Thanks to Prof. Dr. Serpil Oppermann, EASLCE, European Association for the Study of Literature, Culture, and the Environment for the following news:
November 15, 2014. Panel proposed for the ASLE Eleventh Biennial Conference, June 23-27, 2015, University of Idaho, Moscow, ID. “What Lies Beneath ‘Cli-Fi’ Narratives? Climate Science, Climate Justice, Cli-Fi Aesthetics and Ecopedagogies” (FFI see http://www.aslebiennialconference.com/).
Climate change fiction has boomed in tandem with public awareness of fracking, tar sands oil production and transport, oil spills, hurricanes, ocean acidification, global pollution, and extreme weather events brought on by climate change. Climate change fiction deals with such climate change themes from a variety of perspectives, either creating future scenarios of an entirely transformed Earth, or dramatizing present day situations in a thrilling way as a warning. Maggie Gee’s The Ice People, Nathaniel Rich’s Odds Against Tomorrow, Barbara Kingsolver’s Flight Behavior, Saci Lloyd’s Carbon Diaries 2015, and Margaret Atwood’s MaddAddam are some of the examples. This panel invites proposals addressing the genre in terms of environmental cultural studies, environmental justice, eco-aesthetics, eco/feminist visions, and/or ecopedagogies of resistance.
- What is the role of climate fiction in presenting climate change to the larger public? How do these narratives inform or distort the issues of climate change?
- What texts bring subterranean ideas into public discourse?
- How do narratives contribute to or shape eco-aesthetics?
- What underground communities are authoring and promoting climate narratives? What is the relationship between feminist, queer, postcolonial, animal/plant studies, and climate fiction?
- What media channels are being used to convey narratives, and how do these media channels shape the message and audiences for climate fiction?
- How does cli-fi contribute to different cultures relating to Earth transformations?
Please send abstracts of 150 words, with your name, position, affiliation, and email contact information to BOTH Greta Gaard (Greta.Gaard@uwrf.edu) and Serpil Oppermann (opperman@ada.net.tr). Please note: All presenters must register for the conference and be members of ASLE at the time of the presentation. The ASLE Biennial is geared toward actual rather than virtual participants, so at this time we cannot consider Skype presentations.
