In Hamlet’s soliloquy, the phrase “undiscovered country”  refers to “death, The undiscovered country, from whose bourn / No traveler returns.” In this light, the phrase speaks to the urgency of global climate change as the earth passes benchmarks on the way to “irreversible” transformation, making significant parts of the globe uninhabitable by humans and other species. The recognition of this reality has spurred greater action at local, national and international levels to slow down or halt the process, generating new visions of the world economy.  It is also particularly resonant in a moment when decolonial frameworks have become more prominent, facilitating conversations about how the residue of the past affects our present and future. “Undiscovered Country” is a utopian concept resonant with creators of speculative fictions and alternate histories who evoke places beyond our reckoning. The phrase can be read either as an invitation to colonial “exploration” or as a space where colonialism never happened.

For the 2023 conference of the Southeastern American Studies Association, to be held Sept 28-30 in Atlanta, Georgia, we call for papers addressing any aspect of the theme, “undiscovered country”: colonial, decolonial, catastrophic, utopian, and/or speculative. We also encourage papers and panels grounded in the study of place, space, and environment, including both natural and built environments. Finally, interdisciplinary/multidisciplinary explorations of climate change and climate activism are also welcomed.

We welcome papers on the following themes:

Environmental Justice

Sacrifice Zones

Climate Change

Built Environment

Gentrification

Resource Extraction

Colonial Dispossession

Criminal Justice and Abolition

Decolonial Frameworks for Politics and Scholarship

Speculative Fiction that Reimagines Physical and/or Social Space

Intentional Communities 

Remapping Projects 

“Forty acres and a mule” and Reparations

Black Migration(s) and Diasporas

Natural Disasters (Hurricane Katrina, etc.) 

Public History

Memory and Place 

Spatial Hierarchy

Sonic landscapes 

Community Activism

The Green New Deal and other Climate-Related Proposals

 

Guidelines for Submissions:

Please use the form below or go to southeasternasa.org/atlanta2023 to submit your proposals by March 31, 2023

For individual papers, you will be prompted to submit an abstract for your proposed paper (500 words) and a brief bio (max 300 words).

For complete panel or roundtable proposals, you will be prompted to submit a title and description of the proposed panel or roundtable (300 words); a brief abstract for each presentation within the session (300 words per abstract); and a brief bio for each presenter (250 words per bio).

Have any questions? Contact us at conference@southeasternasa.org

Barbara Stevens Heusel/Dennis Moore Travel Grants

In the interest of involving as many people in our conference as possible, each conference attendee may be listed in the conference program as a participant in a maximum of two sessions. While we welcome a range of formats, we ask that panels be designed so that they fit within a 75-minute time frame with at least 15 minutes dedicated to discussion. As always, we especially encourage graduate students to attend our conference, present research, and enjoy being part of our scholarly community. A limited number of Barbara Stevens Heusel/Dennis Moore Travel Grants for graduate students will be made available to offset some of the cost of attending the conference. Follow this link to read instructions on how to apply.

The Critoph Prize recognizes the best graduate student paper presented at each SASA conference. It includes a certificate and a check for $250, as well as recognition at the next biennial gathering. The deadline for graduate students to submit the papers they are presenting at the 2023 conference—as a Microsoft Word or PDF attachment to critoph@southeasternasa.org—is noon on September 28, 2023. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to contact us at critoph@southeasternasa.org.