EVENT Nov 20
ABSTRACT May 15
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Punk and Alternative Cultures (PAMLA)

San Francisco, CA
Organization: Pacific Ancient and Modern Language Assoc.
Event: PAMLA
Categories: American, Interdisciplinary, Genre & Form, Popular Culture, Literary Theory, African-American, Colonial, Revolution & Early National, Transcendentalists, 1865-1914, 20th & 21st Century, Adventure & Travel Writing, Children's Literature, Comics & Graphic Novels, Drama, Narratology, Poetry, Aesthetics, Anthropology/Sociology, Classical Studies, Cultural Studies, Environmental Studies, Film, TV, & Media, Food Studies, History, Philosophy, Miscellaneous
Event Date: 2025-11-20 to 2025-11-23 Abstract Due: 2025-05-15

During the 1970s-1980s golden age and beyond, the San Francisco Bay Area was home to one of the most active and diverse punk scenes in the United States. The scene built upon a long history of radical politics and experiments in alternative living that characterized the Bay Area during the 20th century. This special session seeks proposals on punk culture and/or related topics and issues from any period. Proposals on other subcultures and alternative cultures, and those that address aspects of this year’s conference theme, “Palimpsests: Memory and Oblivion,” are also welcome.

Proposals may address Bay Area punk culture and/or punk music and culture generally, including:

· Bands: Avengers, Beatnigs, Crime, Crimpshrine, Dead Kenndys, Fang, Flipper, Frightwig, MDC, Negativland, Neurosis, the Nuns, Special Forces, Spitboy, Victim’s Family, etc.

· Venues: The Farm, Gilman Street, Komotion, La Peña, Mabuhay Gardens, Phoenix Theater, Ruthie’s, Tool and Die, etc.

· Labels and Distros: 415, Alternative Tentacles, Boner, Lookout, Mordam, MRR, R-Radical, Subterranean, etc.

· Zines: Cometbus, Creep, Homocore, Lookout, MRR, Search and Destroy, etc.

· Political/Theoretical/Ideological contexts: Anarchism, Anticonsumerism, Avant-Gardism, Communism, Dadaism, DIY, Environmentalism, Existentialism, Nihilism, Situationism, Surrealism, etc.

· Punk Film and Documentaries

· Punk Style, Subcultures and Subgenres

 

Proposals may also explore related/adjacent subcultures and movements in the Bay Area and beyond, such as

· The Beats: City Lights, Ferlinghetti, Ginsberg, Merry Pranksters, etc.

· New Left: Antiauthoritarianism, Free Speech Movement, Marcuse, SDS, Weather Underground, etc.

· Counterculture: Bohemianism, Cockettes, Hippies, SF Mime Troupe, Survival Research, Yippees, etc.

· Liberationism: American Indian Movement, Black Panthers, Gay Liberation, Radical Feminism, Third World Liberation Front, etc.

http://pamla.org

gosherjo@uvu.edu

John Goshert