Call for Papers
Last Date: 30thAugust 2026
MZU Journal of Literature and Cultural Studies (MZUJLCS)
Original and unpublished papers are invited for publication in the next issue of MZU Journal of Literature and Cultural Studies, Vol-XIII (Dec-2026). This will be a special issue on the theme Narrativizing the Rural. It aims to explore how rurality is imagined, represented, contested, and reconfigured across literary and cultural texts. Amid global shifts—ecological crises, migration, industrial transformations, and digital intrusion—the rural is no longer a static backdrop but a dynamic site of storytelling, struggle, memory, and identity formation. We welcome interdisciplinary perspectives that interrogate how narratives produce, transform, or resist dominant constructions of the rural. Research articles and Book Reviews
on the theme may be submitted to mzujlcs@mzu.edu.in on or before 30th August 2026.
Suggested Subthemes
- The rural as an archival site
- Regional writing and place-based narratives
- Caste, race, ethnicity, and marginalized rural subjectivities
- Intersections of indigeneity and rural space
- Stories of rural–urban migration
- Post-industrial and post-agrarian rural landscapes
- Diasporic memory and the rural homeland
- Film, television, digital media, and rural aesthetics
- Folk traditions, oral storytelling, and cultural performance
- Virtual rurality and mediated landscapes
- Climate change, environmental justice, and rural vulnerability
- The rural as a site of nationalism, populism, or resistance
- Pastoral and anti-pastoral traditions
Contributors should adhere to the MLA Handbook (9th edition) Style sheet and send their manuscripts as e-mail attachment in MS Word, Times New Roman 12 point font size, with 1.5inch line spacing in about 4000-6000 word limit. All submitted papers will be screened through double-blind peer review. The final decision of selection of articles rests with the editors. Contributors are requested to avoid footnotes, if required endnotes may be used.
Submissions should be accompanied by:
(a) A declaration that it is an original work and has not been published before and is not being considered for publication elsewhere in its final form either in print or electronic form.
(b) An abstract of about 150-200 words with 5/6 keywords explaining the objective and rationale of the paper.
(c) Details of the contributor(s) indicating name, institutional affiliation, contact no and e-mail address.
NB: Submission may be closed earlier than the given deadline if sufficient number of articles are available.