Call for Proposals for Special Issues
The Journal of Comparative Literature and Aesthetics is accepting proposals for Guest-Edited Special Issues.
Individual or joint guest editors are invited to submit proposals in the form of a concept note for the proposed topic, which will be used as a call for submissions. The proposed topic is expected to be of current critical interest and should contribute significantly to comparative literature, aesthetics, philosophy, intellectual history, art history, criticism of the arts, or the history of ideas.
The special issue proposals should demonstrate a clear understanding of the current state of research in their respective fields and offer innovative and relevant ideas that appeal to a broad readership. Additionally, proposals should provide a clear and concise outline of the proposed special issue, including its scope, themes, and objectives.
We look forward to receiving your proposals and encourage you to submit them promptly at editor@jcla.in. Please do not hesitate to contact us if you require any assistance or have any questions regarding the submission process.
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Vol. 48, No. 2, Summer 2025 (Regular Issue)
We are now accepting submissions for our forthcoming regular issue, Vol. 48, No. 2, Summer 2025. Manuscripts in MS Word (5,000–10,000 words) adhering to the MLA 9th edition formatting guidelines should be sent to editor@jcla.in by 31 December 2024.
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Art, Imagination, and Affect
Guest Editors: Radu Bumbăcea and Julia Langkau (University of Geneva)
Much of the philosophical literature on imagination and affective states has focused on our emotional reaction to imaginative engagement with fiction, in particular on two prominent puzzles, known as the ‘paradox of fiction’ and the ‘paradox of tragedy/horror’. While the first asks how we can (rationally) have emotions towards fictional events and characters, the second relates to our apparent enjoyment of negative emotions. Recent discussions have shifted (a) from propositional towards richer kinds of imaginative engagement and mental imagery, (b) from solving puzzles to analysing the peculiarities of affective states in our engagement (c) not only with fiction, but also with various different forms of art. This special issue is dedicated to pushing the debate forward with respect to these three recent developments and to understanding their interdependence. The aim is to take a close look at imagination and affect both in creating art and in its reception.
With respect to (a), we are interested in the creative role of imagination not only in the production of new artworks, but also in our engagement with such works. We would also like to explore the role that affective states and values certainly play in creative imagination. Another question is to what extent our engagement with works is constrained by norms and to what extend there is room for creative imaginative engagement. With respect to (b), one key issue is the role of affective states and imaginative immersion in the appreciation of art. While some authors think both are essential, others argue that the best appreciation is the detached intellectual understanding of minute aspects of the work. Further, we may wonder whether our affective engagement with art follows the same or different norms as affective states in real-life situations, and – again – to what extent the audience is constrained by norms or rather free in their engagement. Finally, with respect to (c), the question is whether fictionality plays a role in how we engage with a work of art. Some authors have recently argued that whether a work of art is considered fictional or not is a matter of genre and is not as significant as we might have thought. We would therefore like to address the general question of whether fictionality has some impact on how we should engage with and appreciate a work.
We encourage authors to submit their contributions addressing interrelations between art, imagination, and affect, with a focus on one of the following or related questions:
- What is creative imagining in the context of art?
- What is the role of affective states in creating art?
- What kind of imagination is involved in appreciating art?
- Do different norms apply to emotions towards fictional art and emotions towards real life?
- Are emotional reactions to art relevant? Is it important for a reader to actually experience an emotion, as opposed to imagining it or realising that the passage demands that emotion?
- Does the fact that after repeated engagement with a work we are less immersed in the fiction and our emotional reactions are much less strong pose a problem?
- Is emotional engagement with art part of engaging properly with it? If so, how does it relate to the artist’s intention
- What role does the distinction between emotions towards the content of a work and its form play?
- What is the connection between artistic means and the emotions we experience in our engagement with fiction?
- Does fictionality make a difference as to how we engage with a work?
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Reimagining the Ocean: The Blue Humanities in French and Francophone Studies
Guest Editors: Keith Moser (Mississippi State University, USA) and Isaac Joslin (Arizona State University, USA)
This volume reexamines the rich tradition of maritime literature in French and Francophone Studies through the lens of the emerging interdiscipline of the Blue Humanities. Compared to the growing body of diverse academic studies devoted to the Blue Humanities throughout the Anglophone world, there is a dearth of research in this innovative and transdisciplinary field within French and Francophone circles. This project represents a point of departure for filling this research gap by reevaluating sea stories and nautical fiction written in French from the vantage point of the theoretical approaches that undergird the Blue Humanities.
For instance, canonical writers such as Albert Camus, Jules Verne, and J.M.G. Le Clézio probe the veritable complexity of the relationships between the nautical and the terrestrial on an interconnected planet in their respective works of fiction. Many French-Francophone authors also remind us of the cosmogonic origins of life that bind Homo sapiens and all other sentient beings to the ocean. Moreover, the French philosophers Gaston Bachelard and Michel Serres suggest that reestablishing a primordial, sensorial connection with water itself is part of an existential, epistemological, and spiritual quest. It is in this sense in which Serres provocatively declares in his essay Biogée, “Don’t ever stop making love to Garonne and being born from it, emerging from it, flowing from my maternal abode […] conjugal bedroom, conjugal bed, beloved woman, birth canal […] belly from which I was driven out when I became a solitary nomad on this Earth. But my flesh has retained these motherly waters.”
Whether in V. Y. Mudimbe’s novel, Entre les eaux, or more recently in Fatou Diome’s Le Ventre de l’Atlantique, waters have consistently held a prominent position in francophone literature, whether as the embodiment of the gulf between the continent and its diasporas, or an impediment or obstacle to be overcome in the endless quests for emigration. One might also consider the role of water spirits in traditional African folktales and mythologies, as well as the opportunities afforded by water for human mobility and its necessity for the flourishing of human civilizations throughout history. Regardless, waters mark a significant trope in francophone literature.
In an era defined by an anthropogenic, ecological crisis of epic proportions, this collection of essays also investigates how widespread maritime pollution, biodiversity loss, and rising sea levels threaten the continued existence of all species. We also welcome contributions from researchers who directly link this unsustainable oceanic destruction to a capitalist economic paradigm that is predicated upon the notion of unfettered growth and expansion. In other words, how do French and Francophone authors undermine this destructive neoliberal ideology that has been exported to all corners of the globe by asking the same fundamental questions as prosperous degrowth theorists like André Gorz, Serge Latouche, and Ivan Illich in their sea narratives? In this same context of how late-stage capitalism appears destined to continue to erode the very foundation of life itself, articles that demonstrate how French and Francophone authors decry the privatization of the commons are especially encouraged.
Some potential topics to consider include:
- Eco-spirituality and water
- Material ecocriticism
- Biosemiotic insights into maritime life
- Deconstructing the nautical-terrestrial binary
- Evolutionary perspectives in cosmogonic narratives
- Coming-of-age maritime fiction or the bildungsroman
- Maritime travel narratives
- Mediterranean Studies
- Maritime fiction and sensory studies
- Ocean pollution
- Loss of oceanic biodiversity in the Capitalocene
- Degrowth maritime narratives
- The symbolism of water in diasporic communities
Submission deadline: 31 August 2025
Email: editor@jcla.in
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SPECIAL ISSUE – A Festschrift for Peter Lamarque
Guest Editor: Washington Morales-Maciel (Universidad de la República, Uruguay)
In felicitation of Peter Lamarque’s oeuvre, we are bringing out a special issue titled “A Festschrift for Peter Lamarque”. This edition aims to celebrate his distinguished academic career, characterized by a commitment to the highest standards of clarity, intellectual depth, and rigorous thought. His internationally acclaimed work has significantly shaped diverse fields within the arts, challenging traditional debates in aesthetics and pioneering new directions within the discipline.
The journal itself has had the privilege of serving as both a platform for his original contributions and as a witness to his influence, with him also serving as an honorary member of the editorial board. In recognizing the breadth of his scholarship and the generosity of his intellectual spirit, the journal aims to pay tribute to a body of work that has, from its inception, treated literature as a vital subject within philosophical aesthetics.
Lamarque’s approach challenges the narrow subordination of literary theory to the semantics and pragmatics of fiction, while also resisting the dissolution of boundaries between continental literary criticism and the social sciences. His enduring contributions to the discipline’s distinct identity, his defence of its autonomy, and his forward-looking research initiatives collectively form a philosophical legacy that this special issue seeks to honour.
We invite original research articles in 5,000-10,000 words (MLA style) addressing, among others, but not exclusively, the following topics and problems:
I. Metacriticism – Aesthetic Interpretation of Literature
i. What are or should be the aims of literary interpretation?
ii. What is the nature of the principles of literary rationality?
iii. What are the specific contributions of the logical-philosophical investigation of fiction to the aesthetic understanding of literature?
iv. What are the theoretical strengths and weaknesses of thought theory for the solution of the paradox of fiction?
v. What are the boundaries between literary, philosophical, psychological and psychoanalytical interpretations?
II. Ontology of Literature
i. What are the objects suitable for literary interpretation?
ii. What is the nature of the aesthetic properties of literature?
iii. What are the conditions of identity and subsistence of works of art, particularly literary works?
iv. Is the construction of characters analogous to the construction of personal identities or the construction of persons?
III. Epistemic Assumptions of Metacriticism
i. What notions of knowledge are presupposed in the contemporary philosophy of literature?
ii. Are recent humanist philosophical programs consistent with conventionalist aesthetics, or can they find foundations in it?
IV. Ethics and Literature
i. Is the aesthetic value of literature ultimately an ethical value?
ii. Is the value of a literary work a function of its ethical content, whether positive or negative?
V. Methodologies of Speculative Aesthetics
i. What are the strengths and legitimacy of transcendental-analytic analyses in conventionalist aesthetics?
ii. Are there substantial differences between sociological and transcendental-analytic analyses of literature?
iii. What are the limits and scope of empirical aesthetics compared to those of speculative aesthetics?
iv. Is a conventionalist elucidation of literary creation, archaic art, and even art outside the boundaries of the Western canon possible?
Submission deadline: 31 March 2025
Email: washington.morales@fhce.edu.uy, editor@jcla.in
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SPECIAL ISSUE – (De)Bordering Aesthetics: 19th-Century German Philosophy and the Migratory Turn
Guest Editor: Gabriele Schimmenti (Roma Tre University, Italy)
Philosophical studies on borders and migration have expanded in recent decades due to (among other things) the international historical challenge represented by the migration processes generated and multiplicated by phenomena such as globalization and climate crisis. In recent years, several scholars in political philosophy and critical political science have advanced the need to rethink categories such as space, territories or borders, as well as the necessity to reconsider political subjectivities from the vantage point of mobility. A migratory turn has also occurred in aesthetics, philosophy of art and art history (Dogramaci 2019). New emergent approaches such as Border Aesthetics (Schimanski and Wolfe 2017; Schimanski 2019) and Migrant Aesthetics (Carpio 2023) emphasize both the crucial role of migration for aesthetic production, and the relevance of aesthetics with regard to the narrative construction/description of borders, borderscapes, migration and the subjectivities involved.
The aim of this special issue is to investigate the relationships between aesthetics, borders and migration in German Philosophy, in particular in 19th-century aesthetics. In fact, 19th-century German aesthetics and, more generally, philosophy represent not only a moment in which an explicit reflection between potentially different concepts of borders is developed — and this can be read as a great attempt of both bordering and debordering — but also a laboratory for rethinking borders from a territorial, (inter)national, economic and cultural perspective, and to consider the phenomenon of global migration in relation to humans and non-humans, including artistic objects.
Last date of submission: 31 January 2025.
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Translation & Philosophy: Disciplines in Need of Dialogue
Guest Editor: Byron Taylor (University College London)
This special volume asks scholars to wonder how, why, to what extent and in what ways ‘the Philosophy of Language’ has supposedly dominated academic Philosophy for so long now, while having almost nothing to say about translation. As such, it invites scholars to consider ways in which the engagement of translation and philosophy can be reappraised and re-examined across a variety of global contexts. This is an oversight long overdue addressing. It will aim to open new dialogue and set forth a new discursive space, with rich possibilities of re-invention and diversification for both disciplines in their mutual engagement. As such, we hope to receive contributions from either discipline, or from scholars with an interest in these issues, the engagement (or lack thereof) between these disciplines.
Analytic philosophy has, at least since the days of the Vienna Circle, opted for a style of writing that is deliberately clear, uncharacteristic and transparency. Yet however confidently it has pursued these ends, it now reaches a moment of stagnant crisis with no clear direction. We are especially interested in contributors who examine how translation and philosophy operate in conjunction, comparison or dialogue with debates of World Literature and untranslatability. For a discipline in a state of self-confessed dysfunction as Analytic Philosophy is, does the introduction or inclusion of translation into philosophy represent a chance for renewal? Should philosophers read more about translation, or should translation scholars read more philosophy? Themes include (but are not restricted to):
1. Translation and Analytic Philosophy;
2. Translation and Continental Philosophy;
3. Translators and philosophers;
4. The language used by philosophers;
5. The history and reception of ideas;
6. Global contexts that challenge Global English;
7. Comparative literature and philosophy.
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Gnosis and Esotericism in Speculative Fiction
Guest Editors: Michael Barros and George J. Sieg
Due in no small part to television adaptations of Sandman and The Man in the High Castle, as well as movie remakes like Dune, there is a surge of interest in both speculative fiction and themes of hidden, often transcendental knowledge. This issue will examine the presence and impact of esotericism and gnosis in speculative fiction, considering how they are expressed and their role in shaping narrative, character development, and thematic depth. Of particular interest are works by authors such as Philip K. Dick, Ursula K. Le Guin, and Neil Gaiman.
Themes and Objectives
- Explore the aesthetic aspects of esoteric themes in literature.
- Discuss what gnosis means for modern stories.
- Study the link between hidden knowledge and speculative fiction.
- Examine how historic gnosis/Gnosticism is expressed in speculative fiction.
- Understand how these themes affect stories and characters.
- Analyze the techniques employed by authors to express esoteric/gnostic ideas.
- Promote discussions between literature, philosophy, and religious studies.
- Highlight examples of speculative fiction that deal with esoteric/gnostic thought and assess their impact.
Possible Topics
- How is the “Gnostic Trilogy” of Philip K. Dick unique in its expression of Gnosticism?
- Analysis of Ursula K. Le Guin’s use of esoteric themes in her Earthsea series.
- The role of gnosis in Neil Gaiman’s American Gods and Sandman series.
- The presence of esoteric symbolism in the work of William Blake.
- Examining the influence of historic Gnostic Christianity on contemporary speculative fiction.
- Representations of mystical knowledge in sci-fi.
- The aesthetics of esotericism in dystopian literature.
- Religion vs. mysticism in speculative fiction.
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SPECIAL ISSUE – A Study of Aesthetics in Art and Representation
Contemporary studies in art in juxtaposition with the politics of representation lack a cogent evaluation of the limitations of the persisting need for epistemic validation for ontological existence. The relationship between art and its contribution toward the endorsement of ontological beliefs is a complex entity that constructs and reconstructs material conceptions of literary history. Such gaps in literary criticism necessitate a theoretical analysis of the aesthetic experience in art and reality, and the scope of aesthetics in its (re)presentation of the reality of art.
This issue is an effort to commemorate the contributions of Prof. Ananta Charan Sukla (1942 – 2020) toward the realm of literary criticism. His chief works in literary theory engage with a tendentious rereading of the concept of aesthetics for the promotion of novel ideas in the field. To understand and develop his literary output, scholars need to question the positionality of the ‘third-world’ subject in Western discourses to enable the creation of mechanisms of departure from mainstream criticism for the development of an alternate mode of enquiry that concerns itself with the establishment of the subaltern as the Subject. Within this postcolonial framework, we need to examine contemporary theories of literary representation, and study the essence of art and its reality.
Other potential thematic constructs for academic discourse include reconsideration of literary theory and representation in comparative literature. Prof. Sukla has extensively worked on distinct modes of representation and re-presentation in fiction. Scholars are, therefore, welcome to integrate the diversity of his research interests to explore the fundamentals of fictionality in literary tradition, particularly its relationship with epistemology and subjectivity. Discourse on fictionality is supremely pertinent to understand Prof. Sukla’s examination of the conceptuality of fiction and its contribution, if any, to the paradigmatic status of the actual world.
To make the issue an academic ode to a remarkable critic, we invite scholarly papers that engage with the potentialities of representation in contemporary criticism and explore the aesthetics of art. We also welcome papers that introduce the anxieties and enquiries of contemporary criticism in their engagement with literary aesthetics. The objective is to continue discussions inaugurated by Prof. Sukla in academia.
Possible topics of discussion include, but are not limited to, the following:
- Mimesis in Greek and Indian Aesthetics
- Indian Aesthetics in Dramaturgy and Poetics
- The Indian ‘Subject’ in Western Aesthetics
- Art, Essence, and Experience in Contemporary Aesthetics
- Examination of Representation and Deconstruction in Literary Theory
- Theorisation of Impersonal Art
- Potentiality of Art in the Indian Milieu
- Transcultural Possibilities of Classical Indian Aesthetics
- Strategies of Deconstruction in Comparative Literature
- Language, Discourses, and Aesthetics
- Ontology and its Representation in Literature
- Environmental Aesthetics in Indian and Western Philosophy
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Chief Currents in Chinese Art History and Aesthetics: Contemporary and Cross-Cultural Perspectives
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Art and Emotion: Philosophical Engagements with Painting
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SPECIAL ISSUE – Understanding and Enjoyment in Aesthetic Experience