Please see the below Call for Papers for the Imaginative Landscapes and Otherworlds (ILO) 2024 conference, being co-organized by Ryan Denson (Trent University) and Alison Norton (Canterbury Christ Church University).
This is the now third annual iteration of the ILO conference, each of which has focused on a different theme. We also hope to publish select papers from this conference in a special issue for the journal Preternature (Penn State University Press). Several papers from our first Imaginative Landscapes and Otherworlds Conference (2022) were published this month in an earlier special issue of Preternature, which can be found here.
Imaginative Landscapes and Otherworlds 2024: The Liminality of Water and Aqueous Realms
Online Conference (June 14)
Humanity has always had a complex relationship with aqueous spaces. We find serene shores and the sound of waves to harbor a calming effect. Yet, the instability of the sea and its hazards simultaneously make it a space of profound terror. We are paradoxically captivated and terrified by such void-like spaces that are naturally alien to us, continuously projecting our hopes and anxieties into these watery spaces.
One clear illustration of this imaginative tendency is the underwater kingdom of the sea god Poseidon in Greco-Roman mythology. The Iliad briefly depicts this as a shimmering golden palace, a utopian version of an actual Archaic Greek palace, while later Greek and Roman poets populated Poseidon’s underwater kingdom with anthropomorphic figures like the Nereids. The palace, with its divine residents, represents the otherwise impossible feat of human-like figures living on the sea floor. This imagined possibility of such anthropic figures residing within the sea’s depths also simultaneously harbors eerie dangers, as with the example of the Blue Men of the Minch in Scottish folklore. Often taking on human appearances of their own, these creatures are said to dwell in the waters of the Outer Hebrides, at times reaching up from the watery void to capsize ships and drown sailors. The human anxiety about the lack of visibility beneath the surface generates the potential for these new threats, specifically from sentient creatures more at ease with the marine world. This conference focuses on the theme of the liminality of water and aqueous realms regarding imaginative landscapes and otherworlds. This includes those involving marine spaces, such as seas and oceans, but also other aqueous environments, such as ponds, lakes, and rivers, and their imaginative inhabitants.
Contributions might include, but are not limited to:
- Underwater otherworlds
- Otherworlds that are accessed via water
- Denizens of the deep in folklore and mythology
- Water as a dividing element between normal spaces and otherworlds
- Rivers that exist within otherworld spaces (e.g. the Styx of the Greco-Roman underworld)
- The encroachment of aqueous otherworlds onto terrestrial civilizations
This online conference is jointly hosted by Canterbury Christ Church University and the University of Exeter. It will take place on June 14, 2024. Proposals should be not more than 250 words for a 15-20 minute paper. The deadline for submission is April 20, 2024. Please include your name and a brief bio (50-100 words) with submissions. For those wishing to submit proposals for panels, please limit participants to 3 and follow the above criteria; a bio will need to be submitted for each participant. Please send abstracts to iloconferenceofficial@gmail.com