ALECC 2018 - call for proposals!

The conference website is now live, so please go there instead!

(This CFP is posted here as a placeholder online location, until the conference website goes live. I will leave it up indefinitely to keep the link alive for as long as possible, but the website should be your preferred destination once it exists, and I'll post that link here.)

Wrack Zone

Call for Papers, Panels, and Other Presentations

ALECC Biennial Conference

20-23 June 2018, University of Victoria

Traditional territories of the Songhees and Esquimalt Nations

Association for Literature, Environment, and Culture in Canada

Wrack (n., v.)

1. ruination, destruction, subversion (e.g., "wrack and ruin")
2. items washed up from the open sea (e.g., "wrack zone"): kelp, plastics, feathers, bodies
3. -ed with guilt, pain, sobs (e.g., "nerve-wracking"): affect, emotion

The phrase “wrack zone” refers to the shifting region just above the high-tide line, where seaweed, woody debris, and floating objects of all kinds are deposited by waves: the collective noun for all those objects is “wrack.” (“Wrack” is also sometimes used for similar collections washing up in rivers and lakes, and on agricultural lands for weeds, vegetable refuse, roots and similar materials.)

The ocean’s wrack zone is where things wash up from elsewhere, but while this might imply a sort of ending, in fact the wrack zone is a profoundly vital site of ongoing materiality. Biologically, for example, wrack is an extraordinarily valuable part of shoreline ecosystems, supporting up to 40% of a beach’s invertebrates, which are a crucial food source for virtually all shorebirds. The wrack zone, as well, is where the detritus of global traffic ends up and takes on ambivalent forms, and represents a philosophically and aesthetically generative space.

With this in mind, the 2018 ALECC conference invites submissions that respond thoughtfully to the term “wrack,” be those submissions practical, creative, theoretical, scientific, or critical.

Behind all of our thinking about this conference theme is the idea of something like transformative resilience amid the ruins of capitalism. However, we are mindful that—as Kate Driscoll Derickson has recently argued—“resilience talk directs our attention toward a social formation that is uninspiring in its emphasis on enduring the effects of the very processes we ought to be focused on transforming” (City 20.1, Feb. 2016). After all, sustainability of the current system cannot be desirable for or desired by those who wish to build more equitable global human and ecological relations: hence, wrack and transformation.

We have elected not to provide the traditional list of diverse areas of interest related to the theme. Instead, although we welcome individual submissions, we encourage potential attendees to seek connections with each other both before you submit proposals and after the final schedule is released. It is our preference that as many presentations as possible will speak to each other, so that it becomes both an interdisciplinary and a collaborative event focused on collective learning.

Although past ALECC conferences have tended to emphasize literary and cultural questions, we are actively seeking presentations from multiple disciplines and discourses. Our local organizing committee contains representatives from Geography, Law, Writing, and Environmental Studies, along with English.

To propose an individual paper, creative or other work, including a reading (20 minutes), please submit a blind (no name included) proposal that includes a title; a 250- to 500-word abstract; your preference for a scholarly, creative or mixed session; and any requests for audio-visual equipment. In a separate document, please send name, proposal title, current contact information, and a one-page curriculum vitae (used for funding applications).

To propose a pre-formed scholarly panel or creative session (three presenters for a 90-minute session), please submit as a complete package the following:

• session title
• 200-word session abstract
• one-page curriculum vitae and contact information for the session organizer and each presenter
• 250- to 500-word blind abstracts for each paper/presentation.

To propose some other kind of format or presentation (e.g., workshops, roundtables, exhibits, performances), please contact the organizing committee in advance of the September 30 deadline to discuss proposal submission requirements.

Proposals should indicate clearly the nature of the session and all requests for audio-visual equipment and any other specific needs (e.g., space, moveable chairs, outdoor location, etc.). We ask that panel organizers attempt to include a diversity of participants (e.g., not all from the same institution).

Proposals must be submitted by September 30, 2017, to ALECC2018@uvic.ca.

Official submissions should include the word SUBMISSION, the abstract type (panel, paper, other), and your (or the panel proposer’s) name in the email subject line: SUBMISSION paper Gayatri Spivak, for example, or SUBMISSION panel Jon Gordon. We will acknowledge all submissions within 3 days of receipt.

Any general questions or queries for the organizing committee should include the word QUERY in the email subject line: QUERY accommodations, for example, or QUERY allergies.