Paper Calls

Edited Collection on 9/11


In a brief essay published in Parallax shortly after the 11th of September 2001, Homi K. Bhabha refutes the reductionism of the “clash of civilizations” explanation for the attacks in New York and Washington, DC, and the downed plane in a Pennsylvania field offered by too many commentators: “[T]he decision to implement and administer terror, whether it is done in the name of god or the state, is a political decision, not a civilizational or cultural practice.” Even as Bhabha makes this significant distinction, his comments point toward another question, necessarily subsequent to the events themselves: How have the political events of that September day, as well as their aftermath, affected cultural practice?

This edited collection, tentatively entitled “From Solidarity to Schism: 9/11 and After in Fiction and Film from Outside the United States,” seeks to address that question through discussions of novels, short stories, and movies from wide-ranging geographical sites of cultural production. That is, the collection’s focus is on how writers and filmmakers from outside the US represent September the 11th and any of the far-reaching events that came about because of the attacks that day. Do these fictions and films, as cultural practices, inaugurate new narrative or formal devices in their efforts to represent the attacks and/or their fallout? What manner of critique is offered, if any? Have these fictions and films ushered in a new aesthetics of terror and its consequences?

This collection will be an important supplement to the US-centered cultural and critical production addressing 9/11, providing researchers and teachers alike with resources and contexts that will allow them to broaden their own examinations of related works.

Please send all inquiries and abstracts of no more than 500 words (or full drafts of between 4000-6000 words) to the editor, Cara Cilano, at cilanoc@uncw.edu by 20 August 2008. Complete essays chosen from the abstracts will be due by 1 November 2008. While the fictions and films may be in any language, the essays themselves should be in English, as should any citations of primary and secondary sources.

The Lion and the Unicorn


The Lion and the Unicorn, a journal committed to a broad investigation of children's literature, is inviting submissions for a special issue devoted to the varieties of the didactic in the long eighteenth century. Didacticism, often considered the dominant literary form of much European and American eighteenth-century children's literature, has been undertheorized.

Articles of 12-15 pages should be submitted by March 1, 2008 to the editors for consideration for inclusion in the April 2009 special issue of The Lion and the Unicorn. Essays should be submitted in PDF format using MLA style. Documents should be sent as an e-mail attachment.

Send submissions to:
Pamela Gay-White
Department of Languages and Literatures
Alabama State University
pdgaywhite@aol.com

and

Adrianne Wadewitz
Department of English
Indiana University
wadewitz@gmail.com

Call for Papers for Topic: The Washington & Jefferson College Review
Volume 57: HARRY POTTER & HIS DARK MATERIALS

J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series and Philip Pullman’s trilogy His Dark Materials have been among the most widely read works of the last fifteen years. Topic: The Washington & Jefferson College Review seeks original, well researched, and gracefully written scholarly essays that analyze the novels, the film adaptations, or the reception of the works. Essays may focus on one author or both, either a single text or several.

Deadline for completed papers: 4 April 2008.
  • Length: 5000-6000 words, including endnotes
  • Style: Chicago, 15th edition
  • Deadline for completed papers: 4 April 2008
  • Send submissions as attachments to: topic@washjeff.edu. Word files preferred