2025 Utopian Studies Conference

Call for Papers

Blue Utopias: Utopian Dreams on Sea and Shore

The 50^th Anniversary Conference of the Society for Utopian Studies

Roundtable and Panel Submission

The Society for Utopian Studies is an interdisciplinary academic organization that has been meeting regularly since its founding in 1975. Our 50^th anniversary conference takes place in Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina from October 30 through November 1, with sessions from Thursday afternoon through Saturday evening.

The Society for Utopian Studies is pleased to continue its long-standing tradition of providing funding to offset travel costs for graduate students presenting their work at its annual meeting via the Nicole LaRose Travel Grant. 

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The organizers of this conference invite scholars to critically consider utopian visions of the oceans and shores of our planet and beyond. These “Blue Utopias” include the myth of Atlantis, to tales of castaways, to the sea as a garden, to modern proposals for undersea living, to current plans for floating cities of capitalist freedom and more. Since the work of Thomas More, whose utopia is an island, the sea and the shore have provided a canvas for new spaces, new places and new people. Oceans are highways of purposeful movement that bring dreamers to those new places and new peoples. Of course, historically these dreams have often been dystopian for indigenous peoples, who have their own visions of blue utopias whether in Oceania, the Arctic, or elsewhere. Space, once called the “final frontier,” provides an unlimited ocean and limitless shores on which to project utopian dreams.

The far and distant shore lends itself to utopian aspiration. Dreams of colonial settlement reflect utopian aspiration even if the reality of such settlements usually belies such visions. Modern migration and the desperate efforts of refugees to escape violence and privation have been couched in dystopian terms for political gain. Popular culture and modern capitalist tourism position the “beach” as a place of liberation, and the vacation resort or cruise ship as a little utopia while ignoring the conditions of exploitation that make these personal utopias possible. Thus, we also invite proposals exploring the problematic nature of “the shore” in utopian theory.

As 2025 marks the 50^th Anniversary of the founding of the Society for Utopian Studies, we also welcome proposals reflecting on and celebrating the 50th anniversary of the Society. We welcome proposals addressing the history, development, and future of the discipline of utopian studies. How can the “three faces of utopianism,” seen in literary/cultural works, intentional communities, and social/political theory, thrive in the face of a reactionary culture and politics?

Finally, we invite proposals reflecting on utopian themes in North Carolina and the American Southeast. The region has been fertile soil for utopian experiments and mythmaking, educational experiments, intentional communities, and planned cities, such as the Lost Colony, “Soul City,” and Black Mountain College.

As always, we welcome proposals from architects, city planners, artists, musicians, and members of intentional communities whose work relates to utopian thought and possibility, as well as dystopian realities and visions. Non-theme related papers, book roundtables, and author-meets-critics proposals are also welcome.

The conference organizers invite scholarly and creative responses to the conference theme from a variety of academic and non-academic disciplines, including scholars in the fields of:

• Latino/a and/or Chicana/o studies;
• LGBTQ+ studies, especially trans of color and queer of color critique;
• Gender and sexuality studies;
• Disability studies and/or medical humanities;
• Postcolonial studies;
• Environmental studies and green and blue utopias;
• Literature, film and media, philosophy, history, and the digital humanities;
• Critical theory, including but not limited to, political philosophy, affect theory, Marxism, disability theory, queer theory, postcolonial theory, environmental theory or posthumanism and new materialisms; and feminist theory.

Proposals of 250-300 words are welcome for presentations in the following formats:

• A 15- to 20-minute individual paper;
• A full panel of up to four speakers, or an informal roundtable of 3-6 presenters;
• A presentation or performance of a creative work or artifact;
• A visual/audio presentation in the form of a poster and/or demo.

Sessions will be 90 minutes. We particularly encourage pre-formed panels/roundtables comprised of shorter presentations with more allocated time for audience engagement. We ask that pre-formed panels leave at least 15 minutes for interactive discussion/Q&A. Please plan the number of presenters accordingly.

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Our keynote speaker will be Dr. Hester Blum, Professor of English at Penn State University. Her keynote address is entitled: “Polar Erratics: In and Out of Place in Circumpolar Seas.” She is the author of The News at the Ends of the Earth: The Print Culture of Polar Exploration (Duke 2019) and The View from the Masthead: Maritime Imagination and Antebellum American Sea Narratives (UNC 2008), as well as the editor of the Oxford edition of Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick (2022), among other volumes. She has participated in several research expeditions to the Arctic and Antarctica, and her awards include fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities and the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation.

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The Society for Utopian Studies is also accepting nominations and/or submissions for the Lewis, Hough, Sargent, and Roemer awards.  For information, please see the Awards tab of the SUS website.