Deadline: September 1, 2023
Contact: D. A. Vakoch
Email: dvakoch@ciis.edu

Chapter proposals are invited for an edited book on transgender cli-fi and sci-fi. We welcome chapters examining climate fiction and science fiction novels, short stories, YA literature, graphic novels, comics, films, television, games, material culture, and other media. We have confirmed contributors from a dozen countries on six continents.

Interested authors should submit a 300-word abstract, a 200-word biography, and a sample of a previously published chapter or article to the Dropbox folder at https://bit.ly/Transgender_Science_Fiction no later than September 1, 2023.

A sampling of confirmed contributors includes:

• “Towards a Latin American Queer Feminist Cli-Fi through Trans Representations: From Caribbean Afro-Futurism to Neo-Gauchesca,” Victoria Jara, PhD, Departments of Languages and Cultures, Film Studies, and Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies, University of Western Ontario, Canada
• “Gender in/on the Brain: Plasticity and Non-Human Transness in Chi Ta-wei’s Novel The Membranes,” Alberto Poza Poyatos, MA, Department of Arts and Humanities, Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Spain and Gabriel Remy-Handfield, PhD, Australian Centre on China in the World, Australian National University, Australia
• “Exploring Transgender Identities through African Mythologies in Nnedi Okorafor’s Lagoon and Akwaeke Emezi’s Freshwater,” Gibson Ncube, PhD, Department of Modern Foreign Languages, Stellenbosch University, South Africa
• “Queer Fusion Technologies and the Monsters We (Do Not) See in Akwaeke Emezi’s Pet and Bitter,” Oluwadunni Talabi, PhD, and Corina/Cori Wieser-Cox, MA, Linguistics and Literary Studies Department, University of Bremen, Germany
• “Rivers Solomon’s Utopian Postnaturalism,” Michael Mayne, PhD, Queer Studies Department and English Department, Denison University, USA
• “Speculative Disidentifications: Multiple Gender and Multiplication of Species in the Novels La comemadre by Roque Larraquy, La mucama de Omicunlé by Rita Indiana, and Ornamento by Juan Cárdenas,” Cristián Opazo, PhD, Facultad de Letras, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Chile; Ignacio Pastén Lopez, MA, Latin American, Iberian and Latin Cultures Program (LAILaC), City University of New York (CUNY), USA
• “‘Truth is a matter of the imagination’: Redefining Vulnerability and Revisioning the Politics of War and the Poetics of Transgender Identities in The Left Hand of Darkness,” Khamsa Qasim, PhD, Department of English, International Islamic University, Pakistan
• “Identity in Flux: Gender, Race, and the Politics of Transition in Chana Porter’s The Seep,” Jamiee Cook, MA, Department of English, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA and Maite Urcaregui, PhD, Department of English and Comparative Literature, San José State University, USA
• “Rethinking the Genealogy of ‘Trans’ in Relation to ‘Monstrosity’ in Mary Shelly’s Frankenstein and Larissa Lai’s Salt Fish Girl,” Sezgi Öztop Haner, PhD, Department of English Literature, Dumlupınar University, Türkiye
• “Reactionary and Recuperative Readings of Dr Jeckyll and Sister Hyde,” Mike Stack, PhD, Department of Psychosocial Studies, Birkbeck, University of London, UK
• “Euphoria, Dysphoria, Genre, and Body-Swapping in The Skin I Live In and Sense8,” Allison Rittmayer, PhD, Department of English, Northwestern State University of Louisiana, USA
• “Unpacking Time Loops in See You Yesterday,” Joshua Bastian Cole, PhD, Department of Performing and Media Arts, Cornell University, USA
• “A Trans-ing of Liminal Gender in Michael Faber’s Under the Skin,” Nicole Anae, PhD, Department of Literary and Cultural Studies, Central Queensland University, Australia
• “‘Like hair colour’: Transbody Fluidity and Wish Fulfillment in The Runaways and Other Comics,” Pritesh Chakraborty, PhD, Department of English, Acharya Sukumar Sen Mahavidyalaya, India
• “‘Not as before’: Sir Tristran’s Trans* Variance as Queer Body Positivity in Camelot 3,000,” Gabriel Schenk, DPhil, and Mercury Natis, MA, Department of Language and Literature, Signum University, USA
• “‘As real a girl as anyone’: Subverting the Superhero Trope in April Daniels’ Dreadnought,” Anamarija Šporčič, PhD, Department of English, University of Ljubljana, Slovenia
• “Challenging Conventions and Shaping Identity: A Comparative Analysis of Transgender Narratives in Ninefox Gambit and The City in the Middle of the Night,” Lenka Filipova, PhD, English Department, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany

We are committed to including a broadly international group of scholarly contributors.

The editor’s previous books include Ecofeminist Science Fiction (2021), Transgender India (2022), Transecology (2021), Xenolinguistics (2024), Dystopias and Utopias on Earth and Beyond (2021), and The Routledge Handbook of Ecofeminism and Literature (2023).

This is a volume of literary, film, and media theory and criticism guided by both transgender studies and climate fiction/science fiction studies. To be competitive, abstracts must:

• Show how transgender studies and climate fiction/science fiction studies can each provide perspectives typically overlooked, ignored, or downplayed by the other field.
• Engage one or more key scholarly works from both transgender studies and climate fiction/science fiction studies, demonstrating the value of diverse approaches to analyzing literature, film, and other media. (If you do not list specific writings from both transgender studies and climate fiction/science fiction studies that you will draw upon, you have not addressed this point.)
• As the result of this dialogue between transgender studies and climate fiction/science fiction studies, provide insights into literature, film, and other media that neither transgender studies nor climate fiction/science fiction studies can offer by itself.

Any abstract that does not explicitly address the above three points in depth will likely be rejected.

Solid first drafts of full chapters are due by February 1, 2024, and final versions that cross-reference other chapters extensively are due April 1, 2024. At least one author of each chapter must have already completed their doctorate. In your 200-word biography, please note the year and university where you earned your doctorate. Only previously unpublished works will be considered.

As you search for scholarly journals to support your analysis, good places to start for climate fiction/science fiction studies include ISLE: Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment, Extrapolation, Science Fiction Studies, and Foundation: The International Review of Science Fiction. In transgender studies, helpful journals include TSQ: Transgender Studies Quarterly, International Journal of Transgender Health, Bulletin of Applied Transgender Studies, and Journal of Gender Studies.

Abstracts and biographies should be submitted as Word documents, and previously published chapters or articles should be submitted as PDFs. Both Word files and PDFs should contain the author’s name in the file names. Please include your email address in your biography file, or there will be no way to contact you.

Posted on August 18, 2023