Call all Papers
100 Years of Pan-African Speculative Imaginaries:
Forms, Strategies, Mythologies
Abstract Submission Deadline: August 15, 2026
The year 2027 marks one hundred years since Marcus Garvey’s death and nearly a century of sustained Pan-African intellectual, political, artistic, and speculative engagements with the future of Africa and the African diaspora. Across literature, philosophy, visual arts, film, music, digital media, performance, architecture, religion, science, technology, and popular culture, Pan-African thinkers have imagined futures that challenge colonial temporalities, contest racial capitalism, and invent alternative worlds of freedom, belonging, and planetary coexistence.
Far from being merely futuristic fantasy, Pan-African speculation has always functioned as an epistemological and political practice. From W.E.B. Du Bois’s visionary fiction and George Schuyler’s Black speculative satire to Nnedi Okorafor’s Africanfuturism, Octavia Butler’s prophetic narratives, Sun Ra’s Afrofuturist cosmology, Janelle Monáe’s android mythologies, Wanuri Kahiu’s AfroBubblegum aesthetics, and the emergence of African science fiction across literature, comics, gaming, cinema, and digital storytelling, speculative imagination has become one of the most productive sites for negotiating race, technology, ecology, migration, sovereignty, memory, gender, spirituality, and planetary futures. Yet, the genealogy of Pan-African speculative thought extends well beyond contemporary Afrofuturism. Indigenous cosmologies, oral traditions, myths of origin, divination systems, ancestral epistemologies, maroon imaginaries, liberation movements, anti-colonial visions, Black radical traditions, decolonial philosophies, and ecological worldviews have long produced speculative grammars through which African peoples have envisioned alternative social orders.
This landmark call for papers seeks to dig into one hundred years of Pan-African speculative production by bringing together scholarships from academics, writers, artists, filmmakers, philosophers, historians, anthropologists, technologists, digital humanists, and cultural practitioners. Rather than treating speculation as a recent literary phenomenon, we understand it as a broad cultural practice through which African and diasporic communities have imagined otherwise. We invite researchers, artists, writers, and speculative thought-leaders to investigate the past century of African and Afrodiasporic speculative arts, examining how they have challenged, expanded, and reimagined the boundaries of the real.
We welcome abstracts that explore the forms, strategies, and mythologies that have defined this century of speculation. Submissions may address, but are not limited to, the following areas:
I. Genealogies and Theoretical Frameworks
· Histories of speculative thought in Pan-African traditions (e.g., Garveyism, Ethiopianism, Negritude)
· W.E.B. Du Bois, George Schuyler, and early Black speculative writing
· Anti-colonial visions of the future and liberation movements as speculative projects
· Black Atlantic temporalities and Black radical traditions
· Theoretical interventions: Pan-Africanism, decolonial theory, African philosophy, posthumanism, critical race theory, and Indigenous methodologies
II. Forms, Genres, and Media
· Literary forms: Science fiction, fantasy, magical realism, weird fiction, experimental fiction, and oral storytelling
· Visual and popular cultures: African speculative cinema, animation, video games, virtual reality, and Afrofuturist music
· Graphic narratives: Comics, webcomics, and digital storytelling platforms
· Afrosurrealism, Afro-gothic, Afro-weird, and African science fiction
III. Mythologies, Cosmologies, and Epistemologies
· African mythopoesis: Water spirits, trickster traditions, and ancestors
· Indigenous cosmologies, sacred landscapes, and cyclical histories
· Divination systems, animism, and spiritual technologies
· Myth as political imagination and the reconstruction of historical memory
IV. Technology, Ecology, and Planetary Futures
· Artificial intelligence, robotics, and algorithmic governance
· Digital sovereignty, data colonialism, and technocolonialism
· Climate fiction, petrofiction, energy futures, and environmental justice
· Indigenous environmental knowledge and oceanic imaginaries
V. Political, Social, and Speculative Geographies
· Geopolitics of imagination: Independence movements, neo-colonialism, and BRICS futures
· Migration, borders, refugees, and interplanetary mobility
· Black feminist futurisms, queer futurities, and speculative bodies
· Redefining Pan-African solidarities in the twenty-first century
Abstracts should be 250–300 words long, accompanied by a 100-word biographical statement for each presenter. Submissions should be made by the abstract submission deadline: August 30, 2026.
Notifications of abstract acceptance will reach contributors by Aug, 15, 2026. Successful authors will be required to submit full papers conforming to the 7th edition of the APA style sheet by Sept, 30, 2026. All manuscript contributors will receive reviewers’ comments and editorial decisions by Oct, 15, 2027. Accepted full papers will be considered for inclusion in a subsequent peer-reviewed special issue of the reputable academic journal, Frontiers of African Diaspora Studies, Vol. 1, No. 2 (forthcoming, 2026), published by the Institute of African and Afro-Diaspora Studies, University of Electronics Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China.
We particularly encourage interdisciplinary engagements that move beyond conventional literary analysis to include visual cultures, music, architecture, philosophy, religion, media studies, political theory, performance studies, environmental humanities, science and technology studies, anthropology, sociology, archaeology, linguistics, and digital humanities. We especially welcome submissions from early career researchers, independent scholars, creative practitioners, and artists based in Africa, the Caribbean, Latin America, Asia, and the wider Global South.
Abstracts should reach the Special Issue Editor: Professor Ignatius Chukwumah, Department of English and Literary Studies, Federal University, Wukari, Taraba State, Nigeria. Email: ignatiusc@fuwukari.edu.ng / ignachuks@gmail.com
Ignatius Chukwumah, Ph.D., is Professor of English (African literature and popular culture) in the Department of English and Literary Studies, Federal University, Wukari, Taraba State, Nigeria. He holds a Ph.D. in English (Comparative Literature) from the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, Nigeria. He is currently the Distinguished Research Fellow of the Institute of African and Afro-Diaspora Studies, University of Electronics Science and Technology of China, Chengdu, China. His numerous articles have appeared in African Literature Today, Tydskrif vir Letterkunde, CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, English Academy Review, Journal of Narrative Theory, and other learned journals. His latest edited volume is Sexual Humour in Africa: Gender, Jokes, and Societal Change (Routledge, 2022), while Teaching Anglophone African Film (MLA) is in press. His latest article is “Collaborative Online Children’s Literature in Africa: Reader Participation on Nigeria’s EbonyStory.com” (English Academy Review, 42, 2025, 71-83).
The following curated list provides foundational and contemporary texts across literature, comics, cinema, and gaming for contributors seeking reference material.
Early Foundations and Speculative Turn (1920s–1970s)
1. Du Bois, W.E.B. Darkwater: Voices from Within the Veil. Harcourt, Brace and Howe, 1920.
2. Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. Random House, 1952.
3. Tutuola, Amos. The Palm-Wine Drinkard. Faber and Faber, 1952.
4. Schuyler, George S. Black No More. Macaulay, 1931.
5. Reed, Ishmael. Mumbo Jumbo. Doubleday, 1972.
6. Delany, Samuel R. Dhalgren. Bantam, 1975.
7. Butler, Octavia E. Kindred. Doubleday, 1979.
8. Morrison, Toni. Song of Solomon. Knopf, 1977.
Contemporary Masters and Africanfuturism (1980s–2020s)
1. Butler, Octavia E. Parable of the Sower. Four Walls Eight Windows, 1993.
2. Hopkinson, Nalo. Brown Girl in the Ring. Warner, 1998.
3. Okri, Ben. The Famished Road. Jonathan Cape, 1991.
4. Due, Tananarive. My Soul to Keep. HarperCollins, 1997.
5. Whitehead, Colson. The Underground Railroad. Doubleday, 2016.
6. Jemisin, N.K. The Fifth Season. Orbit, 2015.
7. Okorafor, Nnedi. Binti. Tor, 2015.
8. James, Marlon. Black Leopard, Red Wolf. Riverhead, 2019.
9. Serpell, Namwali. The Old Drift. Hogarth, 2019.
10. Solomon, Rivers. An Unkindness of Ghosts. Akashic, 2017.
11. Thompson, Tade. Rosewater. Orbit, 2016.
12. Adjei-Brenyah, Nana Kwame. Friday Black. Mariner, 2018.
13. Onyebuchi, Tochi. Goliath. Tor, 2022.
14. Morrison, Toni. Beloved. Knopf, 1987.
Comics, Graphic Novels, and Digital Storytelling
1. Walker, David F., et al. Bitter Root Vol. 1: Family Business. Image Comics, 2019.
2. Fielder, Tim. Infinitum: An Afrofuturist Tale. Dark Horse, 2021.
3. Roye, Okupe, et al. Malika: Warrior Queen. YouNeek Studios / Dark Horse, 2021.
4. Eshiet, Mshati, et al. Jember. Etan Comics, 2018.
5. Clark, P. Djèlí. The Black God’s Drums. Tor, 2018.
6. Disien, Nthato, et al. New Masters. Image Comics, 2021.
Cinema, Animation, and Gaming
1. Coney, John, dir. Space Is the Place. 1974.
2. Kahiu, Wanuri, dir. Pumzi. 2009.
3. Blomkamp, Neill, dir. District 9. 2009.
4. Kahiu, Wanuri, dir. Rafiki. 2018. (Note: Though not strictly speculative, a key AfroBubblegum work)
5. Williams, Andrew, dir. TeraStorm. 2022.
6. Ujamaalive. Neptune Frost. 2021.
7. Disney+. Kizazi Moto: Generation Fire. 2023.
8. Kiro’o Games. Aurion: Legacy of the Kori-Odan. 2016.
9. Disney+/Kugali Media. Iwájú. 2024.
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