Call for Papers: 

The Present is the Future in Motion: Afropresentism as Verb and Aesthetic 

In their April 2022 interview with BOMB magazine, visual artist and theorist Neema Githere (they/she) notes that Afropresentism is as much a practice as it is an aesthetic or theory. “I always say that the present is the future in motion,” Githere insists. “We carry ancient legacies and future aspirations in our bodies in the here and now.” But what does it mean to be a Black body that has survived until the present moment—survived centuries of genocide, colonization, and erasure—to be here, now? 

This panel invites researchers to consider how African and African diasporic writers, artists, musicians, and/or filmmakers engage with questions of temporality, and/or time as a (seemingly) linear progression. Researchers might also explore Black texts, art, and films—regardless of publication or release date—that investigate corporeality, embodiment, affect, or other immediate responses to moments of racialization and racism. 

Unlike Afrofuturist texts, Afropresentism seeks to liberate Black cultural, technological, and social advancement from the realm of the surreal and speculative. Acknowledging that each Black author portrays their Blackness in their own, individual way, what can we learn from their specific representations of race and/or time? What about their Afropresentist work is timely, or transcends time? 

Conference Information: for the Association of Canadian College and University Teachers of English (ACCUTE) 2023 Conference, taking place at the 2023 Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences Conference. The Congress of the Humanities and Social Sciences is known as Canada’s largest gathering of academics, as well as one of the largest in the world. 

Conference Location and Dates: York University – Toronto, 27-30 May 2023 

Deadline for Proposals: 15 November 2022 

Panel Organizer: Jasleen Singh (she/her), University of Toronto, ja.singh@mail.utoronto.ca

Online Submission Form: https://accute.ca/accute-2022-2023-submission-form/ 

Please submit your 300 to 500-word proposal, along with an abstract and biographical note to the online submission form above. Proposals that are not accepted to the panel will be considered in ACCUTE’s General Call. If you have any questions, please contact the panel organizer, Jasleen Singh, at ja.singh@mail.utoronto.ca