Call for Papers:

American Association of Geographers (AAG) Annual Meeting, 10-14 April 2018, New Orleans.

Dark Landscapes: new forms of experience and place

Session Organizers:

Nick Dunn (Lancaster University)

Tim Edensor (Manchester Metropolitan University) 

The relationship with light and dark is fundamental to the our regular social patterns and rhythms, and to how most of us make sense and engage with the world. However, recent research has identified the negligible amount of social science examination into these along with contemporary understandings of darkness and place (Edensor 2013 & 2017).This absence is astounding when we think of the values, meanings and influences that such relationships have upon our cultural practices, not least in how we sense and make meaning in response to widespread urbanization and illumination (Crary 2013, Dunn 2016). Rather than consider darkness as negative, opposed to illumination and enlightenment, we wish to explore the rich potential of the dark for our senses and understanding of different spaces. The history of our relationship with the dark (Ekirch 2005, Palmer 2000) continues to pervade normative attitudes towards it, although contemporary investigations (Williams, 2008; Attlee 2011; Morris, 2011; Shaw, 2015) have only begun to open up the possibilities and diversity of alternative experiences.In endeavouring to build an inter-disciplinary field of inquiry into darkness, this session aims to bring together engagements with darkness from a variety of backgrounds and theoretical orientations. We welcome both empirical and theoretical inquiries from a diverse range of disciplines and welcome presentations in non-traditional formats. It is our intention to use this session as a springboard for a forthcoming special issue.

Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words to Nick Dunn

([log in to unmask]) and Tim Edensor ([log in to unmask]) by the 23

October. We will confirm acceptance by the 24 October and we expect you to register and submit your abstract on the AAG website by the 25 October.

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