The Northeast Popular/American Culture Association’s Race and Ethnicity area welcomes paper submissions from graduate students, faculty, collectors, writers, and independent researchers of popular culture.

NEPCA’s 2021 fall, virtual conference will be held Thursday October 21 – Saturday October 23, 2021. The deadline for proposals is August 1, 2021.  

We encourage panel proposals, as well as, individual submissions. 

Papers are generally 15-20 minutes in length.  We also encourage works in progress, and informal presentations. The key expectations on presentations are that:

• The proposal should be rooted in research. We do not automatically exclude original poetry, composed works of fiction, or musical/dance/storytelling performance, but such works must be connected to greater theoretical and research frameworks.
• NEPCA generally avoids proposals whose intent is overtly commercial.
• Proposals should appeal to a broad audience.

This area considers the intersection of race and/or ethnicity with popular culture.  Suggested topics include (but are not limited to):

• Constructions and depictions/appropriation of race in particular genres (film, comics, music etc.) or mass culture and social media (spirit animals, sugar skulls, “Taco Tuesdays” etc.)
• The intersections of race, ethnicity, popular culture and academia, including pedagogy
• “Whitewashing” and other approaches to racialization in book-to-screen adaptations
• Race and ethnicity in public discourse (Black Lives Matter, immigration, Islamophobia, Sinophobia, Anti-Asian violence, #jenesuispasunvirus …)
• The intersections with and meanings of race and ethnicity in constructions of nation/nationalism, “postracial” culture, neoliberalism, globalization and capitalism

If you have questions about this area, please reach out to the Race & Ethnicity Chair: Enrique Morales-Diaz, Westfield State University, emoralesdiaz@westfield.ma.edu

Visit the Conference Page for more information.

The deadline for the submission of abstracts in August 1, 2021.  Please use this form.