Call for Papers

          Resistance, as performed by both human and nonhuman entities, is a fundamental tool of self-assertion, advocacy, rebellion, and transformation that has an extensive history across many spaces, traditions, and eras within the Romance world. Stemming from the Latin word “resistere,” resistance has taken on a variety of meanings ranging from “opposition to a regime or ruling power,” to the more scientific application of “force exerted by a medium to retard motion through it”. Given its varied usage and historical significance, many scholars from a multitude of disciplines have sought to define resistance utilizing a diverse cast of frameworks. Sociologist Rebecca Raby centers power and agency as cornerstones for understanding resistance, philosopher Jane Bennet approaches resistance from an ecocritical lens by highlighting nonhuman participation in affecting change, and others yet such as Angela Davis, Cherie Moraga, Silvia Federici, and Tricia Hersey reconceptualize how resistance functions in the context of capitalism, racism, homophobia, and other modern forms of institutional oppression.

          These scholarly discussions have led to the elaboration of various forms of resistance that transcend the dichotomy of violent and non-violent. Social, political, physical, economic, material, intellectual, and poetic/literary resistance are topics broached by many scholars and are widely acknowledged as manners by which both human and nonhuman entities can resist. As scholars within the humanities continue to create a more cohesive and profound vision of resistance, more questions continue to arise. What does it mean to resist and who/what are we resisting? Who is/who can participate in acts of resistance and how have humans and nonhumans alike participated in it or performed it? What is the interplay between resistance and existence, and does resistance always have to be conscious? How has the notion of resistance been reimagined with the dawn of climate change in the era of the anthropocene? How does resistance operate on a bodily level, particularly within the context of disability studies? Perhaps the most pervasive and polemic question has pertained to methodology: should resistance efforts operate within our systems to affect change over time, or is a complete sociocultural, political, and/or economic revolution necessary in order to completely dismantle these systems?