Blade Runner 2049 and Philosophy #CFP

Popular Culture and Philosophy
Blade Runner 2049 and Philosophy, Call for Abstracts

Robin Bunce and Trip McCrossin, editors

Describe in single words, only the good things that come into your mind about Blade Runner 2049.
Dialogue … cinematography … music… philosophy!
Abstracts are sought for a collection of philosophical essays related to Blade Runner 2049. The
volume is to be published by Open Court Publishing, as part of their successful Popular Culture and
Philosophy series (e.g., Twin Peaks and Philosophy, Westworld and Philosophy, The Handmaid’s Tale
and Philosophy, and many others).
Abstracts are welcome on any topic of philosophical interest related to Blade Runner 2049. We are
especially interested in work that engages philosophical issues/topics/concepts in Blade Runner
2049 in creative and non-standard ways.
Chapters should be accessible and entertaining to a general audience. They may be critical, but
should be constructively so, readers being most likely also fans. Contributors may want to consult
the above or other volumes in the series (http://www.opencourtbooks.com/categories/pcp.htm).
While Blade Runner 2049 is the volume’s primary focus, we welcome work that reflects the overall
storyline, including: Philip K. Dick’s original novel, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?, the
original film, Blade Runner, K.W. Jeter’s trilogy of Blade Runner novels, and the short films Blade
Runner 2022, Blade Runner 2036, and Blade Runner 2048.

The following is a very modest selection of overlapping areas of interest, which contributors are
encouraged to work in between and beyond.
1. Gender, sexuality, reproduction
2. Race, ethnicity, nationality
3. Reality, experience, their relation
4. Identity and authenticity
5. The nature of consciousness, of bodies
6. Human nature/replicant nature, and the making of persons
7. Reason, memory, empathy, and autonomy in being human, being good
8. Politics and power, government and law enforcement
9. Politics and society, the limits of the city, the expansion of colonies
10. Technology and commerce, social and ecological degradation
11. Allusions to writers and artists, in and out of Deckard’s Las Vegas library, such as Graham Greene, Franz Kafka, Vladimir Nabokov, Sergei Prokofiev, Mary Shelley, Robert Louis Stevenson, Leonardo da Vinci, as well as Wallace’s and others’ religious references.

Contributor Guidelines:
1. Your abstract should be 100-500 words in length.
2. Please submit your work only by email — both in the body of a message and as a pair of
attachments: one a word-processed file (preferably in Microsoft Word (with either a .doc or a .docx
suffix)), the other a version of it in Portable Document Format (with a .pdf suffix) — to both
Robin Bunce ([email protected]) and Trip McCrossin ([email protected]).
2. Please include with your abstract a resume/CV for each author/coauthor (in whatever form you
prefer).
4. First and subsequent drafts should be roughly 3,000 words in length (alternatively, roughly 10
pages, using 12 pt font, with one-inch margins around) and should minimize footnotes and other
conventional trappings of academic writing.
5. Deadlines:
Abstracts: by Monday, September 3, 2018 First drafts: by Monday, October 8, 2018 Final drafts: by
Monday, December 31, 2018.
(We hope to complete and submit the manuscript by the end of January, and so welcome early
submissions.)
Dr Robin Bunce is a historian of ideas based at Homerton College, University of Cambridge
Trip McCrossin teaches in the Department of Philosophy at Rutgers
University, the State University of New Jersey