Possible Topics 2025

Paper Sessions

  • "Report from Home Base":  The political-economic situation in my state/country/region
  • "Keeping Theory Alive":  Building new programs and centers in an age of academic retrenchment
  • "Proliferating Gedankenverbote and Thought Crimes":  Teaching what is banned
  • "Jettisoning the Illusion of Normalcy": Adjusting to the new abnormal
  • "Against Critique":  Enforcing acceptance of the way things were as how things are
  • "They are Relentless":  The futility of arguments in politics and policy today

Challenges

  • Recovering Vanishing Reality in a New Dark Age
  • A.I., Science Fiction, and the Future
  • Critical Realities without Critical Concepts
  • Dark Prospects and Anti-Enlightenment
  • Financial Crises and Eco(nomic/logical)-Emotional Anxiety
  • Class Warfare from the Top
  • Life Itself as a Target:  Nature as Enemy
  • Green Economy:  Too little, too late?

Sessions

  • Author-Meets-Critics
  • Novel and Innovative Concepts
  • What is Real?
  • Was Baudrillard Correct?
  • From Obsolescent to Urgent Questions