International Symposium & Call for Papers
Sponsored by the MOE World Excellence 100 Project

Theme: Critical Canons: Rethinking Aesthetics in a More-Than-Human World
Organizer: Co-hosted by the Department of English & Department of Philosophy, National Chengchi University, Taipei, Taiwan
Date: 6–7 December 2025
Venue: National Chengchi University, Taipei, Taiwan

Deadline for submission: 20 September 2025

Description:

In The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages, Harold Bloom warns us: “If we read the Western Canon in order to form our social, political, or personal moral values, I firmly believe we will become monsters of selfishness and exploitation.” Bloom’s provocation invites us to reconsider not merely what constitutes a canon, but the epistemological, ethical, and ecological conditions under which canons are formed, sustained, and transformed. Similarly, following distinct yet overlapping notions advanced by John Guillory in Cultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon Formation, the processes in which canons emerge and are disputed are animated by protocols of the distribution of literary and cultural capital enacted within academic, political, and cultural institutions. In the twenty-first century—marked by the Anthropocene’s ecological disruptions, the intensification of extractive capitalism, and the emergence of AI-generated cultural forms—our inherited and contested literary and philosophical canons call for renewed critical engagement.

In our symposium theme, “Critical Canons”—a term that means both canons under critical scrutiny and canons of critical importance—the word critical signals not only the need to interrogate and reevaluate canons, but also their essential role in shaping thought and cultural transmission. Canons are neither neutral repositories nor immutable monuments. They are dynamic, relational constellations of texts, images, and ideas, shaped by historical contingencies and cultural negotiations. They can be as rooted as the Shijing’s “Green, green, grass on the riverbank,” yet as diffuse and proliferating as Whitman’s “leaves of grass.” They can speak in Dickinson’s “murmur of a Bee,” or shimmer in Zhuangzi’s “happy fish” dialogue, which can reframe perception as an act of shared joy and being-with. The multiple meanings of the term resonate with our central inquiry: in a more-than-human world, how might canons be redefined, reinterpreted, and reimagined? What are the processes, located in multiple overlapping institutional contexts, which inform the inclusionary and exclusionary gestures of canon formation?

The symposium intends to demonstrate how aesthetic canons across cultures and institutions are not solely textual, social-political, or theoretical constructs but also material and ethical sites in which human and more-than-human agencies converge. While literary, linguistic, and cultural studies contribute narrative, figural, epistemological, and various affective modes of world-making, philosophy provides the conceptual and critical frameworks necessary to interrogate the ontological and normative grounds of canon formation. Taken together, these disciplinary perspectives underscore the productive tensions between close reading and abstraction, between historical particularity and planetary universality—tensions that disclose the generative possibilities of rethinking aesthetics in a more-than-human world. We therefore encourage contributions that explore these intersections from philosophical, literary, and interdisciplinary perspectives, with particular attention to the challenges and opportunities of collaborative inquiry.

We aim to be inclusive and interdisciplinary by inviting contributions along two complementary lines of inquiry: First, we welcome critical analyses of the processes, contexts, and more-than-human agencies involved in the formation, contestation, and transmission of canons. This includes attention to mechanisms of power, cultural capital, ecologies, and institutions that shape what can be considered ‘canonical.’ Second, we encourage interpretive, reflective, or innovative readings of particular canonical texts, ideas, or traditions. We seek papers that illuminate how the meanings and resonances of foundational works shift across temporal, cultural, ecological, or interspecies boundaries, and that attend to the elements, contexts, and stakeholders that participate in their reinterpretation. By bridging these approaches, the symposium provides a platform for both the critical interrogation of canon-making and the creative reinvestigation of canonical works themselves, fostering productive tension and dialogue between theory and practice, structure and interpretation, and between historical particularity and planetary universality.

This symposium is an invitation to re-read, re-hear, and re-compose the canon—not as a fixed archive of human achievement, but as a living, breathing, multi-species conversation. This symposium seeks to reconceptualize aesthetics and canonical formation through a more-than-human lens, engaging cross-cultural, cross-temporal, and cross-species perspectives. We ask:
How might Asian philosophical traditions — Confucian, Daoist, Buddhist, and beyond — of interdependence reshape the ethical and aesthetic underpinnings of canon formation?
How might indigenous cosmologies, local folklore and religious practice, and archipelagic aesthetics reimagine the canon as a network of reciprocal relations rather than a hierarchical archive?
How might Western philosophical thoughts – Ancient Greek and Roman philosophies, Enlightenment and Romantic ideas, etc. —traditions deeply implicated in both ecological imaginaries and natural histories—be re-read in dialogue with Asian classical philosophy and contemporary environmental humanities?
How might the emergence of AI authorship and algorithmic aesthetics compel us to revisit the notions of canon, tradition, and originality, and the temporalities of cultural transmission?
By bringing together scholars of literature, philosophy, cultural studies, media theory, and the arts, this gathering will explore how canons—classical and emergent—can be critically reimagined to account for more-than-human forms of creativity.

Possible Topics:

We welcome proposals addressing, but not limited to, the following:
Theoretical and institutional analyses of canon formation and transmission (including more-than-human perspectives)
Close readings, reinterpretations, or critical reflections on specific canonical texts, ideas, or traditions
Extractive capitalism, ecological justice, and the politics of representation
Asian and non-Asian ethics and aesthetics of interdependence and care
Indigenous oral traditions, folklore and religious practice
Enlightenment and Romanticism re-read in the context of planetary crisis
Classics and ancient histories reframed through more-than-human perspectives
Comparative poetics and transcultural thought
Storytelling as a multi-species survival strategy in the Anthropocene
The ethics of reading and the politics of canon-making
Materiality, temporality, and translation in cross-cultural canon formation
AI authorship, algorithmic aesthetics, and the redefinition of creativity
Format & Structure:

The symposium is an in-person event and is structured as follows:
Day 1: Keynote lectures, plenary panels, and interdisciplinary dialogues among scholars, artists, and practitioners.
Day 2: Thematic breakout sessions, creative workshops, field trips and a closing roundtable envisioning “A More-Than-Human Canon.”

Submission Guidelines
Abstract: 300 words
Short bio: 100 words
Language: English
Deadline for submission: 20 September 2025
Symposium email contact:
Ken Wu (110551502@g.nccu.edu.tw) & Yves Lin (111154010@nccu.edu.tw)
Please include your name, institutional affiliation, contact details, and whether your presentation will be scholarly, creative, or hybrid.

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國際研討會暨徵稿啟事
教育部「世界卓越100支持計畫」補助

主題：典律批判：「多物種世界」中重思美學
主辦單位：國立政治大學英文系、國立政治大學哲學系
時間：2025年12月6日至7日
地點：國立政治大學（台灣，台北）

投稿截止日期：2025年9月20日

研討會簡介

在《西方正典》（The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages）一書中，哈洛・卜倫（Harold Bloom）警告我們：「如果我們閱讀西方正典只是為了建立社會、政治或個人的道德價值觀，我堅信我們將成為自私與剝削的怪物。」卜倫的挑釁迫使我們重新思考的不僅是典律本身的構成，更是典律生成、維繫與轉化的認識論、倫理學與生態學條件。同樣地，約翰・吉洛里（John Guillory）在《文化資本：文學典律形成的問題》（Cultural Capital: The Problem of Literary Canon Formation）中提出相關但不盡相同的觀點：典律的出現與爭議，其過程背後乃由學術、政治與文化制度中關於文學與文化資本分配的規範所驅動。進入二十一世紀，面對人類世的生態危機、掠奪式資本主義的加劇，以及人工智慧所生成的新興文化形式，我們繼承並爭論的文學與哲學典律，都迫切需要新的批判性介入。

在本次研討會主題「典律批判」（Critical Canons）中，「critical」既指典律須受批判性檢視，同時也表明典律在思想與文化傳遞中具關鍵性的重要角色。典律既非中立的典藏，亦非不變的紀念碑，而是由歷史偶然性與文化協商所形塑的動態關係網絡，由文本、圖像與思想交織而成。它既可如《詩經》中「青青河畔草」般深根固植，又可如惠特曼《草葉集》般繁衍擴散；既能在狄謹蓀的「蜜蜂低語」中發聲，也能在《莊子》的「魚之樂」對話中閃爍，重新界定知覺為共享之樂與共存的行動。這些多重意涵呼應我們的核心問題：在「多物種世界」（a more-than-human world）中，典律如何能被重新定義、詮釋與想像？在重疊的多重制度語境中，典律形成中的納入與排除機制如何被理解？

本研討會旨在展示：跨文化與制度的美學典律，不僅是文本、社會政治或理論的構造，同時亦是人類與非人類能動性交會的物質與倫理場域。文學、語言與文化研究提供了敘事、修辭、認識論與各種情感形式的「世界製造」模式；哲學則提供了概念與批判框架，以檢視典律形成的本體論與規範性基礎。兩者結合凸顯了細讀與抽象、歷史特殊性與行星普遍性之間的張力，而這些張力揭示了在「多物種世界」中重新思考美學的創生可能。我們因此鼓勵從哲學、文學與跨學科的角度，探討這些交會，並特別關注協作探究的挑戰與機會。

我們的目標是以開放與跨領域的方式推動討論，並邀請以下兩類研究：第一，針對典律形成、爭議與傳遞過程中涉及的制度語境與非人類能動性進行批判分析，包括權力、文化資本、生態與制度等機制如何界定「何者得以成為典律」；第二，對特定典律文本、思想或傳統進行詮釋、反思或創新性閱讀，闡明基礎性作品如何跨越時間、文化、生態或跨物種界線而改變其意涵與共鳴，並探討參與其再詮釋的要素、語境與行動者。透過此雙重取徑，研討會將成為檢視典律形成與再探典律文本之平台，並促進理論與實踐、結構與詮釋、歷史特殊性與行星普遍性之間的對話。

本研討會邀請與會者「再閱讀、再聆聽、再編織」典律——不將其視為固定的人類成就檔案，而是一場有生命力的、多物種的對話。我們期望透過跨文化、跨時代與跨物種的觀點，重新構思美學與典律形成。具體問題包括：
亞洲哲學傳統（儒、道、佛及其他）中關於相互依存的思想，如何重塑典律形成的倫理與美學基礎？
原住民宇宙觀、在地民間傳說與宗教實踐，以及群島美學，如何將典律想像為互惠關係的網絡，而非階層式的典藏？
西方哲學傳統（古希臘羅馬哲學、啟蒙與浪漫主義等）——這些與生態想像與自然史密切相關的傳統——如何能與亞洲古典哲學及當代環境人文對話？
人工智慧寫作與演算法美學的興起，如何迫使我們重新思考典律、傳統、原創性，以及文化傳遞的時間性？
透過匯聚文學、哲學、文化研究、媒體理論與藝術領域的學者，本研討會將探索如何批判性地重新想像古典與新興的典律，使其能回應「多物種」的創造形式。

徵稿主題（包含但不限於）：
典律形成與傳遞的理論與制度分析（含「多物種」的觀點）
特定典律文本、思想或傳統的細讀、再詮釋或批判反思
掠奪式資本主義、生態正義與再現政治
亞洲與非亞洲的依存與關懷的倫理與美學
原住民族口傳傳統、民間傳說與宗教實踐
啟蒙與浪漫主義在行星危機下的再閱讀
古典文獻與古代歷史的「多物種」重釋
比較詩學與跨文化思想
敘事作為人類世中的多物種生存策略
閱讀倫理與典律建構的政治
跨文化典律形成中的物質性、時間性與翻譯問題
人工智慧寫作、演算法美學與創造力的再定義
會議形式與結構

研討會為實體進行，規劃如下：
第一天：專題演講、大會論壇、學者與藝術實踐者跨領域對話
第二天：主題分組、創意工作坊、田野活動，以及閉幕圓桌論壇「多物種典律」
投稿須知
摘要：300字
作者簡介：100字
投稿語言：英文
投稿截止日期：2025年9月20日
投稿信箱：Ken Wu (110551502@g.nccu.edu.tw)、Yves Lin (111154010@nccu.edu.tw)
投稿請附上姓名、服務單位、聯絡方式，並註明報告形式（學術性、創意性或混合性）。

ASLE 2024 Symposium: Green Fire
University of North Florida
May 16-19, 2024

Green Fire: Energy Stories Beyond Extraction

Call for Individual and Pre-formed Panel Proposals

The concept of energy has a history that long pre-dates any dreams of resource extraction or electrification. Cultures around the world have viewed different energies, plural, as living forces. Depending on the context, the word “energy” might call up images of interconnected beings, landforms, species, and worldviews. Phases of existence have even been understood in terms of energy, since spirits of the dead are often thought to exert their energies on behalf of, or in opposition to, the living. Robin Wall Kimmerer’s explanation of the Potawatomi word puhpowee—“the force which causes mushrooms to push up from the earth overnight”—pertains to conceptions of energy in many different Indigenous cultures. According to this paradigm, humans are just one of the many types of life-forms inhabiting a “world of being, full of unseen energies that animate everything.” Kimmerer stresses that humans have the responsibility to regulate our personal energies in reciprocal relationships with the energies of the nonhumans with whom we share the world. Aldo Leopold’s famous description of the “fierce green fire” leaving the eyes of a mother wolf he helped kill, along with his definition of land as “a fountain of energy” rather than mere property, shows how similar ideas have taken shape in Western cultures.

Yet, while the dream of “a world of being” has endured, it has mostly been eclipsed by the notion that energy exists to be harnessed. The extractivist way of thinking about and living with energy has resulted in forms of devastation and injustice that everyone concerned about the state of the Earth knows all too well.

We invite proposals—for papers, panels, roundtables, workshops, and creative new forms of dialogue—addressing what ecocriticism, the energy humanities, and other disciplines can do to help change the current situation. We seek contributions that explore different ways of understanding energy and being in the world. Scholars in any discipline are welcome to apply.

Guiding questions include, but are not limited to, the following:

Which alternative, Indigenous, or non-Western cosmovisions and cosmologies of energy do people living in extractivist energy regimes need to learn about?
How are day-to-day energetic practices changing in the so-called Anthropocene?
How can environmental humanists, activists, and ordinary people claim seats at an energy “table” dominated by scientists, technocrats, and billionaires?
What might scientific and spiritual energy practices have to learn from each other?
How do those who spend most of their time resisting the extractivist paradigm channel personal, cultural, and more-than-human energies in ways that help them avoid draining their own energies (in the form of burnout)?
How can recent scientific discoveries about how people and nonhuman beings experience energies inform our research and teaching as scholars in the humanities?
Which literary, cinematic, rhetorical, and other representational energies are doing the best work in changing how various publics think about energy?
How are energies being restor(i)ed as meaningful parts of everyday life-worlds?
The symposium will take place in person at the University of North Florida, in Jacksonville, from Thursday, May 16 to Sunday, May 19, 2024. (Scholars who seek alternative presentation formats may contact the co-organizers.) Friday and Saturday will be devoted to panels and plenary speakers, while Sunday will involve workshops at UNF (possibly elsewhere) and field trips and service activities in the ancestral homeland of the Mocama people, also known as the First Coast—site of the oldest permanent European settlements in what is now the United States.

Confirmed keynote speakers include Dr. Kendra Hamilton of Presbyterian College (author of the forthcoming book Romancing the Gullah); author and activist Janisse Ray (Ecology of a Cracker Childhood and numerous other books); and Dr. Heidi Scott of the University of Maryland (Chaos and Cosmos: Literary Roots of Modern Ecology in the British Nineteenth Century, Fuel: An Ecocritical History, and many essays).

To propose an individual paper, please submit an abstract of approximately 300 words and a brief speaker bio to the proposal portal link below.

For pre-formed panel and roundtable proposals, please list names and emails of panelists in the “co-presenter” field; include an overall abstract for the session, as well as titles, brief proposal descriptions and one-sentence speaker bios for each contributor (500 words total).

All proposals are due by by January 26, 2024.

Proposal Submission Form

To discuss ideas regarding workshops and non-traditional dialogues, or to ask about anything else relating to the symposium, please contact the co-organizers, Jennifer Lieberman and Bart Welling, at greenfireASLE@gmail.com.