ASANOR 2026 | American Studies Association of Norway 

Constituting the US in the 21st Century 

June 4–6, 2026 | University of Agder, Kristiansand 

The 2026 American Studies Association of Norway Conference looks back to its early years for inspiration. The very first themed ASANOR seminar was titled “The Bicentennial of the US Constitution.” Many years later we return to this document, not only to revisit its cultural and historical significance but also to ask what it means to invoke the Constitution now, in a time of intensifying democratic crisis and rising illiberalism. 

From the expansion of executive power to attacks on voting rights, judicial independence, and press freedoms, many of the traditional pillars of U.S. liberal democracy are under threat. However, illiberalism is not new to the American experience. Slavery, settler colonialism, voter suppression, censorship, and patriarchal legal structures all point to a long and uneven history of constitutional struggle. 

This conference invites scholars of American literature, history, politics, culture, and the arts to reflect on how the United States has been—and continues to be—constituted: legally, politically, imaginatively, and culturally. How have people in and beyond the U.S. interpreted, challenged, reimagined, or resisted the idea of America as defined by its Constitution? 

We welcome papers addressing topics such as (but not limited to): 

▪ Literary, historical, or artistic responses to constitutional principles, such as freedom of speech, equal protection, or separation of powers, across different eras 

▪ The role of American literature and culture in both supporting and resisting liberal democracy 

▪ Longstanding traditions of illiberalism in American life and their relevance for understanding the present 

▪ The global reception of American constitutional ideals: how have they have inspired, disappointed, or been critiqued from abroad 

▪ Feminist, queer, and trans critiques of the Constitution, especially around gender equality and bodily autonomy 

▪ Indigenous responses to constitutional frameworks, especially concerning sovereignty and land rights 

▪ Post-liberal visions in U.S. fiction, political thought, or speculative media: dystopian, utopian, or otherwise 

▪ The Constitution as a cultural text: its poetics, rhetoric, and symbolic power 

▪ The challenges posed by new technologies (AI, biotech, surveillance) to constitutional understandings of privacy, agency, or citizenship 

▪ Reconsiderations of U.S. citizenship, inclusion, and belonging in changing legal and cultural contexts 

This is an open call to scholars across disciplines, as well as to educators, artists, activists, and public intellectuals. We encourage proposals that consider the role of American Studies abroad and the transnational implications of current political shifts in the United States. 

Submit abstracts of roughly 300 words plus a bio note to Stephen Dougherty (stephen.d.dougherty@uia.no). The deadline for submitting abstracts for conference presentations is Oct. 15, 2025. More information about the conference will be coming soon. 

Call for Papers

The twenty-second HCA Spring Academy on American Culture, Economics, Geography, History, Literature, Politics, and Religion will be held from March 24-28, 2025. The Heidelberg Center for American Studies (HCA) invites applications for this annual one-week conference that provides twenty international Ph.D. students with the opportunity to present and discuss their Ph.D. projects.

We encourage applications that pursue an interdisciplinary approach and range broadly across the arts, humanities, and social sciences. Papers can be presented on any subject relating to the study of the United States of America. We are also accepting applications that focus on the North American continent at large, including Canada, Mexico, and the Caribbean. Possible topics include American identity, migration, issues of ethnicity, gender, transatlantic relations, U.S. domestic and foreign policy, economics, as well as various aspects of American history, literature, religion, geography, law, musicology, and culture. Proposals should include a preliminary title and run to no more than 300 words.

Participants are requested to prepare a 20-minute presentation of their research project, which will be followed by a 40-minute discussion. The presentations will be arranged into ten panel groups. 

In addition to cross-disciplinary and international discussions during the panel sessions, the Spring Academy aims at creating a pleasant collegial atmosphere for further scholarly exchange and contact.

Accommodation will be provided by the Heidelberg Center for American Studies.

Thanks to a small travel fund, the Spring Academy is able to subsidize travel expenses for participants registered and residing in soft-currency countries. Scholarship applicants will need to document the necessity for financial aid and explain how they plan to cover any potentially remaining expenses. In addition, a letter of recommendation from their doctoral advisor is required.

DEADLINE FOR APPLICATIONS: November 01, 2024

SELECTIONS WILL BE MADE BY: January 2025

PLEASE USE OUR ONLINE APPLICATION FORM: https://www.hca.uni-heidelberg.de/spring/applicationspring_en.html

MORE INFORMATION: https://www.hca.uni-heidelberg.de/spring/index_en.html

FOR FURTHER QUESTIONS: lmayerle@hca.uni-heidelberg.de

                                                  jbuchholz@hca.uni-heidelberg.de

Please note that we have updated the deadline for this CFP until October 31, 2024. We look forward to reading your abstracts!

We are planning a peer-reviewed special issue of American Studies in Scandinaviafocused on the topics of individuality and community in mid-century American culture (1945-1964), inviting explorations of the literature, film, art, and thought of the period. We seek 8,000-word articles that focus either on individual writers/artists/thinkers in the period or engage with the topic more broadly. 

Mid-century US culture tends to be described in both simplified and paradoxical terms. On the one hand, it is thought of as a period of ‘containment’ culture, ‘Red-Scare’ rhetoric, and McCarthyism: a time when norms were strong, and it was difficult to be different. On the other hand, it is a period romanticized as the great era of American exceptionalism and industry. As today’s politicians from left to right increasingly rely on nostalgia for an idealized past, it becomes relevant to ask questions about the culture and values of mid-century America, and to challenge stereotypical images of this time, especially that of the white, churchgoing nuclear family, which has become an almost indelible image of the ‘long’ 1950s.  

At this pivotal moment in American history, the individual was often seen as being in conflict with society. Early Cold-War culture saw an increased focus on the negative effects of social conformity on the individual, whether in the form of Holden Caulfield’s restless depression in Salinger’s Catcher in the Rye (1951) or Guy Montag’s awakening from totalitarianism in Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 (1953). Elsewhere, individualism and self-expressionwere celebrated, as can be seen, for example, in the Beat Generation’s rebellion against conformity and in the deep subjectivity in some of the work of the so-called Confessional Poets. 

Conformity was not necessarily only a negative aspect of social life in post-war US, however; the period was also characterized by a very real sense of community and the importance of ‘sticking together’ through thick and thin, especially in the early post-war period.  A sense of community can also be noted in how the rights and needs of individual groups of people began to be emphasized, which is clearly seen in how the Civil Rights movement gained traction and in the burgeoning feminist movement. While some cultural groupings dominated the cultural scene and appear to have been impermeable, marginal groups developed their own literature and arts scene. In American Literature in Transition, Stephen Belletto writes that ‘one reason the 1950s can still seem bland and white bread, with a literature to match, is because at the time the same kind of writers tended to be celebrated while whole groups of others were seen as unliterary’ (4). Further research into alternative cultural output is needed in order to paint a more inclusive and accurate picture of the 1950s, moving beyond WASP culture and the image of the white, nuclear family.  

Delving into the complexities of mid-century American culture, our proposed special issue serves as more than just a historical exploration; by inviting perspectives on diversity and voices from the margins, we seek to paint a more inclusive and accurate portrait of this era. We think a reevaluation of the legacy of the 1950s, and its relevance in today's socio-political landscape, is urgently needed. Our special issue will challenge readers to reconsider their assumptions and critically engage with the complexities of the past. 

For this special issue, we seek articles that approach the topics of individuality and community in the period more broadly, but also articles that focus on individual writers, artists, and thinkers. Topics include but are not limited to:   

• Individualism and conformity culture  

• Individual and community   

• Individual works/authors/artists/thinkers  

• Literary groups or movements  

• Mainstream or avantgarde perceptions of literature and culture   

• The political influence on cultural output   

• National or transnational cultural relations and exchanges   

• The legacy of mid-century American culture and values   

• The legacy of colonialism in mid-century US  

• The commercialization of literature and culture  

• Cultural representations of family  

• Religion  

• LGBTQIA+ culture and mid-century America  

We are calling for 500-word abstracts to be submitted by October 31, 2024; to submit, send by email to annika.lindskog@englund.lu.se. Selected submissions will be notified by November 8, 2024. Finished articles are planned for production in autumn 2025. 

Annika J. Lindskog, Lund University, Sweden 

Sanna Melin Schyllert, University of York, UK