American Anxieties

is the first and currently only peer-reviewed print journal for MA-level American studies scholars in Europe. It is a platform for the best work done by American studies graduate students below the PhD level. It aims to foster academic exchange among young Americanists across Europe, and to thereby advance the field as well as its genuine European perspective on ‘America’ and its presences and effects around the world.

features a general section in addition to a topical one that brings academic works into a dialogue on one common theme. For the upcoming issue, this topical section will be organized around different notions of "American Anxieties." Please feel free to send in work to have it considered for publication in if

  • you are an American studies student at a European university and are looking to publish a paper without a topical restriction.
  • or you are an American studies student at a European university and are looking to publish a paper on "American Anxieties."

Please see the following Calls for Papers for details. Please also note our style guide at www.aspeers.com/style that will give you many helpful instructions on how to prepare your submission for maximum success.

general academic contributions   due 3 November 2013   html | pdf
topical academic contributions due 3 November 2013  html | pdf

Please see our submission guidelines and FAQ section. Submissions should be directed to submit@aspeers.com (or aspeers@uni-leipzig.de).

General Call for Papers

For the general section of its seventh issue, seeks outstanding academic writing demonstrating the excellence of graduate scholarship, the range of concerns scrutinized in the field, and the diversity of perspectives employed. We thus explicitly invite revised versions of term papers or chapters from theses written by students of European Master (and equivalent) programs. For this section, there are no topical limitations. Contributions should be up to 10,000 words (including abstract and list of works cited). The submission deadline is 3 November 2013.

Topical Call for Papers on "American Anxieties"

In her July 2012 Atlantic article “Trickle-Down Distress,” Maura Kelly argues that anxiety might well be considered a “peculiarly American phenomenon.” And in fact, the interrelation between American culture(s) and notions of individual and collective anxiety—from a sense of unease to the experience of crisis to full-blown panic—has proven to be a stimulating topic of interrogation. Accordingly, anxiety, understood not solely as a state, mood, or emotion but also as a phenomenon indicative of larger social dynamics and as a concept capable of performing cultural work, has continuously gained prevalence in scholarly debates.

will, therefore, dedicate the topical section of its seventh annual issue to “American Anxieties," seeking to further explore the topic and the manifold scholarly opportunities and interpretative potential it offers for MA-level American Studies in Europe. Considering the wide range of disciplines that engage with anxiety in its overt and subtle forms, the topic lends itself particularly well to the inherently interdisciplinary approach within the field of American studies. Moreover, many traditional and more recent research foci of American studies can be read as sites of anxieties, thereby shedding light on previously disregarded connections between them. The following thematic clusters, then, might spark but do not delimit ideas for possible submissions:

  • identity, culture wars, etc.

  • (un)reliability, concepts of truth, role of the media, etc.

  • terrorism, fundamentalism, conspiracy theories, anxiety as a disciplinary mode, surveillance/privacy, PRISM, etc.

  • sexuality/gender, homophobia and trans*phobia, crises of masculinity, post-feminism, etc.

  • nationalism, immigration, political extremism, gun legislation, the Cold War, etc.

  • body image, ageism, ableism, etc.

  • financial crises, poverty, class/status anxieties, Occupy, etc.

  • ecocriticism, global warming, health- or food-related panics, etc.

  • Civil Rights, hate crimes, the ‘post-racial,’ Trayvon Martin case, etc.

  • hysteria, phobias, madness, neuroses, trauma, etc.

  • artistic expression, sentimentalism, horror, gothic, the Other, etc.

, the first and currently only graduate-level peer-reviewed journal of European American studies, encourages fellow MA students from all fields to reflect on the diverse roles and meanings of anxieties in American culture. We welcome term papers, excerpts from theses, or papers specifically written for the seventh issue of by November 3, 2013. If you are seeking to publish work beyond this topic, please refer to our general call for papers. At www.aspeers.com/2014 you can find additional information as well as our submission guidelines.

PDF icon cfp_2014_general.pdfPDF icon cfp_2014_topical.pdf