to reify “Reagan-era values” in violent and bloody ways (through figures like Jason Voorhees, Michael Myers, and other slashers) while others offered dark critiques of the politics of the decade—the anti-militarism of George Romero’s Day of the Dead (1985) or the deconstruction of the nuclear family in Joseph Rubin’s The Stepfather (1987).

The editors are developing a new collection of essays with McFarland Books and seek essays investigating the ways horror films during the 1980s responded to the cultural, social, and governmental politics of the decade. We welcome essays from a variety of critical stances (theoretical, psychological, formal, and so forth), but the volume’s purpose is to explore how horror films functioned as a site of political, cultural, and social engagement and/or critique.

We especially welcome essay proposals that take these approaches:

• Close readings of individual films and their engagement with the politics and culture of the era.
• Studies of particular filmmakers and the development of ongoing critiques or concerns within their films.
• Investigations of particular cultural and political themes (poverty, Barbara Creed’s idea of the “monstrous feminine,” the power of corporations, and so forth) in multiple films.
• The evolution within a subgenre over the decade (the slasher, religious/occult horror, and so forth) and how those changes reflected developments in American society.
• Discussions of how horror filmmakers interacted with the film industry and with American culture on an industry level.

This list is not intended to be complete. Other approaches are welcome. While the horror genre thrived in other countries, this volume is primarily interested in American films, films that were prominent for American moviegoers, and films that addressed American political and cultural concerns. While David Cronenberg’s Videodrome (1983, Canadian) fulfills this role, Dario Argento’s Italian films are less likely to do so. However, the inclusion of discussion of foreign films or films outside the decade in order to contrast “American” films of the 1980s or to highlight American political and/or cultural trends may be productive.

The editors seek essays of about 6,000 words.

The audience for this volume is undergraduates through active scholars, though books on this topic will attract an audience among fans of the genre.

Please submit abstracts of 500 words or less to Kevin M. Scott and Connor M. Scott (ohthehorror80s@gmail.com) by August 1, 2017. Abstracts should be accompanied by a short biography. Notification of acceptance will be given by August 15, 2017. Completed essays will be expected by December 15, 2017. And please email us if you have any questions.

Below, find a short list of films we would be especially interested in seeing discussed in essays for the volume. The list is certainly not meant to be exclusive, and we welcome any productive discussion of other films.


1980
Alligator
Altered States
Cannibal Holocaust
Demented
Friday the 13th
The Fog
Maniac
Motel Hell
Mother’s Day
The Watcher in the Woods

1981
An American Werewolf in London
The Entity
The Evil Dead
Friday the 13th PT 2
The Fun House
Graduation Day
Halloween II
Hell Night
The Howling
The Incubus
Inseminoid
My Bloody Valentine
Night School
Omen III: The Final Conflict
Wolfen 

1982
The Aftermath
Alone in the Dark
Basket Case
Cat People
Creepshow
Curse of the Cannibal Confederates
Friday the 13th Part III
Halloween III: Season of the Witch
The Last Horror Film
Poltergeist
The Thing

1983
Christine
Cujo
Eyes of Fire
House on Sorority Row
The Hunger
Something Wicked This Way Comes
Videodrome

 1984
C.H.U.D.
Children of the Corn
Gremlins
A Nightmare on Elm Street
Silent Night, Deadly Night
 1985
Day of the Dead
Fright Night
The Hills Have Eyes Part II
Lifeforce
A Nightmare on Elm Street 2: Freddy's Revenge
The Return of the Living Dead

 1986
Aliens
Class of Nuke 'Em High
The Fly
The Hitcher
Little Shop of Horrors
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2

 1987
Dark Tower
Evil Dead II
Killing Spree
The Lost Boys
Near Dark
Predator
Prince of Darkness
Hellraiser
Stepfather

 1988
The Blob
Killer Klowns from Outer Space
Maniac Cop
Pumpkinhead

 1989
Dr. Caligari
A Nightmare on Elm Street 5: The Dream Child

 Last updated June 8, 2017