Call for Papers/Panels
Online Conference, June 14-18, 2021
*Applicants whose proposals were accepted for the 2020 conference see below*
PROPOSAL SUBMISSION DEADLINE: March 1, 2021
After postponing its 2020 conference, the Society for Animation Studies is pleased to invite panel and paper proposals for its 32nd annual conference. The conference organizing team has been closely monitoring the COVID-19 pandemic and is now planning a completely virtual online conference
All animation-related proposals will be considered, but applicants are encouraged to consider addressing the theme “Animate Energies” in their proposal.
“Animate Energies” evokes animation’s dialectical definitions and practices—animating the inanimate, endowing with life, making objects move, and, in many cases, the tedious work or mechanical labor concealed behind expressions of freedom and possibility. It also evokes forces, powers, and resources that can be exploitative and exploited, oppressive and oppressed, that can generate resistance or activism, and that can produce or endure unforeseen events. To measure energy is to describe action and transformation within a system, which can complicate agent-centered ideas about the experience of animating or being animated.
The conference theme “Animate Energies” invites inquiry into the interdisciplinarity of animation and into the various elements of animation production, distribution, exhibition, and reception. This includes efforts to understand the forces holding together distinct media assemblages—national and transnational studios, distribution infrastructure, aesthetic traditions, fan communities, transmedia narratives, and combinations thereof. This theme encourages participants to consider how animation
enhances thinking about media not in terms of agents and objects but by way of movements, flows, and energies. This mode of inquiry includes comparing theories of animation to theories of mediation. Are claims that media constitute conditions and situations, extend and shape the human, create worlds, and structure being also the claims of animation? How might animation, in its many forms and definitions, draw attention to the energies of media or the activity, agency, and vitality of background conditions, structures, and environments, whether technological, economic, political, social, or ecological?
Applicants submitting proposals are encouraged to engage the aforementioned ideas and the following topics, but all animation-related submissions will be considered:
animation theory and media theory
animation in science and technology studies
interdisciplinary animation/animation studies
animation and transmedia narratives or media mix
global or transnational geographies of animation
experimental animation
BIPOC animation
women in/of/and animation
neuro- and ability diverse animation
animation therapy
animation/animated sound/visual music
animation and game design
animation and comics/manga
animation and eco-criticism or sustainability
animation and political theory
animation and activism or political movements
SUBMISSION FORMATS (Deadline: March 1, 2021)
Please submit all applications using this survey: https://tulane.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_a4S0khbMbMOvnQp
Required specifications for proposals:
● 6 min microtalks: 150-word abstracts + 100-word biographical statement
● 20 min conference papers: 300-word abstract + 3-5 bibliographic references + 100-word biographical statement
● Pre-constituted 3-person panels: 300-word panel summary + 300-word abstract for each paper + 3-5 bibliographic references for each paper + 100-word biographical statement for each author
● Screenings/workshops/roundtables/exhibitions: Proposals should be 350-500 words with project descriptions and links to support material. Please indicate the duration of the event, the number of participants expected, and its requirements for online participation. We welcome applications for curated screenings, but request that accepted applicants secure exhibition rights from filmmakers or distributors.
ACCEPTANCE AND ACCESS
All letters of acceptance will be sent out by early April. Registration for all participants will be available through the conference website. We welcome participants to communicate any access needs through the online registration process. Applicants whose proposals are accepted need to be paid members of the SAS in order to present at the conference.
* If your proposal was accepted for the 2020 conference, please resubmit it through the portal for the 2021 conference and select the resubmission option. Participants whose proposals were accepted for the 2020 conference are guaranteed a spot if they use the same proposal for the 2021 conference. Minor changes to the proposal are acceptable (dates, titles, etc.) but it should be at least 95% the same. This applies to pre-constituted panel/workshop proposals as well. Since these are reviewed as a whole, if one paper changes substantially, the entire panel proposal needs to be submitted as a new proposal for blind review. If a presenter who was accepted as part of a panel would like to submit their accepted proposal as an independent paper not part of a pre-constituted panel, they will need to submit a new proposal which will be subject to review.
Contact the conference team at:
SAS2021@tulane.edu