We are pleased to present our 2025 conference on “Speculative Futures in Languages, Literatures, and Cultures.”

In our globalized world, and its increasingly frenetic pace, we find ourselves envisioning speculative futures to deal with our profoundly changed relationship with the world and access to information. In today’s anxiety-inducing state of the world, both highly connected and dangerously jaded by the world’s tragedies, our collective consciousness carries a multiscalar burden on its shoulders: Climate and nature crises threaten humankind’s existence, increasing political instability at home and around the world endanger the futures and livelihoods of marginalized communities, and concerns have been voiced in higher education, where humanism as progress seems to lose in favor of mercantile interests. To deal with these challenges, artists, writers, intellectuals, and teachers —among many others— build speculative visions for the future in search of hypothetical scenarios, solutions, and alternative events and to challenge the present narratives. These speculative futures are traversed by our pasts and presents, inevitably.  To speculate is often defined as reflecting, theorizing and wondering. The future is defined as the times, developments and events yet to come. Together, speculative futures can involve reflections, theories, or simple curiosity about the future and are often shaped by affections such as hope and fear. Whether the outlook is utopian or dystopian, what paths is the “anxious generation” (Haidt, 2024) taking to tackle our ever-more complex societies? Fear, hope, or caution? 

We welcome papers and panels in English from graduate students that examine some of these questions and thus envision speculative futures from the perspectives of literary and cultural studies, film and media studies, digital humanities, creative arts, and second language acquisition or linguistics.

During the conference, we will explore questions such as:

• What does the future look like for the humanities? How can or might this change?

• Which new developments within Second Language Acquisition [SLA] will help shape the future of learning second languages? 

• How can future or current technological developments help shape the future for cultural- and literary disciplines as well as language learning? Which role does AI play in shaping literature, cultures, and language learning?

• What does the changing landscape for learning languages currently look like and which futures might be envisioned based on these developments?

• What are some future visions for minority groups in a given cultural context? 

• Which social or cultural challenges are we currently—or soon—facing and how can our disciplines help envision a more positive outlook on these futures?

• Where will speculative futures take our disciplines and which speculations are already in the making? What role does hope play in ultra-contemporary literature?

• How does a genre such as “eco-dystopia” tackle the difficult reality we live in? Which perspectives does ecocriticism contribute to these developments?

• Which ethical and moral responsibilities of universities arise in the face of knowledge vs. performance? What are some forthcoming challenges and potential solutions?

Submissions should contribute to advancing our understanding of how speculative futures are being shaped by the evolving landscape of humanities, artificial intelligence, and technological progress. We welcome interdisciplinary perspectives that bridge the gap between theory and practice, offering insights into the complex dynamics of these interconnected fields.