CFP: Environmental Racism and Environmental Casteism: A Reading of African American and Indian Dalit Literature

 --Note:  Springer has shown interest in publishing this book subject to solid content and positive reviews.

Environmental injustice or Environmental discrimination or Environmental inequality occurs when a certain powerful and dominant group of people has a hold of environmental resources and the marginalized community is deliberately left to live on the leftovers or scarcity. This scarcity is a marker of the status of the marginalized groups/communities in the world. Nature never discriminates among its individuals because of race, caste, creed, class, gender, skin color, etc. However, power politics in the ‘world-society’ set-up leads to injustice and inequality of resources. The articulation of environmental injustice finds its articulation in literary spaces which forms an imperative focus of the various organizations and institutions and thus cannot be ignored. The present work explores and investigates the expression and articulation of environmental inequality in literature in the context of environmental racism and environmental casteism. Environmental racism and environmental casteism is a form of ‘institutional discrimination’ which leads to the domination of white/upper castes on the environmental resources and disposal of harmful waste in communities of colour and low castes.

Everyone has the right to enjoy the bounties of nature. One should not be distanced from fresh water and air because of skin colour, race, caste, class, gender or creed. Every government must take care of the basic needs of the citizens without being biased. Unfortunately, since they arrived in the New World, blacks have not only been exposed to political and social exclusion but also to environmental threats. Racist policies of the dominant white society ensured that blacks stayed in vulnerable neighbourhoods and localities from slavery till the present. On the other hand, whites have been enjoying more healthy and clean surroundings thereby giving birth to the idea of white being clean and black being dirty, as Carl Zimring puts it. Subsequently, blacks succumb to diseases, death, and disintegration, both physically and psychologically. After the enactment of civil rights, one comes across a new agitation rampant in American streets. This movement was largely organized by blacks along with other marginalized groups such as native Indians, Hispanics, and Asian Americans. These groups were demanding Environmental Justice. They argued that white America had not treated them well. Their neighbourhoods were converted into junkyards of industrial waste; consequently, their existence was at stake. They were fighting for political representation so that they could decide their fate. The protest aimed to stop the dumping of industrial waste due to which they and their children had become vulnerable to diseases and death.

African American writers demonstrate through their writings blacks struggle for the basic amenities of life which were not possible because of dirty and unhygienic environment. They, at times covertly and at other times overtly, demand and plead for Environmental Justice for their characters, thereby for the entire black community. They highlight how blacks thrive physically, materially, and spiritually once their vicinity is changed to a neat and clean surrounding.

The environmental movements that are popular at present are mostly Eurocentric and/or dominated by the concerns of whites. All the major environmental movements have somewhat marginalized the communities and people on the fringes of society, like blacks, Hispanics, and other ethnic groups, by focusing only on the mainstream Western culture. In recent times, there has been an attempt to provide a counter-narrative to Eurocentric environmental movements by writers and researchers like Carl Zimring, Robert Bullard, Luke Cole and Sheila Foster, Carolyn Finney, Dorceta Taylor, Harriet Washington, etc. Similarly, African American writers like Alice Walker, Toni Morrison, Richard Wright, Zora Neale Hurston, James Baldwin, Ishmael Reed, Fredric Doughlas, Alex Haley, etc., have also challenged the mainstream environmental movements through their writing—by unveiling the acts of environmental racism perpetrated against black communities. 

Dalits in India form the most neglected and marginalized section in India because of ‘casteism’ and ‘caste system’. ‘Dalit’ is a Sanskrit word which means crushed, broken, oppressed, etc.  It is a self-adopted term by the scheduled castes of India as this marginalized section of Indian society feels that terms like ‘Ati[1]Shudra’, ‘Scheduled Castes’ or ‘depressed classes,’ etc., connote ‘derogation’. According to Sukhadeo Thorat, the problem of Dalits is socio-cultural-political as: “they occupy a low position in the Hindu social structure; their representation in government services is inadequate; they are inadequately represented in the fields of trade, commerce and industry; they suffer from social and physical isolation from the rest of the community, and there is general lack of education development amongst the major section of this community” (Dalits in India 2). However, this social, cultural, and political marginalization forms an undeniable link with environmental casteism. Manual scavenging, cleaning the dirt and menial jobs are forced on Dalits due to caste divisions. Access to natural resources such as clean air, clean water, healthy living, etc., is denied to them which results in environmental casteism. Hence, the issue of Dalits is socio-cultural-political-ecological in nature. Many Dalits writers like Baby Kamble, Urmila Pawar, Bama, Viramma, Om Prakash Valmiki, Balbir Madhopuri, Sharankumar Limbale, Kancha Illaiah, Daya Pawar, Jyoti Lanjewar, Hira Bansode, etc., in their writings, have represented the Dalits’ socio-ecological derogation and lived experiences of discrimination because of environmental casteism. Many prominent Dalit leaders and reformers like Jyotirao Phule, Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, Periyar, etc., have found that caste ideology and caste structures give rise to environmental casteism and domination by the few. They worked towards better living conditions for Dalits persistently and relentlessly. Many critics like Joel Lee, Mukul Sharma, etc., have affirmed that Indian environmental movements and academic environmental histories are dominated by mainstream and are fixed in casteism which has overlooked the unfair distribution of natural resources. This results in environmental casteism faced by Dalits unaddressed both in literary as well as public discourse.

 

 The edited book will be divided into two parts:

Part one will have the following sub-categories (The possible topics might include but are not limited to): 

• African American environmentalism
• African American aesthetics and the environment
• Environment as African American solace
• African Americans and environmental injustice
• African Americans and the environmental crisis
• African American identity and the environment
• African Americans and eco-racism
• African American poverty and the environment
• African Americans, religion, and the environment
• African Americans, culture, and the environment
• African Americans and democratization of environmental resources
• African American leaders’ legacy and the environment
• African American women and the environment

Part two will have the following sub-categories (The possible topics might include but are not limited to):

• Dalit environmentalism
• Dalit aesthetics and the environment
• Environment as Dalit solace
• Dalits and environmental injustice
• Dalits and the environmental crisis
• Dalit identity and the environment
• Dalits and eco-casteism
• Dalit poverty and the environment
• Dalits, religion, and the environment
• Dalits, culture, and the environment
• Dalits and democratization of environmental resources
• Dalits leaders’ legacy and the environment
• Dalit women and the environment

 The book aims to chart out the literary discourse around the sub-themes. Therefore, all these sub-themes are to be addressed through literature.

The work will be an edited book. Writers and activists, scholars, and academicians are invited to contribute their papers/articles for the project.

Abstracts (250-300 words) in English with a short bio note (50 words) as a Word document or pdf must be emailed to: shubhankukochar@outlook.com, by December 15, 2023.

 

Editors:

1. 1.      Name : Shubhanku Kochar (Ph. D)

Affiliation: Department of English, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Dwarka, India.

 

1. 2.       Name : Parveen Kumari (Ph.D)
   Affiliation: Department of English, Central University of Jammu, Jammu, India.

Call for Book Chapters: #Theorising #Gender in the Context of Cultural Limitations: Contemporary #Indian #Writing in #English

 No Publication or Subscription Fee/ Free Complimentary Copy

Call for Papers

Theorising Gender in the Context of Cultural Limitations: A Series of Book Chapters on Contemporary Indian Writing in English

Contemporary Indian Writing in English has gained an amazing momentum down the years. Indian writers of English have directly plunged into the world of the different confronting situations from the point of view of woman and the complex dilemmas of the human society. Feminists suggest that there should be a perfect harmony between man and woman. R. W. Connell “Theorising Gender”writes, A social theory of gender is implied and required by current sexual politics”. In fact, theories of social expectations and power relations between man and woman call for an advanced practical transcendence. Writers like Salman Rushdie, Anita Desai, Arundhati Roy, Neelam Saxena Chandra and others have raised the questions of place and elaborated the different cultural issues. Many such writers express the same concerns of feminist theories - the different phases which a female has to undergo and suffer in the male focused society. It definitely includes the female consciousness in the light of gender based limitations and oppressions. Arising from a fertile milieu that fortifies social and political consciousness, Indian women writers have redefined themselves beyond the clutches of patriarchy.

This book project invites the application of different aspects of the gender theories on contemporary Indian Writing in English and accordingly calls upon the prospective contributors to explore the "woman question" raised by contemporary Indian writers of English.

Submission Guidelines

a) The submissions must be accompanied by a covering letter/page bearing the following information:

i. Full Name of the Author(s)

ii. Post/Research Scholar/Student

iii. Institutional Affiliations (if any)

iv. Contact Details of the Author(s) with Mobile Number

v. A self declaration that it is an original work and has not been published/ sent for publication anywhere else.

b) File must be in Microsoft Word format following MLA 8th edition

c) Contributors must avoid plagiarism and maintain a strict ethical stand regarding acknowledgement of works cited and ideas borrowed from others.

d) The papers submitted should evince serious academic work contributing new knowledge or innovative critical perspectives on the subject explored.

e) End notes and foot notes have to be avoided.

f) Title of the paper should be bold, capitalized and centered. The font should be 14 point.

g) In text the titles of books should be Italics and titles of articles from journals and books should be “quoted” and

h) Font of the text should be Times New Roman 12 point.

i) Line Spacing: 1.5.

j) There should be a margin of 1 inch on all four sides of the paper.

k) Word limit: Minimum 4000 and Maximum 5000 words.

l) There will be no publication charges.

m) Rejected papers won’t be sent back to the contributor(s).

n) Authors are requested to submit their manuscript along with a small abstract of 200 words via email on editor.literature@yahoo.com before Nov 15, 2023.

o) Authors are suggested to submit their bio details of 100-150 words using third person narrative.

p) The book will be published by the publisher of an international repute. Every contributor will receive a free complimentary copy of the book.

Editor

Dr. Vinita Basantani,

M U College of Commerce, Pimpri , Pune (India)

 

Call For Chapters: The Representation of Famines in Indian literatures -Routledge Publishing House

 The Representation of Famines in Indian literatures

 

The Proposed work will be submitted to Routledge under its ongoing series “South Asian Literature in Focus”

 

We are falling short of a couple of chapters for this edited work, kindly send your proposal/abstract byApril 5, 2024

According to the UN Refugee Agency, “[A] famine is a situation in which a substantial proportion of the population of a country or region is unable to access adequate food, resulting in widespread acute malnutrition and loss of life by starvation and disease.” Famines have played a vital role in shaping the world’s demography. Some examples of devastating famines that brought extreme changes in the demography are as follows:

Beginning with the “436 B.C. famine in Rome” when thousands of starving Romans threw themselves in the Tiber; “The Great Leap Forward Famine” of China (1959-1961), which resulted in the highest number of deaths by a single famine ever recorded; “The Great Irish Famine” in the late 1840s reduced the population of Ireland by a quarter; “The Bengal Famine” of 1770 lead to the death of one-third of the Bengali population.

Unfortunately, India has not been untouched by this destructive situation. Famines, caused mainly by droughts owing to shorter monsoon seasons, and disorderly distribution of food, have caused millions of deaths through the ages. It becomes imperative to understand the nature of these famines and, for a literature scholar, to understand the role of famines in literatures produced in different parts of India during different times and periods. The famines that shook the nation are:

 

Famines in Ancient and Medieval India

Although there has been a dearth of reliable data on famines in Ancient India, some definite famines are worth stating. One such example would be the Kashmir Famine of 917-918 A.D. The Kashmiri population saw a decline due to the flooding of Jhelum which washed away the crops. An up-to-date record of famines in the earlier period is not available, except for some scattered references in the history of the medieval period. In Mughal India famines and severe scarcities occurred in Akbar's regime during the years 1555-56, 1573-74, 1577, 1583-84 and 1595-98.

During the latter period of the Mughal empire, famines were witnessed during 1630-31 in Ahmednagar, Gujarat, and some parts of Malwa, in 1641 in Kashmir, Punjab in 1646. The years 1658-60 witnessed scarcities in Sindh, Surat, the eastern coast, and Gujarat. Emperors made provisions for the distribution of food and granted tax concessions on transported food. Grain was purchased from surplus provinces and sold at a cheap price. Again, the years 1687, 1702-04 and 1747 saw scarcities of food, fodder and of drinking water. According to H.S. Srivastava, "In 1687, even rich men were reduced to beggary on account of scarcity of food and fodder. The scarcity of water in 1747 was so great that men could not get water even to wash their faces. Men and cattle perished in large numbers."

 

 

Famines During East India Company Regime

The Bengal Famine 1770

The first famine during the East India Company took place in Bengal, Bihar and Orissa in 1770, caused by the continuous crop failures in 1768, 1769 and 1770. According to official estimates, one-third (approximately 10 million) inhabitants of Bengal fell victim to starvation. Prices rose 4 to 10 times the ordinary rates. Even children were offered for sale but there were no purchasers: "The country was so depopulated and deserted that once fertile and populous parts were described by a traveller as a 'pathless forest'."  People went on dying but nothing appeared to have been done to relieve them, except the measures of laying an embargo on the export of food grains and display of a proclamation upon the doors of public offices throughout the Company's dominions against hoarding and buying up of grain. These measures proved an absolute failure.

Nineteenth-century has been known as a century of famines, though the recurrence and severity of each famine were relatively less during the first half of it. Major famines occurred in 1802-04, 1806-07, 1812, 1824, 1825-26, 1932- 34, 1937-38 and 1854, all local and witnessed in different parts of the country during different times.

 

Famines under British Rule

Famines 1860-80

This period of 20 years has been characterized as the most crucial period of agricultural distress which the Indian economy has ever experienced before. First among the series of famines occurred in 1860-61 in North West Provinces including Ajmer-Merwara and adjoining districts of Punjab partly as a result of local disturbances in 1857 during which villages were plundered and burnt so that local stores of grain had been destroyed, and partly as a consequence of unseasonal rains in 1860.

The Great Famine of 1876-78

This famine has been described as the ‘most grievous calamity of its kind that the country had experienced till then, since the beginning of the 19th century’ in the 1880 report by the Famine Commission, and A. Loveday—the author of The History and Economics of Indian Famines—calls it ‘The most extensive famine which India has experienced since the predominance of British power.’ In all, a total area of 2,05,600 sq. miles covering a population of 36.4 million was affected. Official estimates of human mortality stood at 10.32 million. William Digby, however, states that actual mortality was probably much higher than the official estimates. Relief measures adopted in different provinces included the import of food grains to famine-stricken areas, imposition of '1 lb. ration' per day per famine worker, provision for relief works, liberal money advances to the distressed population for purchase of seeds and construction of wells and tanks. Gratuitous relief was in limited areas.

Bengal Famine of 1943

India experienced several scarcities but no major famine for thirty-five years from 1908 to 1942. The scarcities did not involve considerable loss of life. It was in 1943 when Bengal was confronted with a severe famine. The famine was the result of a series of crop failures that Bengal had met since 1938. The outbreak of the Second World War aggravated the situation. War affected Bengal in many ways. Normal imports of food grains from Burma ceased. Wartime controls dislocated private trading and movement of food grains on account of provincial and even district barriers against the movement of grains. There was greater demand for food for army personnel and the influx of refugees from Burma. The famine might be called "more man-made than an act of God". Man's part in this tragic drama was 'the failure on the part of the administration to foresee the beginning of the war in 1939and to take timely action to meet it.

 

Famines since Independence

Fortunately, India did not face any widespread famine since the disastrous famine of Bengal, though there were a series of short-lived local scarcities in different parts of the country till the great famine of 1970-73. The years of relatively widespread scarcities since independence are 1952- 53, 1965-67 and 1970-73. One outstanding case would be that of Kalahandi. According to newspaper reports, in 1993, some 11 million people were severely affected when a drought-induced crisis affected around 600 villages in Kalahandi and its surrounding areas, and almost 500 people were reported to have starved to death. Recent reports suggest that thousands, facing starvation and disease, have migrated to other regions (including some major regional cities) in search of a livelihood.

It will be seen from the history of Indian famines that a long-term policy for reducing the possibility of recurring famines is necessary. Even after more than 75 years of independence, we have not made suitable changes in the famine relief policy and famine works adopted by the foreign Government of India.

 

Indian literature is rich in the representation of the role and impact of famines on the nation-state, communities, and individuals coming from varying backgrounds. According to Mandira Ghosh, in Bengal, a new brand of literature called ‘natun sahitya’ or a new variety of progressive literature was created, because the sensibilities of a section of the progressive middle class were offended, since people begged and died of starvation for lack of food. Other writers like Bibhutibhushan Bandyopadhyay, whose Ashani Sanket (Intimations of Thunder, 1944–1946)interrogate the representation of bodies during the Bengal famine of 1943; Bhabani Bhattacharya’s novels, So Many Hungers! (1947) and He Who Rides a Tiger (1954), provide an epistemological alternative to imperial narratives about the Bengal famine of 1943; Bankimchandra Chattopadhyaya’s Anandmath (1882) is based on the devastating Bengal Famine of 1770. These are a few among the plethora of works based on famines across India.

 

The contributors are required to address one of the following sub-themes:

 

The literary representation of famines in Ancient India

The literary representation of famines in Medieval India

The literary representation of famines in Mughal India

The literary representation of famines in British India

The literary representation of famines in Post-independent India

The literary representation of famines in Contemporary/21st century India

 

This project aims to chart out the chronological history of the representation of famines in Indian literatures in English and translations.

Abstracts (150-200 words) in English with a short bio note (100 words) as a Word document must be emailed to: shubhankukochar@outlook.com, by or before January16, 2024

 Editors:

 1.   Name : Shubhanku Kochar (Ph. D)

Affiliation: Department of English, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, Dwarka, India.

 2     Name : Parveen Kumari (Ph.D)

Affiliation: Department of English, Central University of Jammu, Jammu, India.

 

Invitation to Publish: Contribute to #Environment and #Society #BookSeries

 Environment and Society, a book series published by Lexington Books, an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield, is seeking proposals covering a broad range of topics in environmental studies from the perspectives of the social sciences and humanities. Learn more about the 30 books already in the series on the publisher’s website: https://rowman.com/Action/SERIES/_/LEXES

Books in this series include both monographs and edited volumes that are grounded in the realities of ecological issues identified by the natural sciences. Our authors and contributors come from disciplines including but not limited to anthropology, architecture, area studies, communication studies, economics, ethics, gender studies, geography, history, law, pedagogy, philosophy, political science, psychology, religious studies, sociology, and theology. To foster a constructive dialogue between these researchers and environmental scientists, the Environment and Society series publishes work that is relevant to those engaged in environmental studies, while also being of interest to scholars from the author’s primary discipline.

As scholars examine the environmental challenges facing humanity, they increasingly recognize that solutions require a focus on the human causes and consequences of these threats, and not merely a focus on the scientific and technical issues. To meet this need, books in this series help the reader understand contemporary environmental concerns, while offering concrete steps to address these problems.

Please send proposals for Environment and Society to General Editor Douglas Vakoch (dvakoch@meti.org) and Acquisitions Editor Courtney Morales (cmorales@rowman.com).

Proposal Guidelines:

To submit a proposal, please send:

• a prospectus (see below for details)
• a detailed table of contents
• one or two sample chapters
• your curriculum vitae

If you are proposing a contributed volume, please include titles, affiliations, and brief resumes for each of the contributors. The prospectus should include:

• A description of the book, describing the core themes, arguments, issues, goals, and/or topics of the work, what makes it unique, what questions it seeks to answer, and why you are qualified to write it (2–5 pages).
• A description of your target audience (undergraduate or graduate students? scholars? professionals?).
• An analysis of competing or similar books (including publishers and dates), indicating distinctive and original elements of your project that set it apart from these other works.
• A list of courses in which your book might be used as a text or supplementary text, indicating the course level at which this book may be used.
• An indication of whether any part of your manuscript has been published previously, and if it is a doctoral dissertation, what changes you are proposing to prepare it for publication.
• The length of the manuscript either as a word count. Will there be figures, tables, or other non-text material, and, if so, approximately how many? If the text is not complete, please still estimate its final length, not including the non-text material.
• If the manuscript is not complete, an estimation of when it will be finished. Is there a particular date by which you hope the book will be published (due to a historical anniversary, conference, etc.?)
• The names of four to seven respected scholars in your field with whom you have no personal or professional relationship. Include their titles, affiliations, e-mail addresses, and/or mailing addresses.
• An indication of whether the manuscript is under consideration by other publishers.

Call for Papers: Ecocritical Theory and Practice Book Series

 

Ecocritical Theory and Practice, a book series published by Lexington Books, an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield, is seeking proposals at the interface of literary/cultural studies and the environment. Learn more about the 90+ books already published in the series on the publisher’s website: https://rowman.com/Action/SERIES/_/ETAP/Ecocritical-Theory-and-Practice

Works that explore environmental issues through literatures, oral traditions, and cultural/media practices around the world are welcome. The series features books by established ecocritics that examine the intersection of theory and practice, including both monographs and edited volumes. Contemporary and historical works are equally appropriate.

Proposals are invited in the range of topics covered by ecocriticism, including but not limited to works informed by

• cross-cultural and transnational approaches
• postcolonial studies
• ecofeminism
• ecospirituality, ecotheology, and religious studies
• film/media and visual cultural studies
• environmental aesthetics and arts
• ecopoetics
• animal studies.

Please send proposals for Ecocritical Theory and Practice to General Editor Douglas Vakoch (dvakoch@meti.org) and Acquisitions Editor Courtney Morales (cmorales@rowman.com).

Proposal Guidelines:

To submit a proposal, please send:

• a prospectus (see below for details)
• a detailed table of contents
• one or two sample chapters
• your curriculum vitae

If you are proposing a contributed volume, please include titles, affiliations, and brief resumes for each of the contributors. The prospectus should include:

• A description of the book, describing the core themes, arguments, issues, goals, and/or topics of the work, what makes it unique, what questions it seeks to answer, and why you are qualified to write it (2–5 pages).
• A description of your target audience (undergraduate or graduate students? scholars? professionals?).
• An analysis of competing or similar books (including publishers and dates), indicating distinctive and original elements of your project that set it apart from these other works.
• A list of courses in which your book might be used as a text or supplementary text, indicating the course level at which this book may be used.
• An indication of whether any part of your manuscript has been published previously, and if it is a doctoral dissertation, what changes you are proposing to prepare it for publication.
• The length of the manuscript either as a word count. Will there be figures, tables, or other non-text material, and, if so, approximately how many? If the text is not complete, please still estimate its final length, not including the non-text material.
• If the manuscript is not complete, an estimation of when it will be finished. Is there a particular date by which you hope the book will be published (due to a historical anniversary, conference, etc.?)
• The names of four to seven respected scholars in your field with whom you have no personal or professional relationship. Include their titles, affiliations, e-mail addresses, and/or mailing addresses.
• An indication of whether the manuscript is under consideration by other publishers.

Ecocritical Theory and Practice’s Advisory Board:

• Auður Aðalsteinsdóttir (Iceland)
• Sinan Akıllı (Turkey)
• Zélia Bora (Brazil)
• Nicolás Campisi (USA)
• Chan Kit-sze Amy (Hong Kong)
• Michelle Deininger (Wales)
• Nicole Dittmer (USA)
• Melanie Ruth Duckworth (Norway)
• Jonathan Elmore (USA)
• Lenka Filipova (Germany)
• Christina Holmes (USA)
• Peter I-min Huang (Taiwan)
• Serenella Iovino (USA)
• Özlem Karadağ (Turkey)
• Katarina Leppänen (Sweden)
• Keitaro Morita (Japan)
• Anupama Nayar C V (India)
• Serpil Oppermann (Turkey)
• John Charles Ryan (Australia)
• Joshua Schuster (Canada)
• Murali Sivaramakrishnan (India)
• Scott Slovic (USA)
• David Taylor (USA)
• Rebekah Taylor-Wiseman (USA)

Call for the Participants for an Academic association for African literary studies in India

 This goes out in the public domain that if you are working or researching in India in either African literature or African diasporic literature including African American literature, this is the place for you. I want to club together academicians both teachers and Research scholars under one umbrella of this academic association. The aim of the proposed academic body will be to establish its own dedicated journal of African literature including African diasporic and African American literature in India. The association will also hold its annual conference in collaboration with Indian universities and will also organize talks and seminars along with other literary activities as decided by the office bearers time to time. If you work in the said area and are dedicated to work for the cause of promoting African Literature in India, feel free to send your expression of entrust in about 200 words including your designation, affiliation and research experience to the following email africanliterary6@gmail.com

 before 30th November 2023. 

Call for Book Chapters - The #Planetary #Subaltern: On #South #Asian #History, #Theory, and #Texts in the #Anthropocene

 Concept Note

The Anthropocene, alluding to a geological epoch in which human presence accounts for the most consequential geophysical force, is subjected to criticism for representing homo sapiens as a homogeneous species within a geological stratum. The critics of the Anthropocene hypothesis charge it with the flaw of considering the human as a singular carbon-emitting subject, ignoring such “anthropological differences” that recognise humans in diverse sociological strata with varied ethnic, gendered, cultural, and geopolitical identities (Chakrabarty 2012, 14). While ignoring the human-induced geophysical changes is impossible, it is equally essential to recognise the uneven distribution of those changes and their impacts based on a region’s demography and geo-political situation. Such a disparity intensifies the discussion on human agency, justice, and human subjectivity, which are inextricably linked to human history. Therefore, it seems crucial to critically assess the human subjects with their plurality vis-à-vis the concurrent human-driven planetary crises in the Anthropocene. 

The term ‘Anthropocene’, emphasising the human agency as the dominant geophysical factor, has been doing rounds in the field of science since the 1980s. During the decade, a group of South Asian historians known as the Subaltern Studies Collective also emerged to reclaim the agency of humans on the sociopolitical fringes, and their endeavours resulted in an analogous writing of marginal groups’ history. While the Anthropocene notion implies a persistent impact of human agency on planetary conditions, Subaltern Studies aims to isolate something resembling an agency for the Subaltern – no matter how incoherent and inconsistent. In Subaltern Studies 2.0 (2022), Milinda Banerjee and Jelle J.P. Wouters, echoing the ethos of the earlier collective, widen the scope by stressing the interdependence of ‘multibeing communities,’ a necessary intervention amid the planetary crises.  The planetary crisis “calls on us to extend ideas of politics and justice to the nonhuman […]” (Chakrabarty 2021, 13) and to humans on the margins. Any political interpretation contextualised in the anthropocenic planetary crises also requires the ‘plural epistemologies’ as an interpretative strategy. The ‘plural epistemologies’ represent multiple beings beyond the dominant history to recognise the subaltern subjects as historical beings. The subaltern subjects as historical beings cannot escape their socio-geographical situatedness in the present planetary crises. Humanists have criticised the Anthropocene discourse for overlooking subaltern subjects’ situatedness in its attempt to reify the human as a monolithic force. Acknowledging the (largely ignored) subalterns’ historicity in the epoch characterised by human-caused planetary crises, it appears feasible to call into question the relevance of the Anthropocene discourse and investigate the sense it makes in South Asia, particularly when viewed through the critical lenses of the Subaltern Studies. 

In this regard, the proposed volume aims to facilitate an eventful dialogue between the two discursive fields of study of the Anthropocene and the Subaltern Studies to (re)define human agency and subjecthood in the human-dominated epoch, primarily through analysing subaltern narratives in South Asia. The volume intends to further questions: Does the human-dominated epoch only refer to humans with power? Does the Anthropocene grossly disregard the subaltern communities’ presence? What role does the subaltern play in the Anthropocene? How do we speculate the future of subalterns amidst the planetary crisis? By doing so, the volume aims to open an avenue of study, archiving the South Asian subaltern communities’ micro-narratives concerning the current crises, which include global warming, resource deficit, shortage of water, deforestation, the production of climate refugees, gendered violence and disease, pandemic, and terrorism, among others. Furthermore, the suggested new field of study, supported by the Anthropocene discourses and the Subaltern Studies together, seeks to cater to the new modes of interpretation required for defining the human subject amid the anthropocenic planetary crises, which we would refer to as the ‘planetary subaltern’ in the volume. The volume, thus, considers ‘planetary subaltern’ as a theoretical strategy to trace the South Asian subaltern history and anticipate its future in the Anthropocene.

The volume aims to engage the discourses on the Anthropocene and the Subaltern from three broad perspectives: theorising the ‘Planetary Subaltern’; textual politics of the ‘Planetary Subaltern’; and planetary crisis and the subaltern subject. Thus, we invite chapter proposals that address the following (but not limited to) issues contextualised in South Asia:

• A theoretical approach to the ‘Planetary Subaltern.’
• Textual and media representations of the ‘Planetary Subaltern.’
• Historiography of the ‘Planetary Subaltern’
• Indigenous communities and the planetary crisis 
• Human-nonhuman interaction on the fringes
• Refugee crisis, migration and statelessness 
• Gendered subaltern and the Anthropocene
• Peasant History and the Anthropocene
• Agrarian condition in the Anthropocene
• Postpoliticised environment and the Subaltern
• Planetary crisis and the class conflict
• Casteism and speciesism 
• Planetary crisis and disease 
• Pandemic and the Subaltern

 

References

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. 2012. “Postcolonial Studies and the Challenge of Climate Change.” New Literary History 43 (1):1-18. https://www.jstor.org/stable/23259358. 

Chakrabarty, Dipesh. 2021. The Climate of History in a Planetary Age. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Banerjee, Milinda, and Jelle J.P. Wouters. 2022. Subaltern Studies 2.0: Being Against the Capitalocene. Chicago: Prickly Paradigm Press. 

 

*We are currently in discussions with a renowned publishing house.

 

 

Chapter proposals within 400 words and a short bio-note (50 words) are to be submitted by 15 November 2023.

The invited chapters within 6000-7000 words (excluding end notes and citations) will be due on 15 March 2024 (tentatively).

The chapter abstracts and the full-length chapters are to be submitted to the email ID theplanetarysubaltern@gmail.com

 

 Editors: Somasree Sarkar (Assistant Professor, Ghoshpukur College, University of North Bengal) and Agnibha Maity (Senior Research Fellow, University of North Bengal)

For further queries, please write to us at somasree.2008@gmail.com or rs_agnibha@nbu.ac.in.

Call For Articles : Environmental Narratives and the Eremitic Turn

 Environmental Narratives and the Eremitic Turn (due Nov. 30)

Different Visions: New Perspectives on Medieval Art (an indexed, online, open-access journal) invites proposals for essays that explore the diverse ways in which eremitic bodies, ascetic practice, and the landscape of the wilderness, were represented and imagined in visual culture. This topic encompasses the locus of eremitic experience, which might be from any religious tradition or geographical location, whether wilderness, mountain, or desert, broadly conceived. It also encompasses the bodies – individual and communal – who chose to inhabit that landscape (as a real or imagined place), and their lived experience. We welcome submissions that:

• consider the resonance and meaning of the ascetic tradition across time and space
• investigate the ascetic tradition and its entanglement with notions of the landscape as wilderness and holy mountain
• adopt an environmental or ecocritical approach to the eremitic experience
• explore the tensions between, for example, wilderness and cultivation, inhospitable and fertile landscapes, ascetic practice and the eremitic impulse
• consider the re-imagining or invocation of the historical desert in monastic, mendicant or other contexts
• explore the continuing resonance of the eremitic, in symbolic or ecologic terms, in our contemporary world
• approach the themes above from a global perspective

This special issue engages with urgent contemporary concerns about the impact of human activity on the earth that sustains us. It resonates with recent scholarly interest in the relationship between humanity and nature in the pre- and early modern period, seeking a broad, inclusive, and cross-disciplinary reflection on the visual representation of this interdependence.

Contact Information

Jennifer Borland and Nancy Thompson

Contact Email

differentvisionsjournal@gmail.com

URL

https://protect.checkpoint.com/v2/___https://differentvisions.org/call-for-prop…

Call for Papers: #Feminist Health #Humanities - The Journal of Integrative and Innovative Humanities

 In 2022, the Journal of Medical Humanities announced its intention to re-focus its content on the nascent subject of health humanities, and in 2023, NYU Press published Keywords for Health Humanities, collectively signaling a change in disciplinary trajectory to the medical humanities community. The field’s re-configuration of nomenclature, which also includes critical medical humanities and narrative medicine, reflects its evolution and expansion according to the impetuses of inclusivity and accessibility. “Health,” as Sari Altschuler, Jonathan M. Metzl, and Priscilla Wald note in the introduction to Keywords, “is a site in which the social and global inequities of the world are writ large.” Health allows us a wider lens through which to approach lived experience and affords us the ability to draw on a fuller range of theoretical frames and nuanced interpretations as we attend to social justice.

In this issue of the Journal of Integrative and Innovative Humanities, we are soliciting articles that broadly address feminist health humanities. Feminism challenges oppression and bias, calls for intersectional analysis, and tests epistemological formations. We are curious about what feminism’s intellectual traditions and critical approaches bring to the health humanities and how feminist methodologies challenge or change medical practices or knowledge. A non-exhaustive list of topics manuscripts might address includes:

• How could healthcare change when informed by a justice-oriented or feminist lens, particularly when women’s reproductive healthcare is often a political site of resistance and strife?
• How can the health humanities inform or reflect approaches from other feminist perspectives such as critical race theory, disability studies, madness studies, etc.?
• How does feminist data science work towards closing the gender data gap (in medicine, the sciences, and other disciplines)?
• What do under-studied narratives – from patients, medical practitioners, encounters between Eastern and Western medicines, etc. – bring to our understanding of the health humanities?
• Can we find feminism in our historical approaches and encounters to the health humanities, which have informed our contemporary understanding of the field?
• How do body technologies, medical procedures, or pharmaceuticals shape our encounters with health, the body, the mind, and gender?

Submission Guidelines

Contributions that adhere to the Journal of Integrative and Innovative Humanities’ general aims and scope will be considered. Authors who wish to contribute to the upcoming issue should upload their manuscripts here:

 https://so07.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/DJIIH/about/submissions

The journal does not have a strict word limit, but we recommend manuscripts be in the range of 5000-7000 words, excluding footnotes and references. The manuscript must include an abstract no longer than 150 words. References must follow APA style. Manuscripts should be uploaded no later than January 15, 2024.

For futher information, please contact the guest-editors Nicole Infanta Keller, Chiang Mai University (nicole.keller@cmu.ac.th) or Laura Hartmann-Villalta, Georgetown University (lhartm13@jhu.edu).

The Journal of Integrative and Innovative Humanities is an academic peer-reviewed journal published by Chiang Mai University’s Faculty of Humanities. The journal “...aims to promote the importance of interdisciplinary studies and the coalescence between humanities and other areas such as science – be it natural-, social-, or applied science, economics, and business administration. The journal publishes interdisciplinary papers, bridging the gap between humanities and other disciplines, and emphasizing the critical role of humanities in any fields of study’s discussion and innovation

Contact Information

Soren Ivarsson, Co-editor in chief, Journal of Integrative and Innovative Humanities

Contact Email

soren.i@cmu.ac.th

URL

https://so07.tci-thaijo.org/index.php/DJIIH

CALL FOR CHAPTERS The Asian Caribbean in the Caribbean Diaspora-Lexington Press

 SEEKING CHAPTER PROPOSALS FOR EDITED VOLUME-

Description

To be submitted to Lexington Press, an imprint of Rowman & Littlefield, this edited collection The Asian Caribbean in the Caribbean Diaspora focuses on the historical and contemporary issues faced by Caribbean immigrants of Asian descent in the Caribbean diaspora, particularly, but not exclusively in the global north. Chapters will center and include Indo-Caribbean, Chinese-Caribbean, Javanese-Caribbean, Japanese-Caribbean, and other Asian-Caribbean immigrant groups and communities in diasporic spaces. It is of course foregrounded by the legacies of indentureship, contract labor, and later migrations to the greater Caribbean region, such as the migration of Japanese migrants to the Dominican Republic in the 1950s, to now interrogate the movement of such beyond Caribbean borders. It seeks to expand our notion of the Caribbean diaspora which is often cast in very specific ways, so as to account for the Asian as part of the Caribbean diaspora. It seeks to be both descriptive, while also countering a limited discourse on the Caribbean diaspora.

 

Your book chapter could contribute to one or more of the following topics as it relates to Asian-Caribbean immigrant groups and communities in the Caribbean diaspora:

• Identity formation – race, ethnicity and racialization/racial group consciousness
• Experiences and understandings of anti-Blackness and Blackness
• Experiences of racism, discrimination, anti-Asian hate
• Mixedness, and mixed-race identities
• The politics of transnational identity and transnational attachments
• Religion, religious practice, religious spaces and material culture
• Cultural production
• Language and assimilation
• Gender, sex, and sexuality
• Notion of homeland
• Political behavior/practices
• Differences between the first and second generation, widely speaking
• Caribbeanization of diasporic spaces
• Visibility, census, data disaggregation, cultural alienation
• Oral histories and ethnographies
• Literature and literary intersections

Interested contributors are hereby invited to submit their chapter proposals of between 250 and 300 words, and a brief bio of 250 words on, or before December 15, 2023 to the editor, Aleah N. Ranjitsingh: Aleah.Ranjitsingh03@brooklyn.cuny.edu

 

A detailed publication schedule will be provided after negotiations with the publishers

 Submission Deadline – December 15th, 2023

Notification of selection – January 15th, 2023

Full Chapters Due – May 30th, 2024

 

Editor

Aleah N. Ranjitsingh, Ph.D., Assistant Professor, Africana Studies Department and Caribbean Studies Program, Brooklyn College, City University of New York (CUNY)

Contact Information

Aleah N. Ranjitsingh, Ph.D. - Aleah.Ranjitsingh03@brooklyn.cuny.edu