Call for Submissions

Destroying Cages and Reclaiming Freedom

Deadline: January 15, 2025

We are seeking submissions for our upcoming issue, Destroying Cages and Reclaiming Freedom, which centres on the following question: what is freedom? Arising from reflections on how the affective resonance of the term “freedom” has been shifted due to its use in far-right mobilizations, the issue dwells on what it means to live in a world where calls for freedom are used to both protect the rights and dignity of marginalized groups, as well as attack those same groups through far-right, colonial, and militaristic campaigns.

As we see in the examples of the “Freedom Convoy,” the rise of xenophobic, ableist, and classist policies, efforts to ban racial equity and LGBTQ education, attacks on sexual, mental, and physical health, and the weaponization of rights to free speech in defence of hate speech and genocide, right-wing conceptions of freedom manifest in dialectical opposition to liberation. These conflicting representations of freedom blur understandings of who is being treated unjustly and who needs to be freed. Consequently, the lived realities of subjugated people are questioned and invalidated, while narratives of oppression, abjection, and victimization are appropriated by those trying to benefit from existing arrangements of power. Additionally, the global ecological crisis compels citizens of the global north to rethink liberal notions of freedom, placing it against a backdrop of apocalyptic floods, droughts, and famine that unevenly impact the third/fourth world. These horrors remind us of how “freedom” is defined by capitalism’s unfettered hunger to pillage and destroy nature in conjunction with imperialism, ensuring that freedom is unequally distributed along geo-historical and class lines.

Drawing attention to transformative social movements that challenge the ethical appropriation of freedom through collective struggle and liberation, Destroying Cages and Reclaiming Freedom explores the concept of freedom with the goal of reclaiming it as a social justice rhetoric. Our aim is to develop a radical critique and rejection of oppressive, authoritarian, capitalistic, and ethno-nationalist notions of what it means to be free by redefining the fight for freedom as something inherently inclusive, liberating, and collectivistic. New Sociology invites under/graduate students, independent scholars, activists, community leaders, and creatives to submit to our upcoming issue reflecting on experiences of freedom, imaginings of what freedom is or ought to be, and critiques of different unfreedoms in any of the following formats:

1. Photography, digital and physical artwork, maps, or comics (Max. 3 pages)
2. Poetry, lyrics, or sheet music (Max. 3 pages)
3. Social media posts/threads (Reddit, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook) (Max. 3 pages)
4. Interview transcripts (Max. 3 pages); footnotes or endnotes (Max. 1 page)
5. Short stories–fiction or non-fiction (Max. 3000 words)
6. Photographic or visual essays (Max. 3000 words–if relevant, including references)
7. Diary entries, notes to self, emails, text messages, DMs, or doodles (max. 2000 words)
8. Reflection papers or political commentaries (Max. 3000 words, including references)
9. Other alternative media that you would like to suggest to us (please email us)

Personal exchanges or posts must be written by you. If your submission includes other people, you must get their written consent to submit. We are open to submissions from all emergent scholars, activists, and creatives, but prioritize queer, trans, disabled, neurodivergent, woman-identified, femme, and non-white authors.

All submissions must be submitted with a 150–250 word abstract and at least three keywords to our online portal by January 15, 2025.

If you require further guidance around how to submit, please email our guest editor Naiomi Perera at naiomi@yorku.ca or our EIC at jdacos02@uoguelph.ca.

In solidarity,

Naiomi Perera, Bilal Zahoor, S.B., & Tigist Wame, with Dr Jade Da Costa