“Bookishness” is what Jessica Pressman has described as “creative acts that engage the physicality of the book within a digital culture, in modes that may be sentimental, fetishistic, radical” (Bookishness: Loving Books in the Digital Age, p.1). For the bookish among us, our engagement with the printed word has shifted remarkably in this century. At a moment where we can refer to biblio-style and shelfies, where BookTok and Bookstagram bring new modes of bookish engagement, and concepts like bibliodiversity and algorithms challenge norms both within the book trade and within literary studies and book history, The New Americanist seeks to bring these conversations together in a special issue we’re calling “Print Cultures and Bookishness in Contemporary Life.”
We are looking for articles 6-8000 words in length which in some way capture the bookish in contemporary life. Proposed topics may consider:
*Bookish objects and spaces
*Algorithms and the book trade
*Print culture communities
*Biblio-style, shelfies, and bookish fashion
*Publishing studies and contemporary literature
*Collecting, reviewing, sharing
*Challenges to histories of the book
Please submit a 250-word proposal and a short bio to newamericanistjournal(at)gmail.com no later than 31 March 2023. Accepted proposals will be asked to submit a completed article for review by 14 July 2023. Feel free to write to us with any questions.