*CFP* "GEORGE A. ROMERO: A CANNIBALIZED BODY OF WORK?", INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

International Conference

George A. Romero: A Cannibalized Body of Work?

November 24-25, 2022, Montpellier, France

 

Dug up in 2019, The Amusement Park (1973), and released in theaters in June 2021, commissioned by the Lutherian Church, stands as a reminder that George Andrew Romero (1940-2017) was not just the director of Night of the Living Dead (1968) and creator of the modern zombie. By focusing on an old man abandoned in a theme park where he will be subjected to all sorts of humiliation and abuse, the Pittsburgh director once again fires away at US-American society and remains faithful to an aesthetics whereby the figures of Gothic horror are portrayed in a raw realist mode.

Prompted by this posthumous release, and considering the continued relevance of Romero’s stories of contamination, zombified lives, and deserted stores and streets in the light of a global pandemic, this two-day international conference aims to decenter the habitual views cast on a body of work that has been cannibalized by the living dead. From 1968 to 2009, ten out of the sixteen feature films directed by Romero have ignored the creature to focus on witches in Jack’s Wife/Season of the Witch (1972), vampires in Martin (1977), killer monkeys in Monkey Shines (1988) and faceless yuppies in Bruiser (2000).

*CFP* LLAMADA A PARTICIPACIÓN, XXI CONGRESO DE LA ASOCIACIÓN INTERNACIONAL DE HISPANISTAS

XXI Congreso de la Asociación Internacional de Hispanistas (AIH)

Neuchâtel, del 11 al 16 de julio de 2022

Université de Neuchâtel

 

La Université de Neuchâtel y la Asociación Internacional de Hispanistas invitan a participar en este congreso que se celebra del 11 al 16 de julio de 2022 en Neuchâtel (Suiza).

Se aceptarán comunicaciones referidas a los ejes temáticos que tradicionalmente han sido tratados en los Congresos de la AIH: literaturas hispánicas (géneros, períodos, temas, autores, lectura y recepción, literatura oral, escritura femenina y estudios de género, etc.); lingüística hispánica (diacrónica y sincrónica); enseñanza del español; cultura hispánica (arte, historia, cine, etc.). En el marco de esta amplia convocatoria, se prevén ejes temáticos específicos que serán anunciados próximamente.

El evento se desarrollará en seis jornadas, que integrarán:

*CFP* "EXPLORING MOTHERLY INSTINTICS: REPRESENTATION OF MOTHERS IN INDIAN CINEMA", SPECIAL ISSUE, CAFÉ DISSENSUS JOURNAL

The figure of the mother has always been glorified and depicted in black and white without shades of grey. However, time and again filmmakers and academic thinkers have strived to push this conventional depiction to accommodate various layers associated with the concept of motherhood, as they have sought to challenge the simplistic representation of mothers in popular media. It is important to explore the maternal world further in this highly digitized, globalized and gender-neutral environment.

This proposed issue of Café Dissensus aims to curate a collection of essays on the representation of mothers in films that go beyond the stereotypical portrayal of motherhood as epitomized in the figures of Nirupa Roy and Rakhee Gulzar in conventional Bollywood style, showing unconditional love toward her offspring. 

The proposed issue welcomes submissions on the following themes (though not limited to them):

• Queerness and motherhood 
• Good vs. bad mothers 

*CFP* "USEFUL FILM IN (NEURO) PSYCHIATRY EUROPE, 1900-1950", WORKSHOP

Workshop “Useful Film in (Neuro) Psychiatry Europe, 1900–1950”

University of Lausanne 3-4 March 2022

This workshop is organized in the framework of the SNSF project Cinéma et (neuro)psychiatrie en Suisse: autour de la collection Waldau, 1920-1990

 

Since its inception, the cinematograph had many applications in the medical field, and particularly in the fields of psychiatry, neurology and neuropsychiatry. With surgeons, neurologists and psychiatrists are at the forefront of using film as a tool for analyzing, storing, archiving, and transmitting knowledge. For a long time, the (neuro) psychiatric films made by doctors as part of their teaching and research have been overshadowed by educational and health films. But since 2000, and especially 2010, scholars from different disciplines are increasingly interested in these practices. Several interdisciplinary teams have conducted research, with the aim of rehabilitating film as a privileged source for both the history of medicine and the history of cinema.

*CFP* CALL FOR PROPOSALS, CRITICAL COMPANIONS TO POPULAR DIRECTORS SERIES

The series covers many directors who have not been studied previously in academic publications and whose works nonetheless are highly renowned nowadays. The intent of the series is to offer interesting and illuminating interpretations of the various directors’ films that will be accessible to both scholars of the academic community and critically-minded fans of the directors’ works. Each volume combines discussions of a director’s oeuvre from a broad range of disciplines and methodologies, thus offering the reader a variegated and compelling picture of the directors’ works. In this sense, the volumes will be of interest (and will be instructive) for students and scholars engaged in subjects as different as film studies, literature, philosophy, popular culture studies, religion and others. We welcome proposals for both monographs and edited collections that offer interdisciplinary analyses, focusing on the complete oeuvre of one contemporary director per volume.

Proposals may include (but are certainly not limited to) the following directors:

• Woody Allen; 
• Luc Besson; 
• Katryn Bigelow; 

*CFP* CALL FOR ARTICLES, NEXT ISSUES, NEW CINEMAS: JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY FILM

New Cinemas is seeking scholars and practitioners working in the fields below to act as peer reviewers. A vital part of academic publishing, peer review enriches the discipline and improves the work of authors and reviewers alike. We encourage reviewers from diverse backgrounds and at different stages of their career to join the peer review pool. We are particularly interested in hearing from researchers in Asian cinemas, film theory and philosophy, and genres such as horror and sci-fi.

New Cinemas is a peer-reviewed journal aiming to provide a platform for the study of new forms of cinematic practice and fresh approaches to cinemas hitherto neglected in western scholarship. It particularly welcomes scholarship that does not take existing paradigms and theoretical conceptualisations as given; rather, it anticipates submissions that are refreshing in approach and exhibit a willingness to tackle cinematic practices that are still in the process of development into something new.

We particularly welcome submissions from those close to completing their Ph.D., Early Career Researchers and practitioners, especially from outside ‘Western’ spaces, as well as work on film beyond the text (such as festivals, technology and marketing). We also seek to publish research and cutting-edge thought in shorter formats than the traditional academic article.

*CFP* "FILM EXHIBITION: THE ITALIAN CONTEXT", SYMPOSIUM AND EDITED VOLUME

This symposium and edited volume seeks to draw together research into cinematic exhibition in Italy throughout the twentieth and twenty-first century. Current research into Italian cinema is continuously expanding its purview to consider the great range of genres, forms and contexts that have been engaged by filmmakers working in the country. Similarly, recent studies have shone vital light on the complex make up of Italy’s film audiences, and on the practices of film producers and distributors in the country. This project will continue this critical expansion by investigating the myriad ways in which film media (both Italian and foreign) has been exhibited and consumed in Italy. It aims to investigate both the audience experience of film exhibition and the practices of exhibitors themselves (eg their programming habits, the construction and restoration of cinemas, their relationships with distributors and political organisations etc).

Possible subjects of discussion could include, but are not limited to:

• The screening of silent/early films at travelling fairs and other public events 
• The establishment/construction of Italy’s first purpose-built cinemas 
• The conversion of Italian cinemas to sound 

*CFP* "SHORT-FORM HORROR: HISTORY, PEDAGOGY, AND PRACTICE", ISSUE 5.2, MONSTRUM JOURNAL

From TV to TikTok, movie trailers to music videos, and GIFs to short films, the short form dominates most of our media consumption. The horror genre is ripe for experimentation in the short form, through screamer videos, short stories and flash fiction, television series, and even commercials. Today, most horror creators work primarily in the short form; with the continually prohibitive costs associated with a sustained feature-length filmmaking career, many filmmakers and creators—particularly those marginalized by race, gender, or socioeconomic status—prefer, or are compelled, to explore the creative and professional possibilities of short-form media. 

While the number of BIPOC, queer, and women-identifying creators who have established and successful careers in horror filmmaking remain few and far between, the short-form market is brimming with content from these often-marginalized voices and is, therefore, one of the most productive media niches for theorizing issues of race, gender, sexuality, disability, and the intersectionality of these identifiers in the horror genre. In attending to the richness of the short form, how can scholars, makers and curators not simply diversify the content and canon of horror as a field, but also challenge our assumptions of how we read, analyze, consumer and react to horror media?

*CFP* "THE 'LITTLE APPARATUS': 100 YEARS OF 9.5MM FILM", INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE

The ‘little apparatus’: 100 years of 9.5mm film

16, 17, 18 June 2022

University of Southampton

 

An international conference hosted in person and online by the Department of Film Studies’ Centre For International Film Research at the University of Southampton.

December 1922 will mark the centenary of the introduction of 9.5mm film to the French cinematographic market.  Pathé Freres first launched their ‘Pathé Baby’ home cinema system on domestic territory in time for the Christmas season, with the promise of a soon to follow lightweight and modestly priced cine-camera using the same narrow gauge, that could fit in a vest pocket (1923, pp. 48–50). In time, the new gauge became available elsewhere -arriving just ahead of Kodak’s 16mm film/cinema system and together signalling the first major boom in amateur filmmaking.

*CFP* "SPIES AND SECRET AGENTS ON EASTERN EUROPEAN SCREENS", SPECIAL ISSUE, STUDIES IN EASTERN EUROPEAN CINEMA JOURNAL

While various generic manifestations of popular cinema in Eastern Europe have attracted increasing scholarly attention, as testified, for instance, by special issues of SEEC devoted to sci-fi and musicals, a  research gap can still be observed regarding the espionage genre in the region, despite the fact that some of the Eastern European titles of this variety have become box office hits. The lukewarm academic interest in Eastern European spy thrillers thus far can perhaps be partly explained by the low cultural prestige of the genre and its assumed adherence to the hegemonies and realpolitik of the Cold War – implicit preconceptions that the proposed special issue is designed to address.

 

Aside from screen stories with a central focus on clandestine affairs, we also encourage studies on works that present secret agents in a range of generic frameworks, such as historical dramas, biopics or comedies.

• Some of the possible topics and approaches include:
• The espionage genre and cinematic secret agents before World War II
• Spy films and Cold War

*CFP* "THE IDEA OF THE SHAKESPEARE ACTOR", EDITED COLLECTION

What comes to mind when we think about the Shakespearean actor, or Shakespearean acting? What do actors past, present, and future consider ‘Shakespearean acting’ to be? Is the idea of the Shakespearean actor helpful, or does it limit and restrict the notion of what Shakespearean performance can be?

Histories of Shakespearean acting have often provided catalogues of names weighted in favour of white cisgender actors including David Garrick, John Gielgud, Laurence Olivier, Derek Jacobi, Kenneth Branagh, and Mark Rylance, in favour of cerebral or declamatory performance styles, and in favour of performing in an English accent. This collection will read against the grain of theatre history to confront the idea of the Shakespearean actor.

As performance trends have changed over the last thirty or forty years, and as landmark works in Shakespeare and early modern performance studies have shown, the limits and definition of ‘the Shakespearean’ have expanded.[1] New approaches address the limits of a teleological, British-centric approach to the histories of Shakespearean acting and acting practices: there have been interesting challenges to the limits of 'Shakespearean acting' from earlier periods, from figures such as Ira Aldridge, Paul Robeson, Asta Nielsen, Ellen Terry, Sarah Bernhardt, Fanny Furnival, Sarah Siddons, and even Edward Kynaston.

*CFP* "REGGAE FILMS, REGGAE ICONS, REGGAE MUSIC", 7TH GLOBAL REGGAE CONFERENCE

 "Reggae Films, Reggae Icons, Reggae Music"

7th Global Reggae Conference

University of the West Indies

February 16-19, 2022

 

 

Hosted typically as a premier biennial event, in this its 7th staging, the Global Reggae Conference shifts to a triennial offering in 2022. Hosted inside Jamaica’s Reggae Month, this conference will engage academics within a wide field of scholastic orientations and practice. In celebration of the productive space created by the film, this conference aims to bring together students, scholars, filmmakers, researchers, writers, critics, music aficionados, and artists to deliberate on the conference theme. This event comes as part of larger project on music, popular culture and Reggae Studies in particular, through which scholars, students, institutions have engaged in partnership to expand scholarship and outreach through research, creative production, community engagement, experimentation, archive building, and exhibitions, among others.

*CFP* "IMAGES BETWEEN SERIES AND STREAM. RETHINKING SERIALITY AND STREAMING", INTERDISCIPLINARY CONFERENCE

Interdisciplinary Conference

“Images Between Series and Stream – Rethinking Seriality and Streaming”

18-19 November 2021. Conference will be held online.

 

In the last few years watching TV series has become a distinct socio-cultural phenomenon. The increasing rise of streaming media services has profoundly changed the accessibility standards of TV series but also the way of watching them. However, the domestication of our life in pandemic, made us realize that streaming series and films should become more important objects of our interest than ever before. In some sense, we live in-series and on-stream platforms. New technological situations, such as the presence of videoconferences in our life, presents us not only with new problems but a new reorganisation of sensibile as Jacques Ranciere might say. Video-technology enters into our private sphere and in some sense it calls us to be constantly available – to be on-stream but also to live in series of accessibilities. The re-organisation of our life is obvious, but the role of images in this “re-” or “de-” organisation still requires some reflection. We are in constant tension between being-in-series and being-on-stream. We perceive ourselves as moving-images on screen. It affects our relationships and our perception. The collaboration of the Techno-Humanities Lab and Film Lab encourages us to ask questions on two different planesphilosophical and cinematic one. Thus, we ask what happens with the pieces of the film art when they become just “tiles” on a streaming platform — a series of „bricks in the wall”? But also – what happens with us when we become just tiles on video conference meetings?

*CFP* "WASTE", VOL. 42.2 (FALL 2022), SPECTATOR JOURNAL

Look around and all the eyes can see is waste. From piles of face masks used during the COVID-19 pandemic to heaps of fake lifejackets left behind by migrants along Europe’s shores, we seem to be surrounded by discarded objects—used, abused, and left behind. As climate change accelerates and racial capitalism continues its relentless agenda of extraction and consumption, human and nonhuman life grows increasingly disposable as well. Despite—or perhaps because of—ongoing calls for better “management,” governments seem more than willing to sacrifice the elderly, disabled, and poor in order to “save” the economy. Over the past few years, we have watched states detain migrant children in cages and abandon refugees stranded at sea. We have witnessed communities around the world endure increasingly extreme weather events while environmental regulations are dismantled by autocrats and democrats alike.

Waste, materially and conceptually, is marked by a certain excess. The term ‘waste’ can signal excessive practices of extraction and production, or improper habits of consumption (wasting food, wasteful spending). It can describe an excess of the body (excrement), and the refusal or inability to make the body productive (wasted talent, waste of time, to waste away from disease or malnourishment). As a verb, ‘waste’ can also mark excessive acts of destruction (laying to waste). Across these uses, waste seems to connote a transgression, a violation of an intended order.

*CFP* CALL FOR ARTICLES, ISSUE 1 & 2, VOLUME 2022, NEW CINEMAS: JOURNAL OF CONTEMPORARY FILM

New Cinemas is a peer-reviewed journal aiming to provide a platform for the study of new forms of cinematic practice and fresh approaches to cinemas hitherto neglected in western scholarship. It particularly welcomes scholarship that does not take existing paradigms and theoretical conceptualisations as given; rather, it anticipates submissions that are refreshing in approach and exhibit a willingness to tackle cinematic practices that are still in the process of development into something new.

The journal aims to provide a platform for the study of new forms of cinematic practice and fresh approaches to cinemas hitherto neglected in western scholarship. It particularly welcomes scholarship that does not take existing paradigms and theoretical conceptualisations as given; rather, it anticipates submissions that are refreshing in approach and exhibit a willingness to tackle cinematic practices that are still in the process of development into something new.

All articles submitted should be original work and must not be under consideration by other publications.

*CFP* "VFX AND FANS: PARTICIPATORY CULTURE AND THE INDUSTRY", SPECIAL ISSUE, KINEPHANOS JOURNAL

Interactions between creators from the entertainment industry and the fan community have been around for a long time. In 1891, Holmes fans reacted very strongly to the famous detective death. It resulted in a flood of angry letters sent to author Conan Doyle, who resurrected him in a subsequent episode. Even the Hollywood star system was first motivated by the fans’ desire to know their favorite actors appearing as anonymous shadows on the screen. Later on, communities gathered around sci-fi magazines such as Hugo Gernsbach's Amazing Stories in 1926. It was a decisive moment that saw the birth of "fandom" as we know it today, and it certainly contributed to the emergence of audiences known as "cultists", a term coined by Matt Hills (2002), which is a type of public that is increasingly knowledgeable, who feels a certain "empowerment" towards fetishized works. 

The end of the 20th century, with the development and democratization of digital technologies, has witnessed the rise of this new consumer-producer paradigm that thumbs its nose at the ideology of the Frankfurt School's passive consumer. Without forgetting that the modern fan is the product of a long line of popular works and "B-movies", from Flash Gordon (1936) to the science fiction films of the 1940s and 1950s in the United States (with the rise of communism and its alien invasion films), from Star Trek in the 60s to Star Wars in 70s - a wave on which the franchise is still "surfing". Special effects films, a cinema of attraction that traditionally places "the effect" at the center (Gunning), have always fascinated the public, but always from a distance without being able to really interact with them or create or propose their alternative versions. The only interventions possible were, until now, centered on "a posteriori" actions, via journal sections of readers' letters, for example, or web forums, without much impact on the result.

*CFP* "HOLLYWOOD REFRAMING", MONOGRAPHS OR EDITED VOLUMES

Announcing the Reframing Hollywood series at Mississippi University Press.

The Reframing Hollywood series will feature dynamic and original short monographs and edited collections, each of which explore a single film of significant cultural impact which has emerged from the American film industry since the turn of the new millennium. These vibrant critical explorations of contemporary American film will offer a stimulating, academic, yet accessible interrogation of a single work from a variety of critical perspectives.

The inaugural volume in the series, Black Panther: Interrogating a Cultural Phenomenon by Terence McSweeney, is the first in-depth study of one of Marvel’s most successful and culturally influential films. Future volumes in the series will focus on films from such popular genres as science fiction, horror, superhero films, action, comedy, war, animation, and a variety of others. Each contribution is intended to offer challenging, up-to-date, and compelling insights into contemporary American cinema and what it means to the world.

Each manuscript in the series should maintain an overall word count between 40,000 and 60,000 words.

*CFP* "AND YET IT MOVES! ON CINEMA, MEDIA, AND MOBILITY", XXVIII INTERNATIONAL FILM AND MEDIA STUDIES CONFERENCE

And Yet It Moves! On Cinema, Media, and Mobility

XXVIII International Film and Media Studies Conference

November 2nd–5th 2021

On-line/Udine – Gorizia (IT)

 

The covid pandemic has dramatically revealed the high level of mobility in our contemporary society by, paradoxically, reducing human movement to almost zero, even if images, data, news, financial flows, material goods, and the virus itself have continued to circulate at full speed around the globe. The pandemic has provoked new configurations of the media system, pushing media adaptability and pervasiveness into unexpected scenarios, and accelerating technological and socio-cultural processes already underway (Keidl, Melamed, Hediger and Somaini 2021). As we seem to slowly regain our mobility, it seems fitting to reflect at large on the role historically played by cinema and media in shaping movement and space. 

*CFP* CALL FOR CONTRIBUTION, FILM HISTORY BOOK SERIES

We are seeking proposals for complete/in-progress/planned manuscripts and edited collections for a proposed book series. The series will focus on film history: both the history of film as media texts and the history/evolution of the cinematic apparatus.

RIT press has expressed interest in this series and has asked that we secure some projects before moving forward with approval. 

Potential topics include but are not limited to:

• classical films, directors, and genres 
• early cinematic technology 
• historical advances in cinematic technology 
• historical politics and propaganda in film 
• historical analysis of the production, distribution, exhibition, and reception of film 
• historical adaptations 
• production histories – the studio system and beyond 

*CFP* "POETIC INSURRECTIONS. ROMANTIC LEGACIES IN MODERN AND CONTEMPORARY FILM AESTHETICS", INTERNATIONAL FILM STUDIES CONFERENCE

Poetic Insurrections. Romantic Legacies in Modern and Contemporary Film Aesthetics

Research Centre for Visual Poetics (University of Antwerp)

20-21 January 2022

 

The ‘return’ to Romanticism in the recent consideration of modernist cinemas (see Richard Suchenski, Projections of Memory: Romanticism, Modernism, and the Aesthetics of Film; Daniel Morgan, Late Godard and the Possibilities of Cinema) can be taken as a way to frame the apparent contradictions in the work of a number of key figures: the revolutionary cinema of Jean-Luc Godard seems at odds with the seeming reactionism of a sanctification of natural beauty in his ‘late’ works. The strict materialism of Jean-Marie Straub and Danièle Huillet, in its turn, gave way to reflections on the necessity of myth and utopian ideals in the politicization of art. And although the cinema of Marguerite Duras is characterized by a destructive negativity, her films exhibit a minute attention to material presence. We believe that the same contradictions that characterize these works can be found in the films of a number of contemporary filmmakers - Chantal Akerman, Abbas Kiarostami, Hong Sang-soo, Wang Bing, Lav Diaz, Albert Serra etc. - allowing us to align them with the project of aesthetic modernism. It is our contention (one we share with Nancy & Lacoue-Labarthe, Rancière, J.M. Schaeffer and others) that this project can indeed best be approached by considering its romantic undercurrent.