Call for Papers: ‘Adaptation in the Humanities: Reimagining the Past, Present and Future’

Our knowledge of the world — imagined, experienced, or learned — is constantly in flux. As humans, we change, adapt, and mould the environments around us, the knowledge systems we use and the items we create. Adaptation can be forced through the presentation of an obstacle, or it can occur symbiotically within a group.

In 2020 Limina: The Journal of Historical and Cultural Studies, the Perth Medieval and Renaissance Group (PMRG), and Medieval and Early Modern Studies at The University of Western Australia are joining forces to provide a forum for the presentation of the myriad of ‘adaptations’ worlds, individuals, languages, ideas, and peoples, real or otherwise, experience.

The conference will be held at The University of Western Australia from the 3–4 October 2020. It will consist of a masterclass, opening plenary address and reception on 2 October. The main conference will take place on 3–4 October 2020. For full details, please visit the conference website: https://conference.pmrg.org.au.

The conference committee invites proposals for 20-minute papers or panels (of no more than three speakers) from the breadth of humanities research to explore the products of adaptations, and the processes that bring them into being.

Papers topics may include, but are not limited to:

  • Literary and popular culture adaptations (e.g. text to screen; children’s literature and YA adaptations of texts, graphic novel and video-game recreations of literary classics);
  • Adaptations throughout history (e.g. Cultural adaptations, reception, neoclassicism, medievalism, early modernism, Neo-Victorianism, Gothic revival, science fiction, utopianism, etc.);
  • Adaptation of memory (e.g. emotion or event based i.e. historical re-enactments, responses to crises/trauma/adversity/oppressive systems);
  • Translation studies (e.g. translations of medieval manuscripts or ancient papyri);
  • Adaptation and electronic literature (e.g. going beyond re-mediation to interface and recreate the text)
  • Childhood studies (e.g. learning; education; “adapting to and through the world”);
  • Critical studies on visual adaptations (e.g. interpretive dance; interactive artworks);
  • Adaptations of the self (e.g. biographies; auto-biographies, con-artists, fakes, forgeries and scams);
  • Adaptation and embodiment (e.g disability, immaterial bodies, in/corporality, disability; cyborgs, AI);
  • Adaptations of reality (e.g. sci-fi; hallucinogens, VR);
  • Museum and Material Studies (e.g. displaying/reinterpreting/rehousing material artefacts to contemporary audiences, heritage studies and technology, 3D modeling/printing);
  • Environmental adaptations (e.g. permanently or temporarily adapting the environment to suit the needs of humans, artificial environments, biospheres/biodomes);
  • Adaptation of space and place (e.g. rehabilitation, renovation, renewal, gentrification, repatriation).

Conference abstract submissions should consist of:

  • A title
  • An abstract (max. 200 words);
  • A short biography (max. 50 words).

Submit abstracts to: [email protected] by the 31 May 2020. The committee aims to have responses returned by 14 June 2020.

Limina and PMRG also welcome themed panel or workshop session proposals for the conference. Proposals should consist of:

  • Panel Title;
  • Proposed Chair (if available);
  • Details of each presenter and paper as described above.

Submit panel/workshop proposals to:  [email protected] by 31 May 2020.

There will be a limited number of bursaries available for post-graduate students and early career researchers (within 5 years of the award of their degree) for presenters travelling from interstate or overseas. Details of the bursaries will be announced shortly.