The Latinx Project’s Graduate Student Working Group Symposium
Perspectives on Aesthetics, Sexuality, and Geography
March 20, 2025
Open Call
The Latinx Project Graduate Student Working Group (GSWG) invites applications from graduate students (MA/PhD) for our first annual symposium at New York University. Inspired by a set of topics salient to the inquiries of Latinx studies, queer studies, and critical feminist geography, The Latinx Project GSWG Symposium seeks contributions that speak to the growing creative tradition of women of color feminist and Black feminist writing on racialized and queer genders and sexualities, aesthetics, embodiments, and geographies.
While we are interested in papers that investigate the material and symbolic forces that subject Latinx people and spaces to stereotype, disappearance, disenfranchisement, and death, we are especially interested in contributions that bring us to alternative practices that refuse assimilation and proper comportment, ones that foreground pleasure, defiance, contradictions, sensuality, creativity, fantasy, and survival. We hope that Perspectives on Aesthetics, Sexuality, and Geography: The Latinx Project GSWG Symposium will serve as a space to share exciting questions, provocations, and directions for interdisciplinary scholarship in the field of Latinx studies.
Participants may choose to address the following topics but are welcome to explore others:
geographies, ecologies, spatial politics, place-making, socialites
aesthetics, visual culture, poetics, music, fashion
resistance, advocacy, transformation, refusal, deviance, solidarities
sexuality, erotics, desire, pleasure, sexual politics
intellectual traditions, genealogies, methods
memory, embodiment, performance, gestures
The in-person symposium will take place on March 20, 2025 at New York University. We welcome writing and modes of presentation that experiment with form while keeping with the 10 minute requirement. A standard projector and sound system will be available. For more information on eligibility, please visit our website.
Please submit your 250-300 word abstract by February 27, 2025 using this form. Successful applicants will be notified by March 1, 2025. Please feel free to contact Orlando Ochoa (Graduate Assistant) with any questions: oo634@nyu.edu.
About GSWG
The Graduate Student Working Group at The Latinx Project fosters a collaborative environment for networking, professional development, and community. GSWG is open to graduate students at NYU, area institutions, and independent scholars looking for community. Please join us for our upcoming events and subscribe to our mailing list to receive updates relevant to graduate students.
FAQ
Who can apply? We welcome submissions from MA/MFA/PhD students and candidates across all disciplines. As this is being organized to strengthen our local network, we are prioritizing submissions from applicants who live in NYC and surrounding areas.
Can I apply if I don’t live in New York? Students who live outside of New York are welcome to apply. However, our symposium is taking place in-person and students must be present for presentation.
Are there travel grants available? Unfortunately, we are not able to provide financial support for travel.
When and where will the symposium occur? “Perspectives on Aesthetics, Sexuality, and Geography” will take place on March 20 at 20 Cooper Square.
Can I present a paper or project that’s in-progress or is being developed for a class? Yes!
The symposium will run in the morning and early afternoon of Thursday, March 20. Breakfast, snacks, and lunch will be provided. Upon acceptance, we will ask for dietary restrictions or allergies. On the next day, Friday, March 21, we will invite presenters to join us for a celebratory dinner.