CFP: Dreams

In past years, the International Committee of the Children’s Literature Association has organized a special panel focusing on children’s and young adult literature from a specific country at the conference. This year, we are hosting a themed panel at the ChLA annual conference to be held in Atlanta, Georgia from June 2-4.To that end, we seek paper proposals on the topic of “Dreams” that approach this theme from an international, non-Euro-American perspective. Preference will be given to papers that examine texts originally written in languages other than English and/or created by authors and illustrators from communities beyond Anglo-American children’s and YA publishing traditions, including global indigenous communities. Topics could include but are not limited to the following:

• Dreams as the vision of what is possible, including political / social change
• Children’s dreams, aspirations or nightmares (literal and figurative)
• Adults’ dreams or visions about childhood
• Dreams as expressions of cultural desires, aspirations or fears
• Dreams as a narrative device (“it was all just a dream”)
• Dreams and storytelling as imaginative work
• Freudian understandings of dreams as “wish fulfillment” as well as other interpretive paradigms that come from non-western traditions
• Symbolism and meanings of dreams in various cultures (e.g. Dreamtime)
• Dreams of other places, spaces, and opportunities
• Dreams as a way of memorializing/recovering the past
• Dreams as a way to make sense of or to re-imagine selfhood
• Dream worlds vs lived realities
• Inter-generational dreams/visions
• Dreamers and visionaries

Since there might be an option to present at the conference virtually, we encourage scholars and students who are based outside of North America to submit proposals.Please submit a 350-word abstract and a 200-word biographical statement with the subject line, “ChLA 2022 Themed Panel Submission” to nithya.s@txstate.edu by 11:59 p.m. (Pacific Standard Time) September 30, 2021.Two abstracts will be selected, and the authors will receive “The ChLA International Honor Award,” which includes a grant of $500 each to cover expenses related to the conference (such as the membership and registration fees). Those papers selected for the International Focus panel will accompany a presentation by the Distinguished Scholar who will be invited by the committee to present at the conference.Authors of proposals selected for the panel will be notified by October 10, 2021.  The International Committee encourages those scholars who are not selected for the Themed Panel to submit an abstract through the general Call for Proposals so that international children’s literature will become part of other panels at the conference.The deadline for general submission to the ChLA 2022 Annual Conference is October 15, 2021.