Call for Papers: The Disability and Horror Handbook, edited by Raphael Raphael, Angela Marie Smith, and Sophia Siddique, Bloomsbury Academic Press EXTENDED ABSTRACT DEADLINE: May 10, 2024 The horror genre has always been interested in disability. Indeed, it has displayed, exploited, and reveled in disability. From antecedents in classical and medieval monster stories, through early manifestations in Gothic literature, Grand Guignol, and German expressionist cinema, to today’s horror movies, TV shows, and video games, the genre has used bodily and mental transformation as the engine for many terrifying plots. Disability also shapes many of horror’s strange and threatening—or victimized and vulnerable—characters and drives its countless shocking spectacles. Undeniably, horror frequently sensationalizes disability and perpetuates harmful stereotypes about monstrous Others. At the same time, the genre’s sharp critiques of normative society and sympathy for outsiders also render its disability politics messy, complicated, and even radical. The Disability and Horror Handbook, a volume of collected essays to be published by the Bloomsbury Academic Press, sets out to understand, engage, and build on contemporary popular and critical excitement about horror’s disability dynamics, tackling both its exploitative impulses and its grotesque/delightful potential for remaking our minds, bodies, and perceptions of disability. We seek contributions reflecting horror’s contradictions, exploring the genre’s portraits of ableist and oppressive locations and practices or evocations of resistance, community, and joy. We particularly seek essays that reflect the global diversity of the horror genre, attend to disability’s intersections with race, gender, class, and sexuality, and are written accessibly for a general audience. Original essays are invited on a wide range of disability/horror texts. Concerns may include (but are not limited to): * horror progenitors such as Gothic literature, Grand Guignol, German expressionism, and the freakshow * 20th- and 21st-century movies, TV, online videos and creepypasta * games * emerging transmedia forms related to artificial intelligence/large language models (AI/LLMs) and virtual and augmented reality (VR/AR) * submissions by & about disabled/crip horror creators, critics, & fan communities * considerations of horror’s use or representation of specific impairments, disabilities, and bodymind differences * the formal disability dynamics of literary, visual, aural, and cinematic conventions * reception Submissions will be accepted until May 10th, 2024. Please send proposed title, abstract (300-500 words), and brief biography (50-100 words) to Raphael Raphael at rraphael@hawaii.edu<mailto:rraphael@hawaii.edu>, Angela Marie Smith at ang.smith@utah.edu<mailto:ang.smith@utah.edu>, and Sophia Siddique at soharvey@vassar.edu<mailto:soharvey@vassar.edu>. -- Dr. Angela Marie Smith (she/her/hers) Associate Professor, English and Gender Studies Director, Disability Studies Co-Chair, Universal Design and Access Committee University of Utah ang.smith@utah.edu<mailto:ang.smith@utah.edu>