TaPRA 2025 Bodies and Performance CFP
Deadline: Monday 10 March 2025
27-29 August 2025, University of Warwick
Theme: Fleshy futurities: Embodied yearning, resistance and grief
Given that the destructive futurities of the broligarchy hinge on transcendence, whether bodily or planetary, we suggest that there is an urgent need to ground questions of futurity, yearning and beyondness in a commitment to a fleshy embodiment and placehood. Recognising that New Materialist and post-human thought parallel millennia of often-uncited indigenous epistemology (Zoe Todd, 2016), and often neglect the embodied realities of racialisation (Zakiyyah Iman Jackson, 2015), we are cautious regarding claims to the ‘beyond’, nevertheless, given that the present moment is increasingly intolerable for many, we are curious about future imaginaries, grief and desire. Resonating with bell hook’s concept of yearning as an activist methodology (hooks, 1990), fleshy futurities asks how the terrain of the body might become a space of self-determination, resistance and possibility. With the conceptualisation of fleshy futurities, we acknowledge the legacy of Afrofuturism in the reclamation of embodied experience and rejection of oppressive systems to imagine new possibilities, recognising, as Audre Lorde reminds us, that ‘the master’s tools will never dismantle the master’s house’ (Lorde, 1984). We invite you to play in a space of uncertainty, strangeness, speculation, and maybe even hope towards the future. Dress code: sci-fi realness.
Themes and frameworks we are interested in exploring further include but are not limited to: alternative future imaginaries; queer futurities (José Esteban Muñoz, 2009); afrofuturism; queer inhumanism (Mel Y. Chen and Dana Luciano, 2015); the various pessimisms and optimisms; solarpunk; feminist abolitionism (Angela Y, Davis, Gina Dent, Erica R. Meiners, and Beth E. Richie, 2022); yearning and desire.
In addition to proposals for 20 minute papers we invite alternative modes of presentation including practice sharings and developing and speculative 5-10 minute ‘drips’ and ‘dribbles’ of research. As always we welcome proposals in written, video or voice-note form, though if invited we will require an abstract of some sort for the conference programme.
Submit your abstract here by 10 March 2025
How the TaPRA conference works:
Our conference has two types of sessions: whole group sessions for all delegates and parallel panels of papers, performances, and interventions streamed by “working group”. The working groups focus on specific research interests and disciplines and set their own themes for each conference. This is detailed in CFPs like this one. There is also an opportunity to exhibit practice research in a gallery.
A complete list of our 13 working groups is available here on the TaPRA website. Most delegates choose a working group that aligns with their interests and use this group as their base for the conference, attending most or all of their slots as the working groups meet multiple times. These sessions host presentations from long-standing members and new colleagues. However, you can attend sessions hosted by any other working group throughout the conference. The programme also includes open panels where attendees are encouraged to visit working groups sessions other than their own.
To speak, present, or perform TaPRA, you will need to identify your preferred working group and submit a proposal that speaks to their theme. You apply to one working group. You can also indicate that you are willing for your paper to be considered by other working groups.
Conference environment:
In addition to whole group sessions, working groups, and open panels. the Practice Gallery and publisher stalls are open for most of the conference, and there are more social events at various moments including the conference dinner.
Access:
The 2025 annual TaPRA conference at the University of Warwick will be a hybrid event, facilitating participation by online delegates alongside those attending in-person. Since our 2021 conference we have been able to experience benefits of online conferencing, such as increased opportunity for international presenters, lower financial costs to participate, and greater accessibility for those with caring responsibilities. The 2025 conference at Warwick aims to retain the wider opportunities for engagement that online platforms offer, whilst also maintaining a space for in-person engagement and social interaction.
Key dates:
- Applicants will receive decisions on their proposals on 11 April 2025
- Conference registration opens 12 May 2025
- Early bird registration closes on 30 June 2025
- Presenter registration deadline is 18 July 2025
- General registration closes 12 August 2025
Bursaries:
Each working group has one bursary available for postgraduate and early career researchers. The bursary includes free conference registration and £300 towards conference travel and accommodation, to be disbursed after the event on showing proof of spend. If you would like to be considered for a bursary, please tick the relevant box on the ‘Abstract Submission Form’, when submitting your abstract.
Please note: only one proposal may be submitted for a TaPRA event. It is not permitted to submit multiple proposals or submit the same proposal to several Calls for Participation. All presenters must be TaPRA members, i.e. registered for the event; this includes presentations given by Skype or other media broadcast even where the presenter may not physically attend the event venue.
