Call for Proposals: Archipelagic Flows

Call for Proposals: Archipelagic Flows

Joint publication of 
GPS: Global Performance Studies
and
Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance

Editors

Manneke Budiman, University of Indonesia
Jazmin Llana, De La Salle University, Philippines
Theron Schmidt, Utrecht University, Netherlands
Vincenz Serrano, Ateneo de Manila University, Philippines
Susanne AH Sitohang, Universitas Kristen Indonesia

Deadline for proposals (500 words + 150 word bio): 14 December 2026, 
by email to akda@dlsu.edu.ph and gps-proposals@psi-web.org

Publication: October 2027

We welcome proposals in English. There may be possibilities to publish in Filipino and/or Bahasa Indonesian, resources pending. Please indicate in your proposal if this is an area of interest for you.

Following the joint annual conferences of Critical Island Studies and Performance Studies international in Jakarta, Indonesia, in July 2026, we are pleased to invite submissions for consideration for joint publication in Akda and GPS on “Archipelagic Flows”. This joint publication continues the interdisciplinary and international confluence of the Jakarta gathering, bringing together two journals with somewhat different disciplinary and regional focuses in collaboration on an interlinked journal issue. There will be a single shared table of contents for the joint issue, with articles published simultaneously on each journal’s respective platform based on suitability of article format and topic, as determined by the editorial team after peer-review. Both journals are completely Open Access and all articles will be freely available.

The joint publication calls for proposals that engage with, extend, and even challenge the conference themes. As described in the conference announcement, the idea of ‘archipelagic flows’ is a vital framework for reimagining world-making in our current global context – a world fractured by conflict, systemic violence, and unprecedented threats to human and non-human life on a planetary scale. Drawing on the metaphor of island archipelagos, this approach addresses a crucial question: How can distinct communities maintain their autonomy while fostering necessary interconnections in the face of ecocide, deepening inequalities, and widespread impoverishment? Karen Barad’s notion of existing “together apart” offers a productive lens for understanding how we might cultivate flourishing conditions across differences. This framework bridges insights from performance studies and critical island studies, suggesting new methodologies for survival and coexistence that transcend simple binaries of isolation versus connection. Like islands in an archipelago, communities can maintain their distinctive characteristics while participating in larger networks of mutual support and exchange, creating resilient systems capable of addressing contemporary challenges while preserving cultural and ecological diversity.

We welcome proposals that engage with the specific performance and ecological contexts of, but not limited to, Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific, as well as those that extend archipelagic thinking toward forms of world-making, decolonial dismantling, and contrapuntal connections and entanglements more broadly. We aim to continue the productive dialogue and exchange between and within critical island studies and performance studies, whether that is an explicit dialogue within a particular proposed article, or by editorial selection of diverse perspectives on similar contexts or challenges.  The distinctive capacities of the two journals open possibilities for multiple modes of scholarship, whether as more traditional analysis-based article, or as dialogic, image-based, or mixed-media assemblages.

Conference themes that would be welcome in this context include (but are not limited to):

• Cultural exchange, oceanic encounters, trade and circulation
• Migration and diaspora, borders and border-crossing
• Epistemic and ontological pluriversality, fluid states, conceptualization of flow
• Nonhuman and multispecies ecologies, animated earth and water, climate change and rising oceans
• Queer archipelagos, trans fluidities, alternative histories and memories
• Emerging methodologies of interdisciplinary and intercultural research
• Archipelagic and oceanic cultural traditions, performing islands, island performance studies

About the journals

Both Akda and GPS are peer-reviewed, Open Access academic journals. Neither journal charges fees for accessing articles, nor for publishing or processing submissions.

Akda: The Asian Journal of Literature, Culture, Performance (https://animorepository.dlsu.edu.ph/akda/) is an international, double-blind peer-reviewed journal that seeks to publish cutting-edge articles in the areas and intersections of Literary, Cultural, and Performance Studies. It is an open-access journal, which comes out twice a year, normally in April and October. As a Philippine-based journal, Akda publishes articles written in English and in Filipino with abstracts translated in English. While most of the contributions focus on literary, cultural, and performance studies in the Philippines, we especially welcome articles that will inaugurate new and dynamic directions for scholarly inquiry on the literary and cultural production of the Asian region. We publish articles that may potentially be relevant to the concerns of the various national and cultural contexts in Southeast Asia, Asia-Pacific, and the larger Asian region. Our commitment to diversity and to multicultural dialogue fosters Philippine and Asian research that is locally engaged and attentive to rethinking literary, cultural, and performance phenomena while providing an international platform for regional voices.

GPS: Global Performance Studies (https://gps.psi-web.org/) provides a platform for scholars and artists engaged in a broad range of performance studies, including contemporary performance practices; theory, politics, social and cultural contexts of and as performance; performance and visual arts and media; and practices of resilience and care for everyday life. We emphasize a global perspective on these themes and practices, and aim to support under-represented narratives and epistemologies that trouble and contest the discipline of performance studies.

As an online platform, GPS aims to create and utilize digital methods of publishing as a method for supporting diverse and situated knowledges that intervene within centralized or universalizing academic discourses. We are interested in modes of scholarship that engage productively with the relationship between form and content, and we support video and audio papers, podcasts, and recordings; performance texts, scores, and scripts; as well as academic articles that take a more conventional text form. GPS is published biannually and is funded by Performance Studies international.

Proposals and timeline

Proposals should be a maximum of 500 words and include the preferred format (video, audio, text, mixed, etc.), as well as a 150 word biographical statement. Submissions must be original, unpublished work not under consideration for publication elsewhere. GPS and Akda follow a double-blind peer review process.

Proposals: 14 December 2026 – send by email to akda@dlsu.edu.ph and gps-proposals@psi-web.org

Notice of acceptance: 15 January 2027. Note: Acceptance of proposal does not guarantee publication, as all articles must be peer-reviewed.

Full articles for peer-review: 30 April 2027

Revisions after peer-review (if needed): 15 June 2027

Final drafts after editorial feedback: 31 August 2027

Publication: October 2027 (approximately)