SARE-Southeast Asian Review of English

CALL FOR PAPERS: SARE Volume 60, Number 2, 2023

2023-09-29

SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English

CALL FOR PAPERS, SPECIAL ISSUE, JULY 2023: SPECIAL ISSUE: SARE, VOL. 60, No. 1, JULY 2023

2022-09-14

SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English

Image taken by Nukhbah Taj Langah CALL FOR PAPERS “ Religion, Secularism and Nationalism: Literature of South Asia” Guest Editors: Nukhbah Taj Langah and Goutam Karmakar The history of colonization has significantly impacted the understanding of three key terms within the context of South Asia: religion, secularism, and nationalism. Considering the fact that the idea of civic nationalism as a political formation is arguably a Western liberal construct that is intricately linked to imperial legacies, the overarching question remains how religion has convoluted the secular and nationalistic perceptions within the South Asian context. Religion and nationalism in South Asia are frequently determined by the racist rhetoric of certain communities and the extremist rhetoric of fundamentalism and religious fanaticism; minority politics; issues of caste, class, and ethnic identity; border politics; pseudo-secular overtones coupled with liminality; rhetoric of war and violence; right-wing politics; defensive strategies and essentialism; and diaspora and ambivalence, among others. Based on such a convoluted context, this special issue seeks to explicate how the rich religious, political, and cultural dynamics of South Asia remain entwined with questions such as: how can democratic processes be implemented in independent states by separating politics from religion? How do certain literary texts depict the notion of nationalism expanding beyond the concept of a single nation due to the intricate ethnic, regional, and cultural offshoots? How does the idea of nations within a (independent) nation create the need for a broader understanding of nationalism? How does religious mobilization in South Asian literary narratives become a carrier of culture within and beyond South Asian countries? How can (mis)conceptions regarding religious fundamentalism be understood through the policies and politics of secularism and postcolonial nationalism? In what ways does religion in the South Asian literary landscape play a significant part in the creation of political structures and secular democracies in South Asia? Addressing these pertinent questions, this SARE special issue aims to explore the representation of "Religion, Secularism and Nationalism" in contemporary South Asian literature. This special issue aims to investigate the extent to which religious and national identities are regarded as potent dimensions of social participation in South Asian literature. This special issue also intends to probe deeper into literary and theoretical studies of particular authors and writings to locate how religions in South Asia enhance cohesiveness among all creed-sharing adherents, regardless of their geopolitics, and how countries assert a unity of those sharing attributes, such as linguistic, racial, and ethnic diversity, within a particular geo/demography. The crucial questions raised above evidently invite us to explore the layers of identity and representation issues deeply rooted in the highly charged historical and political context of South Asia. This can be approached through the literary and cultural analysis of diverse literary productions. Contemporary South Asian literature remains significantly impacted by this dense socio-political and cultural context. Hence, themes concerning nationalism, evolving identity concerns, and resistance are reflected in the works of many South Asian writers, including: Arundhati Roy, Salman Rushdie, Rabindranath Tagore, Khushwant Singh, Rabisankar Bal, Taslima Nasreen, Kazi Nazurul Islam, Saadat Hasan Manto, Bapsi Sidhwa, Fehmida Riaz, Jameel Ahmed, Kamila Shamsie, Mohammad Hanif, Sri Nissanka, Lakdasa Wikkramasinha, Yasmin Goonerante Manjushree Thapa, Lekhnath Paudyal, Lakshmi Prasad Devkota, Prasad Koirala, Balkrishna Sama, Khaled Hosseni, Husain Salaahuddheen, Bodufenvalhuge Sidi, Ibrahim Shihab, Saikuraa Ibrahim Naeeem, and many more writers belonging to the peripheries. We invite critical academic debates from scholars interested in exploring such challenges emerging from South Asia as represented through their primary focus on literary discourses. The thematic focus may include but is not limited to the following areas of interest reflecting through South Asian literature: Evolving dynamics of South Asian identity Redefining nationhood and nationalism Tradition vs modern South Asia Religion vs. nationalism Place, identity and ethnic nationalism Gender, religion and identity Redefining Nationalism(s) Secularism and the formation of the nation-states South Asian Diaspora and nationalism Ethno-nationalism and nationhood Language, Identity and Nationalism Religious minorities and politics of otherization Secularism and postcolonial nationalism Religious fundamentalism and extremism Right-wing Politics in South Asia Religion, war, and nationalism Articles & Book Reviews This SARE issue invites scholarly articles (5000 and 7000 words), and book reviews (not more than 1500 words) addressing the themes suggested above. Creative-Non-Fiction & Poetry We are also inviting creative prose/non-fiction and poetry (originally written in English and/or translated from other South Asian languages) related to the thematic focus of this issue. Creative non-fiction should not be longer than 4000 words. Abstracts of 200 words (maximum), along with a 50-word author bio, are to be emailed to Guest Editors, SARE at specialissuesare@gmail.com with a copy to The Editor, SARE at sare@um.edu.my by 15 November 2022. All decisions about the selection of contributions will be sent out by 30 November 2022. The deadline for the submission of full papers (5000-7000 words) and/or creative non-fiction/poetry: is 1 March 2023 . Submissions should be in English and uploaded to the SARE website through the “Make a Submission” portal at https://sare.um.edu.my .

CALL FOR PAPERS: SPECIAL ISSUE: SARE, VOL. 59, No. 1, JULY 2022

2021-08-12

SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English

CALL FOR PAPERS SPECIAL ISSUE : SARE , Vol. 59, No. 1, July 2022 "EcoGothic Asia: Nature, Asia, and the Gothic Imagination" Guest Editor: Associate Professor Li-hsin Hsu Since the emergence of modernity, the perceived eastern emphasis on the harmony between humanity and nature has been profoundly challenged and reshaped by the process of industrialization. Asia as a geo-poetic imaginary and a geo-political locus of both utopic imagination and dystopic anxiety in literature – both non-Asian and Asian – magnifies, problematizes, or sometimes accelerates such a disquieting and polarized projection. The “EcoGothic”, as an interdisciplinary approach that investigates the intersection between the ecological and the Gothic imagination, provides a useful epistemological and methodological tool to rethink how aesthetics, philosophical thoughts and social-cultural or environmental discourses in (or about) the Asian / Pacific region complicate our understanding of human-nonhuman interactions. We invite submissions for a special issue of SARE to explore the enmeshed human-nonhuman relationship by examining the interconnectedness between the natural, the supernatural or the unnatural, the diseased, (dis)possessed and contagious bodies - human or nonhuman – the haunted as well as haunting landscapes, and the terrifying or monstrous flora and fauna in literature in or about Asia. We ask how the EcoGothic imagination in (or about) Asia conceptualizes or addresses the notion of human-nature co-existence or the precarious state of human-nonhuman (dis)harmony. How does reading literatures of ecological crises, disasters, or extinctions help us reimagine Asia as a heterogeneous geography, both symbolically and in reality? In an age of the Anthropocene, how are our perceptions of human-nonhuman interactions redefined by the COVID-19 pandemic or other environmental/ecological crises? How does local knowledge address global issues in the environmental humanities from or about this region? Submissions might consider how recent theories of ecologies, technologies, philosophies or sociologies might renew our ways of reading literature about human-nonhuman interactions in our time. Papers might also consider how the notion of Asia is represented or reconfigured in relation to contemporary events or interdisciplinary approaches and narratives, or how reading environmental works, both Asian and non-Asian, might assist our understanding of the EcoGothic as a multifaceted concept in refreshing directions. Topics might include, but are not limited to: Asia and the (un)natural / supernatural Transcultural / Transpacific Gothic The Gothic and Orientalism Gothic gardens and tropical wildlife Volcanic islands and vengeful oceans Aliens, monsters, or ghosts / spirits in an Asian context The inhuman, transhuman, anti-human, more-than-human / posthuman Apocalyptic / dystopic imagination and the (non)Asian other Deserted rural areas and haunted urban landscapes Indigeneity and environmental injustice Invasive species and regional Gothic Disorder / excess / transgression in nature Diseases and extinction Bodily contagion and dis / trans-figuration Migration, displacement and (im)mobility Fear of the nonhuman world and / or the wilderness Ecological crises and race / gender / class (in)equality Strange natures and queer ecologies This SARE special issue invites papers, of between 5000 and 7000 words, that address, but need not be limited to, the above questions. Abstracts of 200 words (maximum), along with a 50-word author bio, are to be emailed to The Editor, SARE at sare@um.edu.my, with a copy to the Guest Editor at johsu@mail2.nccu.tw by 15 November 2021 . Decisions will be sent out by 30 November 2021. The deadline for the submission of full papers is 1 March 202 2 . Submissions should be in English and uploaded to the SARE website through the “Make a Submission” portal at https://sare.um.edu.my. Further submission guidelines can be found on our website.

SPECIAL ISSUE: SARE, VOL. 58, No. 2, DECEMBER 2021

2021-02-12

SARE: Southeast Asian Review of English