Polish Journal for American Studies

PJAS Special Issue 2026 Call for Papers

Dear Colleagues,

Please find attached Call for Papers for the special issue of Polish Journal for American Studies (2026). 

This special issue is devoted to “The Ecological Eye/I in the 21st Century:  Sustainability in North American Non-Fiction”.

The look offered by the ecological I/eye has never been more urgent than today. The need to see, show, and reflect on the global ecological catastrophe remains one of effective responses to the ongoing crisis, as demonstrated by the surge of non-fiction comics (Steve Duin and Shannon Wheeler’s Oil and Water (2011), Joe Sacco’s Days of Destruction, Days of Revolt (2012), Rachel Hope Allison’s I’m not a plastic bag (2012), Richard McGuire’s Here (2014), Mark Kurlansky and Frank Stockton’s World Without Fish (2014), Kate Beaton’s Ducks: Two Years in the Oil Sands (2014/2022), Joe Sacco’s Paying the Land (2020)) and non-fiction narratives (Ernestine Hayes’s Blonde Indian (2006) and The Tao of Raven(2016), Grant J. Merrit’s Iron and Water (20180, Terry Tempest Williams’s Erosion (2019), Heather Durham’s Wolf Tree(2022)) devoted to our ecological pasts and futures.

We invite contributions from American scholars and academics to submit their original research articles that explore the complex relationship between the ecological eye/I and sustainability in contemporary North American non-fiction, with particular emphasis on graphic narratives (comics non-fiction, comics journalism, etc.), verbal narratives (life writing, essays, memoirs, etc.), and hybrid forms.

Please do not hesitate to contact us at pjas2026@gmail.com should you have any questions.

Kind regards,

Katarzyna Macedulska & Małgorzata Olsza