Call for Proposals

Assembling Uncharted Futures: Interrogating Traditions Through the Process of Recovery and Renewal.


Radical change has the power to compel us to question what we know and who we are in relation to present circumstances. How might we rethink our identities, experiences, relationships, and ways of moving through the world as we venture into unmapped futures? How do we respond to the unknown considering the familiarity of what is known? Moreover, how do we recover and restore from the pain of the past and contemplate the weight of long-standing traditions? This year’s GEO Conference carries the theme of assembling uncharted futures--the process of navigating new territory while keeping in mind the lessons of tradition. We engage with the processes of recovery and renewal brought on by the experience of change, and we invite critical interrogation of tradition(s) as they fade into the past and lose their grip on present circumstances.


We welcome papers and projects, both creative and academic, that respond to themes of navigating the unknown, questioning the strongholds of tradition, and embarking on recovery and renewal. We invite proposals for individual papers, panels, and roundtables, as well as creative writing submissions (poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, prose, etc.) and nontraditional approaches to conference panels. Interdisciplinary panels and panels that speak to diverse sites of intellectual production outside the academy are particularly welcome.


This conference will take place as a Zoom webinar Friday March 4 and Saturday March 5, 2022.


Potential areas/topics to explore:


  • Creative fiction/nonfiction/poetry/prose

  • Themes of citizenship and implications of immigration/borders

  • Social justice movements including: Black Lives Matter, the Civil Rights Movement, LGBTQ rights, Women’s rights, Reproductive Justice/Rights, etc.

  • Historical occurrences of plagues, pandemics, removal of bodily autonomy and rights

  • Historical recovery/archival studies

  • Interdisciplinary studies

  • Library & information science

  • Literary approaches/analyses of world crises

  • Literature as protest, expression, and activism

  • Intersections between STEM and the humanities

  • Activism/Social Justice Reform, Policy

  • Historical and/or Cultural Narratives

  • Speculative Approaches and Futurism

  • Digital Studies

  • Theatre/Performance Studies

  • Disability Studies

  • Rhetoric, including: rhetorical theory; history of rhetoric; women’s and feminist rhetorics; digital rhetorics; cultural rhetorics

  • Composition and Writing Studies: including creative writing pedagogy, collaborative learning, ESL pedagogy, writing center studies

  • Literature and Film

  • Genre Studies

  • Memory/Trauma Studies

  • Ecocriticism

  • Critiques of Tradition

  • Critical Race Theory/Legal Studies; Law & Literature

  • Postcolonial studies


For paper proposals or creative submissions, please submit a 200-300 word abstract or summary of creative work. For panel proposals, including roundtables or nontraditional panels, submit an abstract of no more than 500 words. Please include your preferred email, institutional affiliation and full name. Send all submissions to conference.geo@gmail.com no later than January 7 at 11:59pm.