Call for Papers: AMS Chicago 2024

Music and Embodiment in Screen Media

Perhaps the most conventional role of music in screen media is to stand in for immaterial things:  the mental, spiritual and emotional side of the narrative, and most particularly the subtle psychological states of the characters. Because music itself is immaterial, it is the natural vehicle for representing that which cannot be represented. 

Or so the familiar argument goes. But there are moments when music does no such thing. 

The AMS Music and Media SG seeks short presentations (15-20 minutes) on moments where screen music is thrillingly, bracingly, or disgustingly enmeshed with bodies. Subtopics may include performance studies, organology, affect theory, entrainment, voice studies, the erotic, the grotesque, timbre, dance, acoustics, gastromusicology, audience response, or any other facet of the bodily humanities. All forms of screen media are eagerly embraced. 

Please send abstracts of no more than 250 words as a PDF attachment to (not counting the title of the presentation) to [email protected].  Your PDF should be anonymized but must include the title of your presentation. Please list your full name and contact information in the body of the email, along with the title of your presentation. For full consideration, submit your abstract by April 30, 2024. The program committee will notify applicants in mid-June, 2024. The selected papers will be presented during the AMS’s 2024 meeting, November 14-17 in Chicago Illinois. 

Note that SG papers are not official AMS papers:  you are allowed to submit to both the AMS and an SG (and present at both, if you are lucky enough). The AMS prohibitions against presenting on consecutive years do not apply.