Annual conference Cologne / Bamberg 2021

Speculative fiction and ethics
12th Annual Meeting of the Society for Fantasy Research

University of Cologne/ University of Bamberg (Virtual)
23.-25. September 2021

Organization: Judith Rauscher (K), Mareike Spychala (B), Sara Tewelde-Negassi (K), Lorena Bickert (B)

“Science fiction is not predictive; it is descriptive”
– Ursula K. Le Guin

 

Since then Ursula Le Guin 1976 an introduction to her SF classic The Left Hand of Darkness (1969), their emphasis on the descriptive, not extrapolative, or even prophetic, nature of speculative literature has become a household word. Speculative literature, according to Le Guin, does not use it to describe what will be. Nor does it describe what is. Rather, it is a thought experiment that asks not only who we are—whether as individuals, as a community, or as humanity in general—but more importantly, who we could be, who we are want, and how our actions and our day-to-day decisions can influence it. Philosophy and in particular ethics as one of its sub-disciplines also deal with these questions. In the research field of "literature and ethics", ethics is intertwined with literary studies and, according to Michael Eskin, is dedicated in particular to the importance of literature and the narratives it contains for the "moral potential" ("the moral potential" 560) of the people in society. For the 12th Annual Meeting of the Gesellschaft für Fantastikforschung (GFF), we are interested in papers that examine how speculative literature and other speculative media question personal, social, and political ethics, questioning the existence of universal moral standards, and thereby the specific contexts and complicating ones Illuminate conditions in and under which individuals and communities act and make decisions.

 

Whether in classic speculative literature like HG Wells The War of the Worlds (1897), Charlotte Perkins Gilmans Herland (1915), JRR Tolkiens The Lord of the Rings (1954), or Michael Endes The never ending Story (1979), in Star Trek Episodes like "The Measure of a Man" (TNG, 1989) and "Death Wish" (VOY, 1996) or in films like Guillermo del Toros Pan's Labyrinth (2006) and Jennifer Phang's Advantageous (2015), in comics like Enki Bilals Le sommeil du monstre (1998), Video Games Like The Last of Us (2013) or in contemporary novels such as Cornelia Funkes Inkheart (2003), Annalee Newitzs Autonomous (2018) or NK Jemisins The City We Became (2020), questions of ethics play a central role everywhere. The same applies to countless other stories that can be attributed to the fantastic.

 

We invite submissions on all forms and genres of fantasy and its ethical engagement, whether it's literature, comics, film, television, music, video games, or live role-playing. In the opentrack any paper on the Fantastic can be submitted. However, we particularly welcome topics such as:

• ethical questions and thought experiments in works of the fantastic
• Gender, race, class, sexuality or ecology and ethics in the fantastic, also from a transnational perspective
• Ethics and emotion or morality and affect in the fantastic
• post-humanist, queer, anti-racism or decolonial interventions and ethical issues in speculative literature and speculative media
• Representations of alternative familial, community, social and political orders and ethical issues in the fantastic
• Representations of violence, war, illness, dying or death and ethics in the fantastic
• Negotiations of the ethical dimensions of technologization and scientific progress in speculative literature and speculative media
• Debates about the ethical dimensions of the production, distribution and consumption of speculative literature and speculative media

Please send your Exposé (300 words in German or English) and a Short biography (150 words) until March 31, 2021 to Jun.-Prof. dr Judith Rauscher (University of Cologne) and Mareike Spychala, MA (University of Bamberg) at the following address: gff-2021@uni-koeln.de.

GfF CfP Speculative Fiction & Ethics (German)

GfF CfP Speculative Fiction & Ethics