Deadline: 11-25-24
Contact: Mary Newell, Adjunct Assistant Professor, University of Connecticut, Stamford
Email: mnewell4@gmail.com
Phone: 9145228017

“Atmospheres of Poiesis /Poetic Atmospheres,” panel CFP for the 2025 Biennial Conference: Collective Atmospheres, to be held July 8-11, 2025, at the University of Maryland.

Can thinking through atmospheres bring ecological resonance to our poetry?

As the layer of gases, including oxygen, that surround the planet, atmosphere serves a protective function, enables respiration, and houses the liquidity and wind [motion/disturbance?] that can coalesce as weather. By enabling both breath and perception, the atmosphere is a node of connection between the global and the individual. Since the air is a shared resource among all species that breathe, it can foster experiences of interconnection. As a sustaining blanket, the atmosphere and the green life that oxygenates it ought to be a recipient of our gratitude. Since its relative purity is critical for survival, it is a rallying point for political action.

Poetic manifestations of atmosphere abound. Breath is foundational to the study of poetry: as respiration, it enables lineation, spacing and rhythm, as inspiration, the poem’s source. Could the potential liquidity of the atmosphere be metaphorically relevant to a poem’s linguistic fluidity and the atmosphere’s potential to overflow to its ethos, tone, and dramatic appeal? Could new poetry reflect the acceleration in extreme weather incidents or the disruption they cause, not just as topic, but through various poetic strategies?

Submit your abstract to Mary Newell, Adjunct Assistant Professor, University of Connecticut, Stamford, at mnewell4@gmail.com, by November 25, 2024.

Posted on October 14, 2024