This multidisciplinary conference builds on the first Island Dynamics conference on DARKNESS in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, in 2019, with focus on darkness as a figurative or symbolic and material or embodied aspect of the environment. In material culture, darkness as partial or complete absence of light informs approaches to technological design, architectural spaces, domestic and public environments, and natural ecosystems at land and sea. Mythological narratives may present darkness as void and chaos, something destructive but also as a state from which light may emerge.
Historically, colonial encounters with Indigenous societies and unfamiliar landscapes frequently resulted in the projection of fears and superstitions on new and strange cultures and ecosystems, especially when these coincided with experiences of literal darkness or lack of familiar, visual reference points—submarine and subterranean spaces and ecosystems, nocturnal environments, or journeys through landscapes during the long polar night. Darkness disturbs and questions ideas of progress and civilisation at the edge of the visible, the familiar, and the rational.
In the history of science, exploration, and literary and artistic expression, the invisible imaginary of darkness thus constantly haunts ideas and ideologies of enlightenment rationality and knowledge. It oscillates between ideas of darkness as sanctuary on the one hand, and, on the other, as a destructive and threatening condition—between the diminishing spaces of wild ecosystems or environments outside the sphere of artificial light, and the murky underbelly of historical, social, and material systems of exploitation, extraction, and marginalisation. Present discussions on the development of forms of artificial intelligence both repeat some of these tropes and discourses, and highlight the manner in which the future of these emerging technologies reflects the values, cultural forms, and ideas of our culture and society.
Abstract submission
This academic conference invites contributions addressing these and related topics from a variety disciplinary perspectives and traditions. Presentations should aim at addressing darkness as material and perceptual, and as figurative and symbolic at the same time. 20-minute presentations are welcome on any aspects of darkness in culture and the environment. The deadline for abstracts 15 June 2024. An online abstract submission form will open by 24 April, with the details to be listed here. If you have any questions, please e-mail convenor Anne Sofia Karhio at anne.karhio@inn.no.
