CfP for Student Papers: aspeers 14 (2021): General Section and Topical Section “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism”

aspeers, the first and currently only MA-level peer-reviewed journal for American studies in Europe, will accept submissions by October 25, 2020.

In its fourteenth issue, aspeers will feature a general section and a topical one. While the general section accepts submissions on any American studies topic (e. g. revised versions of term papers or chapters from BA theses), the topical section will focus on the theme “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism”, calling for submissions that explore US literature, (popular) culture, society, history, politics, and media through the lenses of pride and shame.

Please find the two calls for papers below. For more information please have a look at http://www.aspeers.com/2021.

=== General Call for Papers ===

For the general section of its fourteenth issue, aspeers seeks outstanding academic writing demonstrating the excellence of graduate scholarship, the range of concerns scrutinized in the field, and the diversity of perspectives employed. We thus explicitly invite revised versions of term papers or chapters from theses written by students of European Master (and equivalent) programs. For this section, there are no topical limitations. Contributions should be up to 7,500 words (including abstract and list of works cited). The submission deadline is October 25, 2020.

aspeers 14 (2021) will also contain a topical section organized around the theme “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism.” We encourage European MA-level students to submit papers on this topic in particular. Please consult our topical Call for Submissions at www.aspeers.com/2021.

For more information, our submission guidelines, and a timetable of the review process for this issue, please refer to http://www.aspeers.com/submit. Please direct questions and inquiries to mailto:editors@aspeers.com.

=== Topical Call for Papers on “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism” ===

400 years ago, the Mayflower arrived on Patuxet land and established the settler colony of Plymouth. Just two years later, the Patuxet peoples were pronounced extinct. Despite or due to this settler violence, the Plymouth colony gave rise to the American tradition of “Thanksgiving” and the mythology of Europeans building a ‘City upon a Hill’ in America.

200 years later, in 1820, eighty-six free black ‘immigrants’ traversed the Atlantic to establish the first settlement in Liberia. This was sponsored by the American Colonization Society (ACS). The ACS’s core belief was that Black freedom—Black voting, Black landowning, Black civil liberties—was incompatible with (white) American ideals and democracy, and that founding colonies in Africa promised to thus ‘whiten’ the US.

Now, in 2020, the United States has hundreds of military bases worldwide, spreading across scores of different countries and housing, according to some estimates, about 200,000 troops. Even though the US is technically a nation, its ubiquitous global influence on economies, politics, and cultures constitutes it as an empire.

For its fourteenth issue, aspeers dedicates its topical section to “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism” and invites European graduate students to critically and analytically explore the United States’ long history and contemporary culture of colonial violence. We invite papers discussing American literature, history, (popular) culture, society, politics, and media through the lens of American colonization and imperialism. We also encourage authors to consider the manifold connections between the United States and other parts of the Americas, especially the Caribbean as well as Central and Latin America, in the context of these questions.

Topical submissions may consider:

• representations of colonization in literature, (popular) culture, and other media
• identities and sociopolitical group formations forged around narratives of ‘America’
• the role that narratives of America as a colonizing force have played in defining identities
• alternatives and resistance to US colonization and imperialism
• practices of ‘writing back’ against colonial or imperial rule
• constructions of race and gender in the context of (white) imperial violence

aspeers, the first and currently only graduate-level peer-reviewed journal of European American studies, encourages fellow MA students from all fields to reflect on the diverse meanings of “Narratives of American Colonization and Imperialism.” We welcome term papers, excerpts from theses, or papers specifically written for the fourteenth issue of aspeers by October 25, 2020. If you are seeking to publish work beyond this topic, please refer to our general Call for Papers. Please consult our submission guidelines and find some additional tips at http://www.aspeers.com/2021.