The conference will be held on Saturday, February 21, 2026.
CALL FOR PRESENTATIONS: Triangle Undergraduate Literary Conference
Date: February 21, 2026 at Duke University (Holsti-Anderson Family Assembly Room)
Proposals Due By: December 31, 2025 @ 11:59 PM
For this conference, we are interested in research related to literature, which could include (but is not limited to) critical readings, theories of literature and literary production, translation, digital and computational approaches to literature, and the impact of literature on society.
Proposals should be for ten-minute long presentations, which will be followed by five minutes of questions. We ask that submitted proposals include a working title, a brief abstract (up to 250 words), and a short excerpt from the project (up to 500 words; works in-progress are acceptable).
We are especially interested in the following topics, but we welcome any paper that may relate to literature in any form:
- Literature of the mid-twentieth century to the present
- Medieval and early modern literature
- The ethical dimensions of literature across various time periods and geographical regions
- Works that are not traditionally considered “literature” but may still be analyzed using literary methods/theories (e.g., musical works, theatrical productions)
- Poetry and poetics
Additionally, this year, our conference would like to highlight scholarship in the U.S. South. We highly encourage any presentations which draw attention to the diverse voices, bodies, stories, and landscapes of the South. Possible topics include but are not limited to:
- The role of religion and/or religious texts in the Southern imagination
- Southern literature and/or writers that reckon with the dissonant fantasies and realities of the South
- Presentations that illuminate the visible and invisible perspectives of people of color on the South’s complicated legacy
- A critical re-reading of a text that presents a homogenous view of the South
- The importance of musical and visual traditions as a form of remembering in the South
Though we encourage papers that focus on the U.S. South, we will accept presentations that relate to literature or literary traditions in any capacity.
While we are excited to consider papers that study works not written in English, all papers and presentations will be conducted in English.
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