Call for Papers: “Rot and Renewal” Seminar — ACLA 2026 Annual Meeting
Jessie Croteau
Dear Colleagues,
On behalf of the American Comparative Literature Association (ACLA), we are pleased to announce a Call for Papers for the seminar titled “Rot and Renewal: Theorizing Decomposition across Space and Time” to be held at the ACLA 2026 Annual Meeting in Montreal.
Seminar Abstract
How might we chart the generative possibilities of decomposition? Often indexing danger, disease, or disgust, decomposition has also emerged across multiple disciplines as a
process that upends theorizations of agency, archives, and temporality, offering the promise of re‑composing damaged worlds (DeSilvey, 2017; Hage, 2021; Lyons, 2020; Tsing, 2015).
This seminar invites papers that theorize, historicize, or creatively engage with decay—whether material, symbolic, political, or aesthetic. We welcome contributions from literature, environmental humanities, STS, media studies, political theory, the arts,
and related fields.
In exploring everything from entombed plutonium reactors to decompositional art and literature, cryonic suspension to compost politics, we seek to understand how processes of breakdown afford new approaches to knowledge production amid ecological breakdown and social decay. Together, we will ask how attending to rot, decay, rust, half‑lives, death, and renewal might transform our research methods, imaginaries, and sensibilities.
for more information: https://www.acla.org/seminar/d1a3deb9-9a25-4097-871a-7066ab2200ed
Submission Guidelines
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Please submit a 300‑word abstract, along with a short bio (100 words), outlining your argument, methodology, and connection to the seminar theme.
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Submissions are due by October 2, 2025, via the ACLA paper proposal portal (opening August 26).
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Decisions will be communicated by December 1, 2025.
Seminar Format & Conference Details
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Each seminar session consists of three meetings across the conference, with each session featuring three to four presenters, each offering a 20‑minute presentation followed by discussion.
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The 2026 Annual Meeting will take place February 26 – March 1, 2026, at the Palais des congrès de Montréal.
Please contact Christopher Walker (Christoph...@colby.edu) and Jessie Croteau (jcro...@haverford.edu) for questions.