What is the Human: Concepts and Controversies
Binghamton University Comparative Literature Graduate Conference
Featuring keynote speaker Dr. Christine Daigle, Director of the Posthumanism Research Institute and Professor of Philosophy at Brock University
In the wake of environmental catastrophe, developing knowledge on animal and artificial intelligences, and the living legacy of coloniality, we are once again faced with these eternally recurring questions: What is the human? What is beyond the human? What are the consequences of shifting conceptualizations of the human? Many schools of thought examining eco-criticism, posthumanism, post-colonialism, and more now confront these previously established boundaries, interrogating the ways in which our construction of ‘the human’ and consciousness has left us blind to other agencies and existences in the world. Simultaneously, there are other post- and decolonial scholars who remind us that our limited definition of ‘human’ is not new; many people have been—and continue to be—left out of a definition of the human. The Binghamton University Comparative Literature Department seeks papers from a range of scholarly approaches which address these concerns.
We invite work that engages with topics including, but not limited to:
- Posthumanism/Transhumanism
- Anthropocentrism/Anthropocene
- Eco-criticism
- Artificial Intelligence
- Machine translation
- Postcolonialism/Decoloniality
- Genocide/mass atrocity/human rights
- Migration and boundaries
- New Materialism
- Speculative fiction
- Futurisms
- Critical race theory
- Queer theory
Abstracts of up to 300 words should be submitted to bingcoliconf2020@gmail.com by February 14, 2020. Submission emails should include name, a brief bio, and your preferred pronouns.
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