DECODINGS
Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts Newsletter
January 2026, Vol. 31, No.1
*SLSA 2026 RATIO ETHICA: University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil
*SLSA Membership: Join/Renew
*Elections and Appointments: 2nd VP, Member-at-large, graduate liaisons
*New Book Series: Proximities: Experiments in Nearness
*Call for Volunteer Ombudspersons
*Policies:Respectful Behavior and Freedom of Speech
*Social Media & Website Redesign
*AnthropoScene Book Series
*Configurations Book Reviews
*SLSA Europe
SLSA 2026, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil, August 25-29, 2026
RATIO ETHICA: Toward Epistemic Justice
Venues: University of São Paulo (USP), Butantã Campus (FFLCH–USP, Milton Santos Auditorium, Brasiliana Library, Japanese Culture House, among other places)
USP Organizers: Prof. Dr. Paulo Farah, Prof. Dr. Artur Matuck, Profa. Dra. Neusa Maria de Andrade.
With the support of the Graduate Program in Humanities, Rights, and Other Legitimacies (PPGHDL–FFLCH–USP) and SLSA.
Conference website: https://www.brasilafrica.fflch.usp.br/en/about-ratio-ethica-event
Tentative deadline for abstracts of proposals: January 31, 2026 (may change)
Submission site:https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=reslsausp2026
Contact Information: For questions regarding submissions, registration, accessibility, or institutional partnerships, please contact: ratioethica@usp.br
Conference Theme
The international conference RATIO ETHICA: Toward Epistemic Justice invites scholars, artists, writers, scientists, and practitioners from across disciplines to critically engage with questions of epistemic justice and the emergence of Alterscience. At a moment when climatic, social, and political crises destabilize established structures of knowledge, the conference seeks to reimagine what counts as valid knowledge and to amplify epistemologies historically marginalized or excluded.
Epistemic justice is proposed here not only as a corrective to inequalities in knowledge production but also as a generative framework for constructing new, plural, and inclusive intellectual futures. This paradigm calls for encounters across the humanities, social sciences, natural sciences, arts, and emerging technologies. It requires us to rethink how knowledge is produced, legitimized, and transmitted, while also examining its ethical, political, and ecological consequences.
The event continues USP’s long tradition of interdisciplinary and critical inquiry while deepening the international collaboration with the SLSA. Together, we aim to cultivate an intellectual environment open to experimentation, dialogue, and transformative practices.
Areas of Interest–We welcome proposals addressing, but not limited to, themes such as:
Addressed in an interdisciplinary way, these axes will enable the building of bridges between different fields of knowledge and the emergence of new understandings of Epistemic Justice.
The conference also welcomes proposals that, while not explicitly listed above, critically engage with the broader theme of epistemic justice and alterscience.
Submission Guidelines
Submissions should include title, name, affiliation, and contact details.
Submission link: https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=reslsausp2026
Important Dates [subject to revision].
Deadline for abstract submission: January 31
Notification of acceptance: March 1
Early registration deadline: May 15
Final registration deadline: August 20
Conference 25–29 August 2026
TRAVEL AWARDS for Ratio Ethica: SLSA provides a limited number of travel awards for underfunded members presenting at the annual conference. Members of SLSA who present at the annual conference in Brazil may apply for travel subventions by emailing their name, title of their SLSA presentation, an indication of how long one has been a member of SLSA, a postal address, and any information about their funding for the conference to the Executive Director carol.colatrella@lmc.gatech.edu by August 1, 2026. Please provide estimated travel expenses and the amount of support (if any) anticipated from other sources. If you have received travel support from SLSA in the past, please include information about that support (when and how much). SLSA officers will review applications and approve funds for as many as our budget permits; preference will be given to student members and those members most in need. Each person awarded funds will be mailed a US check after the conference. SLSA funds can be used to defray hotel, registration, transportation, or other travel expenses. Information about Essay and Book Prizes and SLSA Travel Awards is posted on the society’s Awards website. https://litsciarts.org/awards/
SLSA MEMBERSHIP: Join or renew your membership for 2026
Membership in the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts (SLSA) connects you with a worldwide community of approximately 600 scholars, researchers, and artists interested in the multi-disciplinary study of the relations among literature and language, the arts, science, medicine, and technology. Each year the annual SLSA conference attracts hundreds of participants from many different disciplines, including the history, sociology, anthropology, rhetoric, and philosophy of science, technology, and medicine; literary history and criticism; art; art history; media studies; cognitive science, and a wide variety of fields in science, technology, engineering, and medicine. Members receive three issues of Configurations, the SLSA journal; four issues of Decodings, the online newsletter; and access to the LITSCI-L, a moderated email list that reaches over 1800 subscribers.
ELECTIONS & APPOINTMENTS: Nominations and Self-Nominations for 2nd Vice President, SLSA Member-at-Large and Graduate Student Liaisons Requested: Laura Otis (lotis@emory.edu) as the chair of the Nominations Committee, and Melissa Littlefield and Christina (Ting-Ting) Shiea (cshiea@uw.edu) as members call for SLSA members to nominate candidates. Here is their recent message to members:
If you would like to get more involved in SLSA, we encourage you to nominate yourself (self-nominations are the norm) for one of three leadership opportunities, depending on where you are in your academic journey:
1) SLSA is seeking a new Second Vice-President whose term would begin at the SLSA conference in fall 2026. The Second Vice President can significantly shape SLSA’s future because this position involves a progression to First Vice-President and then to President of SLSA. Vice-Presidents and Presidents not only plan the annual conferences; they pursue opportunities for relationships with other societies and facilitate projects that fulfill the society’s goals. Their duties are described in the following passage in the SLSA Bylaws: “Each second Vice-President serves two years in that post before moving up to the office of first Vice-President and then the post of President, serving successive two-year terms. … The President presides at meetings, conducts necessary business throughout the year, convenes a meeting of the Executive Committee preceding the annual meeting, and generally oversees the functions of the Society. The two Vice-Presidents assist the President, preside at meetings in the President’s absence, and help plan the programs of annual and special meetings. The First Vice-President is responsible for the annual conferences held during their tenure.”
2) We are seeking nominations for Member-at-Large, whose term would begin at the SLSA conference in fall 2026:
A SLSA Member-at-Large serves for one two-year term and attends the yearly Executive Committee meeting at the conference and other online Executive Committee meetings throughout the year (probably 3-4). The Member-at-Large is a voting member of the Executive Committee with the opportunity to influence society decisions and suggest new ideas.
3) We are seeking nominations for Graduate Student Liaisons (more than one can serve simultaneously) whose term would run from June 15, 2026, to June 15, 2027:
SLSA relies on grad student liaisons to advise officers and conference organizers on how the SLSA experience could be made better for grad students, such as through conference programming or support networks. SLSA grad liaisons need to attend the four yearly Executive Board meetings (usually one at the conference and three on Zoom), where they can share students’ ideas and get to know how SLSA works as a professional society. Serving as a SLSA graduate liaison offers a good professional learning opportunity, but there is also a more concrete benefit: SLSA will waive the conference registration fee of its grad student liaisons.
If you would like to be a SLSA Second Vice President, Member-at-Large, or Graduate Student Liaison, please write a 150-word statement on why you would like to serve and how you could contribute to SLSA leadership, and send it to Laura Otis (lotis@emory.edu) by March 15, 2026. The Nominations Committee members will read all the statements of the Second Vice President and Member-at-Large nominees and let you know whether you can be put forward as a candidate for election this year. Grad Student Representatives are appointed rather than elected, so in this case, the Nominations Committee members will read the statements, make a recommendation and pass the statements on to the officers who can make the appointments.
SLSA BOOK SERIES Proximities: Experiments in Nearness, from University of Minnesota Press
We are thrilled that the first volume of the Proximities Series—Microbial Resolution, by Gloria Chan-Sook Kim—is now published and available!
Adjacencies abound. We are past the moment of merely thinking in terms of how opposites attract and nodes network. Today, disciplines and fields move consciously proximate to one another, in conversation and growing together. Further, the future is no longer sometime in the distance, but appears near to us, often grasped as an impending horizon of political, social, economic, and environmental catastrophe. Now more than ever, so much is so close. See the Call for Proposals (https://litsciarts.org/proximitiesflyer.pdf) for more information.
Books in the Proximities series think proximately, that is, in disciplinary tandem, about the relationships within and between the arts, literature, and science, as well as how scholarship can best be in active dialogue with communities and the world around us today, and in the future. Published in association with the Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts, this series not only thinks across disciplines, but thinks about the continuities and crossings themselves, interrogating how and why their disciplinary proximities matter. Proximities publishes work that is crafted with nearness in mind: human nearness to one another and the world around us; nearness to one another’s thoughts; to our written and unwritten pasts; to critical trends and crises; to our futures ahead. This kind of scholarship powerfully catalyzes awareness of what it means to work interdisciplinarily by challenging assumptions about disciplinary thinking from the outside in, and the inside out. If interested in submitting a proposal, please contact the editors with a short description of your book project. Series Editors: David Cecchetto—York University (Toronto, Canada) dcecchet@yorku.ca and Arielle Saiber—Johns Hopkins University asaiber@jhu.edu
SLSA OMBUDSPERSONS: Any member interested in volunteering to serve as ombudsperson, should apply by emailing Carol Colatrella (carol.colatrella@lmc.gatech.edu); include a short statement of why you are interested in serving in this role and what experience you can bring the position. Current officers will review applications to make appointments.Each Ombudsperson is an impartial entity who strives to see that SLSA members and SLSA conference attendees are treated fairly and equitably. Any member/attendee can seek the advice of an Ombudsperson. The Ombudsperson is impartial, neutral, and confidential. The rights and interests of all parties to disputes are considered, with the goal of achieving fair outcomes.
The primary responsibilities of the Ombudsperson are:
Ombudspersons: Marcel O’Gorman marcel@uwaterloo.ca and Kari Nixon mkarinixon@gmail.com
Respectful Behavior and Freedom of Speech policies are posted here:
SOCIAL MEDIA AND WEBSITE REDESIGN: Wayne Miller, Electronic Resources Coordinator (wayne.miller@gmail.com), asks for new images for the SLSA website homepage (litsciarts.org). Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal and Ed Chang are developing SLSA social media. SLSA members interested in contributing to social media on behalf of the society are encouraged to email Ed (change@ohio.edu) and Ranjodh (ranjodhsingh.dhaliwal@unibas.ch). Adam Nocek, Wayne, Ranjodh, and Ed are working with a graphic professional to redesign the SLSA website.
ANTHROPOSCENE: This book series from Penn State University Press was published in collaboration with SLSA. While not all scientists have accepted the term “anthropocene” as part of the geological timescale, the idea that humans are changing the planet and its environments in radical and irreversible ways has provoked new kinds of cross-disciplinary thinking about relationships among the arts, human technologies, and nature. This is the broad, cross-disciplinary basis for books published in the series, which includes specialized studies for scholars in a variety of disciplines as well as widely accessible works of interest to broad audiences. Send questions to the SLSA liaison for the series, Pamela Gossin at psgossin@utdallas.edu or psgossin@gmail.com. Titles in the series appear here: https://www.psupress.org/books/series/book_SeriesAnthropoScene.html SLSA Member Discount from Penn State University Press: Use promo code NR21 for 30% off AnthropoScene titles purchased directly, plus free domestic shipping and discounts on foreign shipping! See https://www.psupress.org/emailassets/NR_SLSA_1021.html
Configurations Book Reviews: Jay Labinger, the Configurations book review editor, will publish around 10 reviews per year, of books–on any topic–that are likely to interest a wide cross-section of SLSA members and Configurations readers. If you wish to propose a book for review, please email Jay (jal@its.caltech.edu) the author/title/publisher, a very brief description and statement of why it merits being reviewed in Configurations, and whether you would like to do the review yourself or, if not, any suggestions you may have for appropriate reviewers. Authors are welcome to propose their own recent book for review, with the same info. Jay will invite reviews via a posting on litsci-l, asking if anyone interested in reviewing one of them to contact him; the list of available books is posted at https://litsciarts.org/publications/ Check an issue of Configurations to see the preferred length and style for reviews. After a reviewer is matched with a book, Jay will ask for submission of the review within four months and will share the estimated date of publication.
The EUROPEAN Society for Literature, Science, and the Art is the sister organization of the international, USA-based Society for Literature, Science, and the Arts. SLSAeu welcomes colleagues in the humanities, the social sciences, the arts, and all fields of science, medicine, engineering, and computer sciences as well as independent scholars, artists, and scientists. https://www.slsa-eu.org/.
SLSA EXECUTIVE BOARD (2025-2026)
President: Rajani Sudan, Southern Methodist University (rsudan@mail.smu.edu)
Executive Director: Carol Colatrella, Georgia Institute of Technology (carol.colatrella@lmc.gatech.edu)
First Vice-President: Adam Nocek, Arizona State University (Adam.Nocek@asu.edu)
Second Vice-President: Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal, University of Basel ranjodhsingh.dhaliwal@unibas.ch
Members-at-Large: Paula Leverage (2023-25), Shane Denson (2023-25), Nat Mengist (2024-26)
Graduate Student Liaisons: Damian Enyaosah, Christina (Ting-Ting) Shiea
Configurations Editors: Melissa Littlefield, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and Rajani Sudan,
Southern Methodist University. Configurations Email address: configurations@smu.edu
Configurations Book Review Editor: Jay Labinger, California Institute of Technology (jal@its.caltech.edu)
Publications Committee: Pamela Gossin; Raymond Malewitz; Bruce Clarke
Electronic Resources Coordinator: Wayne Miller (wayne.miller@gmail.com)
Arts Liaison: Dennis Summers (dennis@quantumdanceworks.com)
Social Media Liaisons: Ed Chang (change@ohio.edu); Ranjodh Singh Dhaliwal
(ranjodhsingh.dhaliwal@unibas.ch)
Ombudspersons: Marcel O’Gorman (marcel@uwaterloo.ca); Kari Nixon (mkarinixon@gmail.com)
Past Presidents: David Cecchetto, York University, Toronto; Marcel O’Gorman, University of Waterloo; Ron Broglio, Arizona State University; Robert Markley, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; Laura Otis, Emory University; Richard Nash, Indiana University; Alan Rauch, University of North Carolina-Charlotte; Bruce Clarke, Texas Tech University; Eve Keller, Fordham University; Jay Labinger, California Institute of Technology; T. Hugh Crawford, Georgia Tech; Susan Squier, Penn State; Sidney Perkowitz, Emory University; Stuart Peterfreund, Northeastern University; James J. Bono, SUNY-Buffalo; N. Katherine Hayles, Duke University; Mark Greenberg, Drexel University; Lance Schachterle, Worcester Polytechnic Institute; Stephen J. Weininger, Worcester Polytechnic Institute
The Executive Director can be reached at (404) 894-1241 or carol.colatrella@lmc.gatech.edu.
Postal address: Carol Colatrella, Executive Director, SLSA, School of Literature, Media, and
Communication, Georgia Institute of Technology, 686 Cherry Street, Atlanta, GA 30332-0165
SLSA websites: http://www.litsciarts.org and http://slsa.press.jhu.edu
