NEACIS 2015 Session

The Area is proud to sponsor a second session this year at the annual conference of the New England region of the American Conference for Irish Studies. The conference is being held at the University of West Haven on Friday, 20 November, and Saturday, 21 November.

NEACIS 2015 Conference

Saturday, November 21st: Session 6 (Kaplan 203, 3:45-5:00 PM)

Horrors of the Irish Imagination: Papers from the Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area of the Northeast Popular Culture/American Culture Association

Organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area Chair

Chair: Christopher Dowd, University of New Haven

1. “Francis Crozier and the Mysterious Disappearance of the Franklin Expedition”

Donald Vescio, Worcester State University

Don Vescio is a faculty member of Department of English at Worcester State University.  After serving ten years as Worcester State’s Chief Information Office/Vice President of Information Technologies and two years as Vice President of Enrollment Management and Marketing, Don now focuses his energies on teaching undergraduate and graduate students in a variety of disciplines.  His research interests are in critical theory, narratological analysis, and information design. 

2. “Louis MacNeice’s Bogeymen”

Samuel Robertson, Suffolk County Community College 

Sam Robertson is an Associate Professor of English at Suffolk County Community College.  He received his Ph.D. from New York University.  Though he teaches a wide range of courses, and considers himself a Generalist, his specialty is twentieth-century Northern Irish poetry.  He has written on such figures as John Hewitt, Louis MacNeice, Michael Longley, and Derek Mahon.  He lives in Brooklyn and enjoys spending summers in the White Mountains of New Hampshire.

3. “There’s Something Rotten in Denmark Ireland: Irish Zombie Media and the Irish ‘Other’ ”

Kristine Larsen, Central Connecticut State University

Dr. Kristine Larsen is Professor of Astronomy and Faculty Coordinator of the Copernican Observatory and Planetarium at Central Connecticut State University. Her teaching and scholarship focus on the intersections between science and society, including science education, the history of science, and scientific motifs in literature, television, and film. Her research on popular culture has focused on The Walking Dead, Doctor Who, the Resident Evil series of films, Lost, Harry Potter, Dominion, and The Last Mimzy, and in particular the fantasy works of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis, and Andrzej Sapkowski. She is the author of Stephen Hawking: A Biography and Cosmology 101, and co-editor of The Mythological Dimensions of Doctor Who and The Mythological Dimensions of Neil Gaiman. Her twenty-five year career as a science educator has been recognized by the 2014 Connecticut Science Center's Petit Family Foundation Women in Science Leadership Award, the 2013 Walter Scott Houston award of the North East Region of the Astronomical League, the 2007 Distinguished CCSU Alumni Service Award, and the 2001 CCSU Excellence in Teaching Award.

4. “Have the Irish Doomed Civilization?: Bram Stoker’s Dracula and Its Enduring Legacy in the  21st Century”

Michael A. Torregrossa (Independent Scholar) 

Michael A. Torregrossa is a graduate of the Medieval Studies program at the University of Connecticut (Storrs). His research interests include adaptation, Arthuriana, comics and comic art, medievalism, monsters, and wizards. Michael has presented papers on these topics at regional, national, and international conferences, and his work has been published in academic journals and edited collections. Michael is founder of The Alliance for the Promotion of Research on the Matter of Britain and co-founder, with Carl James Grindley, of The Virtual Society for the Study of Popular Culture and the Middle Ages; he also serves as editor for these organizations’ various blogs and moderator of their discussion lists. Besides these activities, he is currently Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area Chair for NEPCA, a position he has held since 2009, and organizes sessions for their annual conference in the fall (and other conferences like this one) and maintains the area’s blogs.

For more information on the Science Fiction, Fantasy, Horror, and Legend Area of the Northeast Popular Culture/American Culture Association please visit our blog at http://nepcafantastic.blogspot.com/.

CFP Ongoing Video Games Studies for the Popular Culture Review

Ongoing Video Games Studies CFP for the Popular Culture Review
Discussion published by Amy Green on Tuesday, September 15, 2015
https://networks.h-net.org/node/GROUP_NID/discussions/83096/ongoing-video-games-studies-cfp-popular-culture-review


The Popular Culture Review is seeking out scholarly articles on video games to be included as part of an ongoing series featured in each issue. While we want to keep the range of topics open, serious consideration of the digital narrative, especially in the form of focused analyses of specific titles or series, are of special interest. Approaches combining the ludological approach with the narratological approach are also of interest. The goal of the journal is to continue to expand upon a growing and serious consideration of gaming as a storytelling platform.

Please submit your articles, as blind attachments, to Dr. Amy M. Green, who is the editor of the gaming section. The PCR accepts electronic submissions only. Please direct them to amy.green@unlv.edu and indicate PCR Gaming Article Submission in your subject line. Please include all author information and the title of the article in the body of your email message.



Additional Information:

The Popular Culture Review is the refereed journal of Far West Popular Culture and American Culture Associations, sponsored by the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, and is published twice yearly. Members of the FWPCA/FWACA receive each issue as part of membership. Single copies may be purchased for $7.50 by individuals. Yearly subscriptions for institutions and libraries are $25.00. Address correspondence to the editor.

Documentation may be in the form appropriate to the discipline of the author. Otherwise, MLA format is preferred. Quotes and paraphrased passages must be followed by their citations within the text. In accordance with copyright laws, we request that quotations not exceed one-hundred (100) words in length.

The author is responsible for obtaining permissions for illustrations, song lyrics, advertisements, etc., which are to be published with the article.

Authors must be members at time of publication. (Persons who have registered for our conference are automatically members for the year of attendance. Those who have been members for at least two years are exempt.)

Call for Book Proposals in "Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture" Series

Of potential interest:

Call for Book Proposals -- R&L "Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture"
Discussion published by Bob Batchelor on Tuesday, September 8, 2015
https://networks.h-net.org/node/GROUP_NID/discussions/82290/call-book-proposals-rl-sports-icons-and-issues-popular-culture

Hello, please see the Call for Proposals/Authors below. I would be happy to answer questions at your convenience. This book series is aimed at smart, general readers, so the emphasis is on strong research and writing. I have suggested some topics that I would like to see and those favored by the Senior Editor I work closely with at Rowman & Littlefield. I welcome additional suggestions!

Please contact me at your convenience: Bob Batchelor, cultpopculture@gmail.com

Call for Proposals

Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture

A New Book Series from Rowman & Littlefield Publishers

Series Editors: Norma Jones and Bob Batchelor

The editors of the Rowman & Littlefield Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture Series are currently accepting proposals for volumes focused on sports stars and how they reflect and influence not only their sport, but also broader popular culture. In an age when these sporting icons cross over into everyday lives and popular culture, the time is ripe for assessing, reassessing, and refocusing our gaze on the centrality of these athletes in our the contemporary world.

Rowman & Littlefield Sports Icons and Issues in Popular Culture Series will include single-author, co-author, and edited volumes that address the concerns listed above. The Series editors also hope to receive proposals that add to our current understanding of past and current sports icons as well as rising stars in the sporting world. This new series intends to demonstrate how these sports icons not only reflect and influence fandom issues but also broader audiences in terms of lifestyle such as fashion and music. The audience for this series is smart, general interest readers, so strong writing and research is preferred to academic jargon.

Potential Topics (among the endless possibilities):

• Lou Gehrig: An American Life
• Shaun White: Bringing Extreme to the Mainstream
• Arnold Palmer: Golf, Life, and the Modern World
• The Green Jacket: A History of the Masters
• Michael Jordan: Icon
• Sugar Ray Leonard and the Making of the 1980s
• Andre Agassi: An American Sports Icon
• New York: The History of a City’s Love (and Hatred) with Sports
• Gina Carano: Lady Fighter
• LINSANITY! An Asian/American Sports Icon

Volumes in the series will typically run between 80,000 – 110,000 words, exclusive of notes, bibliography, and index. Authors and editors are responsible for negotiating and securing their own permissions for use of images, illustrations, and other copyrighted material.

Proposals should include:

-- Discussion of the volume’s significance

-- Competitive titles/studies

-- A proposed table of contents,

-- Estimated length (and number of images, if applicable)

-- Projected timeline for completion,

-- A sample chapter/excerpt that demonstrates writing style and voice

-- Author/editor’s CV

For more information, please see the Rowman & Littlefield Publishers guidelines at: https://rowman.com/Page/RLAuthRes

Inquiries and proposals should be directed to both Series editors, Norma Jones at njones39@kent.edu and Bob Batchelor at cultpopculture@gmail.com, or to Rowman & Littlefield’s Associate Editor in Sports, Arts & Literature: Christen Karniski at ckarniski@rowman.com.

About the Editors:

Bob Batchelor is a cultural historian and media studies scholar who has written or edited 27 books, including John Updike: A Critical Biography (2013) and Gatsby: The Cultural History of the Great American Novel (Rowman & Littlefield, 2014). He is the editor of R & L’s Contemporary American Literature, Great Writers/Great Books, 100 Greatest…, and Cultural History of Television book series. He teaches in the Media, Journalism and Film Department at Miami University.

Norma Jones is a David B. Smith Fellowship recipient and doctoral candidate in the College of Communication and Information at Kent State University. Norma co-edited Aging Heroes: Growing Old in Popular Culture (R&L, 2015). She is the co-editor of two companion volumes on heroines of popular culture (Heroines of Film and Television: Portrayals in Popular Culture, Heroines of Comic Books and Literature: Portrayals in Popular Culture). In addition to contributing to popular press books regarding business and nontraditional student experiences, Norma has authored or co-authored eight chapters/entries in edited volumes such as the American History Thorough American Sports volumes, as well as the Asian and Pacific Islander Americans edition in the Great Lives from History series. She is also an associate editor for The Popular Culture Studies Journal, the official journal of the Midwest Popular Culture / American Culture Association.

CFP Colllection on “You’re Not Cool Just Because You Teach with Comics”: Studies on the Integration of Popular Culture in Teaching and Learning About Education (proposals by 1/31/2016)

I don't know the context here, but it seems a worthwhile endeavor:

“You’re Not Cool Just Because You Teach with Comics”:  Studies on the Integration of Popular Culture in Teaching and Learning About Education
Call for Chapter Proposals
https://networks.h-net.org/node/GROUP_NID/discussions/83751/call-chapter-proposals

Discussion published by Edward Janak on Wednesday, September 16, 2015

Rationale:

A group of high school history teachers attended the 2015 meeting of the Popular Culture Association/American Culture Association.  After each of the first two days, they were enthused and excited to meet a group of like-minded people.  However, after one session, one of the teachers walked up looking dejected.  When asked what was wrong, he fumbled for words for a moment or two, then finally said “Just because you teach using comic books does NOT make you a cool teacher!  And it DEFINITELY doesn’t mean you know what to do with those comics.”

The purpose of this edited volume is to address that frustration.  It is intended to serve as a place for teachers and scholars to begin seeking ways in which popular culture has been tapped for research and teaching purposes in effective means around the country.  The book will be divided into two parts:

Part I will allow teachers and scholars who perform research using popular culture to provide a discussion on any methodological issue or other related topic;
Part II will allow teachers and scholars who have great success teaching via popular culture to discuss the pedagogy/andragogy they tap.

Submission Areas:

Predicted possible topics for papers include, but are not limited to:

• Reflections/linkages between schooling and popular culture in the United States;
• Theoretical perspectives to using popular culture in education, teaching, or preservice teacher education in the United States;
• Use of popular culture in both formal and informal settings;
• International/multinational/cross-border lenses through which popular culture/popular perception of schooling can be viewed;
• The role of history in education, teaching, or preservice teacher education in the United States and/or re-integrating historical foundations into education;
• Successful use(s) of popular culture in education, teaching, or preservice teacher education in the United States;
• Representation(s) of teaching and/or schooling in popular culture through history;
• How education has impacted/has been impacted by popular culture;
• The impact/emergence of LGBTQ studies in schooling and education;
• Queering any of the represented fields/multidisciplinary approaches to the represented fields (education, schooling, history, archival studies, teaching, preservice teacher education);
• Otherization/de-otherization of immigrants via their representation(s) in popular culture (Hollywood, Television);
• Tapping into (or resisting) popular technology to improve education; and/or
• Exploring the intersections of social media, social identity and education.

Proposals:

We thus invite educational scholars to submit the following to both of the editors appearing below:

An abstract of 500 words (excluding sources cited) providing an overview of the chapter in its entirety
A list of tentative sources cited/data points; and
Brief (1-2 page) curriculum vitae of each contributor including, when relevant: affiliation/position, publication history, and educational history.

Please note:  Graduate students, K-12 teachers and independent scholars are all highly encouraged to submit. When possible, we encourage collaboration with a university faculty member.

Submissions:

If accepted, contributors will be responsible for producing manuscripts that meet the following criteria:

• be relevant to the field and further the conversation;
• be a minimum of 5,000 words (20-35 pages) in length;
• follow all formatting and style guidelines from the Chicago Manual of Style;
• contain all original material (not have been previously published); and
• not contain any copyrighted material (images, lengthy passages, etc).

Important Deadlines and Dates:

• Submission of abstracts to editors: January 31, 2016
• Notification of decisions to contributors: April 2016
• Submission of proposal to Lexington Press: May 2016
• Chapter submission to editors: August 2016
• Revision/redraft of chapters from editors: November 2017
• Revision re-submission from contributors: January 2017
• Submission to press: June 1, 2017
• Tentative publication date: November 2017

Editor Information:

All enquiries should be directed to:

Dr. Edward Janak, Chair          
Educational Foundations and Leadership
Judith Herb College of Education
University of Toledo
5000-C Gillham Hall, Mail Stop 921
2801 West Bancroft Street
Toledo, OH  43606-3390
Phone: (419) 530-4114
Email: Edward.janak@utoledo.edu


Dr. Ludovic A. Sourdot
Associate Professor, Curriculum & Instruction
Department of Teacher Education
Texas Woman’s University
P.O. Box 425769
Denton, TX 76204-5769
Phone:(940) 898-2216
Email: lsourdot@mail.twu.edu

CFP Essay Collection on The Hobbit in Fiction and Film (abstracts by 12/1/2015)

From H-Film:
https://networks.h-net.org/node/14467/discussions/86662/cfp-essay-collection-hobbit-fiction-and-film-working-title

CFP: Essay Collection on The Hobbit in Fiction and Film (working title) with McFarland publisher

Discussion published by Janice Bogstad on Friday, October 2, 2015
COMPARING JACKSON’S The Hobbit FILMS TO TOLKIEN’s NOVEL: : Text into Film   Edited by Dr. Janice M Bogstad

 Call for papers for an essay collection -12-15 essays of 6000-8,000 words in length.

The deadline for receipt of an abstract, for consideration, is Dec 1, 2015. Final manuscripts are due March 1, 2016 with encouragement for earlier submission.  Contact me to discuss exceptions.



Send Abstracts and address queries to:    
Dr. Janice M. Bogstad, Professor    bogstajm@uwec.edu  715-836-6032
(McIntyre Library U of Wisconsin-Eau Claire   Eau Claire, WI  54702-5010

Manuscripts will be reviewed in a double-blind process by peer reviewers after having been tentatively accepted by the editor.

The collection will consider comparisons between Tolkien’s original Hobbit and the three Jackson films.  Of interest are structural parallels and differences, changes in character-focus from the book to the films, and considerations of philosophical differences in the overall message of Tolkien’s original book and Jackson’s films, but other well-supported arguments will also be considered.  As with the previously published essay collection, Picturing Tolkien (McFarland 2011), this collection will focus on positive comparisons. Essayists may wish to discuss features of the film that are, in their judgment, less successful, but will be asked to hold condemnation of the cinematic text simply on the basis of its differences from the textual narrative.  Authors may decide to focus on the films or the novel but the primary focus is comparative features of both.  Contribution to Tolkien scholarship can be articulated with two concepts:  its audience is the informed reader, not only the Tolkien, literary or film critic.  Its basic framework is in respect of co-measurability, that the books and the films are co-creations with parallel structures that intersect at certain points.  Each should be examined and compared as if those comparisons and intersections are significant to understanding contemporary Tolkien studies.

CFP James Bond: Spectre and the Daniel Craig Era (Spec Issue of The Journal of Popular Film and Television) (8/21/2016)

From H-Film:
https://networks.h-net.org/node/14467/discussions/94136/cfp-special-themed-issue-james-bond-spectre-and-daniel-craig-era

CFP: Special Themed Issue on James Bond: Spectre and the Daniel Craig Era

Discussion published by Lisa Funnell on Friday, November 6, 2015
CFP: Special Themed Issue on James Bond: Spectre and the Daniel Craig Era
The Journal of Popular Film and Television

The release of Spectre (2015), the 24th James Bond film, has been accompanied by much speculation in the critical and popular media about the film. From discussions about casting and characterization to the circulation of photographs of shooting locations to conversations about the style and tone of the new Bond song, Spectre has been a topic of conversation long before the film was released. As the film debuts in various international markets, anticipation and conjecture are steadily being replaced by questions about the current direction of the series and speculation as to whether the franchise even has a future. As Daniel Craig reportedly noted, he would rather “slash his wrists” than play James Bond for a fifth time, just before British critics, as it turns out, celebrated his performance in Spectre.

The Journal of Popular Film and Television will address these questions in a special James Bond themed issue focusing on Spectre (2015) and the other Daniel Craig James Bond films: Casino Royale (2006), Quantum of Solace (2008), and Skyfall (2012). This special issue will be edited by Dr. Lisa Funnell (University of Oklahoma) and Dr. Klaus Dodds (Royal Holloway, University of London). We are interested in papers that analyze Spectre and the other Craig era films from a socio-cultural perspective and address topics such as:

• heroism
• villainy from individual villains to organizations like Quantum and Spectre
• narrative structure, style, and tone
• inclusion, adaptation, and/or absence of traditional Bond elements
• geopolitics and geographies of Bond
• feminism
• social locations such as gender, race, class, sexual orientation, ability, nationality, etc.
• action aesthetics/choreography and the body
• nationality, (post)colonialism, and/or imperialism
• post-9/11 and/or post-7/7 context
• terrorism (domestic, cyber, nuclear, corporate)
• technology and gadgetry (or lack thereof)

Submissions should be 5000 to 7000 words in length (including bibliography and notes), be double spaced in Times New Roman font, and adhere to MLA style. Please include a 100 word abstract and 5-7 key words to facilitate online searches. Send an electronic copy of your submission in .doc or .docx format to Dr. Lisa Funnell lfunnell@ou.edu and Dr. Klaus Dodds K.Dodds@rhul.ac.uk by August 21, 2016.

For more information about the Journal of Popular Film and Television, please see http://www.tandfonline.com/action/journalInformation?show=aimsScope&journalCode=vjpf20#.VjEmsytqmpo

Any inquiries about the special themed issue on James Bond should be directed towards Dr. Lisa Funnell lfunnell@ou.edu or Dr. Klaus Dodds K.Dodds@rhul.ac.uk

Editor Bios:

Lisa Funnell, Ph.D is an Assistant Professor in Women’s and Gender Studies at the University of Oklahoma. She is the editor of For His Eyes Only: The Women of James Bond (Wallflower 2015) and has published extensively on gender and feminism in James Bond. She is currently writing a book with Klaus Dodds on The Geographies, Genders, and Geopolitics of James Bond (Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming)

Klaus Dodds, Ph.D. is Professor of Geopolitics at Royal Holloway, University of London. He has written numerous articles on the popular geopolitics of James Bond and other spies/assassins including Jason Bourne. His book with Columbia University Press on International Politics and Film co-written with Sean Carter was published in May 2014.

They recently published “‘The Man with the Midas Touch’: The Haptic Geographies of James Bond's Body” Journal of Popular Film and Television 43(2015): 121-135.