June 20-21, 2023
New Approaches to Nonhuman Fables (Workshop 1)
This opening workshop will mark the official start of the project and set the agenda for the subsequent activities. It will feature papers by several key participants to explore new approaches to the genre.
Autumn 2023 / January 2024 (online)
Fabulous Species/Human-Animal Relationships (Workshop 2)
This second workshop will be in two parts. Firstly, there will be a session on a selection of fables in relation to a wide variety of human-animal relations, such as domestication, experimentation, extinction, and kinship. Secondly, we will discuss cultural, social, and scientific discourses about the chosen species, through readings of species-based fables.
2024
Global Fables (Workshop 3)
In the third workshop, we will celebrate the global tradition and circulation of the fable by engaging with fables from different linguistic and cultural traditions, such as the Jataka tales and Kalīla wa-Dimna, ‘Brer Rabbit’ fables, and a selection of Indigenous or other non-European fables. We will also have sessions on contemporary reworkings of fables, in which we will consider what light these fables might shed on our understanding of other species, and nonhumans’ entanglement in regional and global politics, including the ongoing legacies of colonialism.
Science and Speculative Fables (Workshop 4)
In the final workshop, we will explore the role of the fable in understanding science and technology, ranging from science fiction to the intersections between fables and scientific knowledges. There will be sessions on sci-fi fables, digital media, such as video games and AI, as well as the influence of fables on the scientific imagination. We will consider the power of nonhuman fables and fabulation to address global issues, including climate change and the rapidly changing environmental conditions.
May 2025 (TBC) Final conference