CFP Reimagining Frankenstein in the 21st Century: Cross-Cultural Adaptations in Visual Culture (12/1/2025)

Please note, this call has educational and employment restrictions for applicants.

REIMAGINING FRANKENSTEIN IN THE 21ST CENTURY: Cross-Cultural Adaptations in Visual Culture

deadline for submissions:
December 1, 2025

full name / name of organization:
Cenk Tan and Defne Ersin Tutan

contact email:
adaptingfrankenstein@gmail.com

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/10/01/reimagining-frankenstein-in-the-21st-century-cross-cultural-adaptations-in-visual

CALL FOR BOOK CHAPTERS

REIMAGINING FRANKENSTEIN IN THE 21ST CENTURY: Cross-Cultural Adaptations in Visual Culture

Edited by Cenk Tan & Defne Ersin Tutan

Editors’ Introduction

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley’s Frankenstein, or, the Modern Prometheus (1818) has endured for over two centuries as one of the most mutable and culturally vibrant texts, continually reinvented through shifting global anxieties and paradigms. Despite transcending its original historical and cultural context, Shelley’s narrative has been utilized to mirror contemporary fears and concerns, thereby keeping its initial core. Whether it be fears of technological overreach, social alienation, and the ethical boundaries of human ambition, or concerns over science, identity, and power in the broader sense, Frankenstein still retains its global allure and timeless appeal, owing significantly to its adaptations on screen and on television.

Grounded in innumerable and invaluable novel-to-film analyses, Adaptation Studies has recently expanded its boundaries in innovational directions, and, as Sarah Cardwell contends, “[j]ust as adaptations have moved away from their source books, so too must the approach through which we consider them. […] [N]ovel-adaptation comparison is an inadequate starting point for the interpretation, analysis and evaluation of individual adaptations” (205-206). In line with this perspective, contemporary scholarship addresses adaptations as rewritings, appropriations, modernizations and/or localizations that shed light not necessarily on the source texts they adapt but on “the circumstances of their creation” (Murray 5). Viewed in this manner, adaptations of Frankenstein do more than retell a familiar story—they refract Shelley’s foundational questions through local narrative traditions, demonstrating the text’s remarkable adaptability to different cultural contexts and crises.

In this framework, this edited volume sets out to examine how 21st-century films and television series adapt Frankenstein across diverse cultural contexts—from Hollywood blockbusters to local cinema traditions—to reanimate Shelley’s core themes for modern audiences. Through case studies spanning Guillermo Del Toro’s anticipated Gothic reimagining, German refractions, South Korean thrillers, and beyond, the volume aims to reveal how the Frankenstein lore speaks to urgent contemporary concerns. By doing so, it also aspires to formulate theoretical stances on localization.

As such, the chapters are expected to demonstrate an argumentative framework and move beyond the mere “from the page to the screen” approach of comparing the two; instead, moving from the case study to possible “theorizing,” the argument is to look forward to designing an approach through which localized adaptations contribute to Adaptation Studies in the broader spectrum. Therefore, informative/descriptive studies will not be considered.

To elaborate, each chapter is expected to be solidly grounded in a theoretical argument through which it would address the dynamics of adaptation in the localizing process. It may strive to answer questions such as: how does the source text get appropriated in its new national, social and historical context? How does it (or is made to) appeal to a foreign audience (i.e. to one that is different from the source text’s original audience)? Is the source text appropriated in line with the local necessities of production or with the assumed expectations of the society and/or the audience? Is the end-product recognized as an adaptation or claimed to be “native”? [One should bear in mind Thomas Leitch’s remarkable question: “If an audience overlooks the intertextual allusion of a specific adaptation, does it still qualify as an adaptation?” (95).] Is the localized version merely a commercial product, a commodity, or a political/social/cultural “statement”? Does it actually keep any of its genuine literary and/or artistic merits or is it incorporated into popular culture? As such, the chapters would contribute to the ongoing debates on localization as a fashionable contemporary form of adaptation, as well as the theory of adaptation at large.

Works Cited

Cardwell, Sarah. Adaptation Revisited: Television and the Classic Novel. Manchester UP, 2002.

Leitch, Thomas. “Adaptation and Intertextuality, or, What isn’t an Adaptation, What Does It Matter?” A Companion to Literature, Film, and Adaptation. Ed. Deborah Cartmell. Wiley-Blackwell, 2012. pp: 87-104.

Murray, Simone. The Adaptation Industry: The Cultural Economy of Contemporary Literary Adaptation. Routledge, 2012.



Each chapter should strictly abide by the word limit of 5000, including the endnotes, and the works cited. Endnotes should be preferred over footnotes. The body of the work should be organized under section titles where appropriate (such as Introduction, Theoretical Argument, Case Study, Conclusion, and the like). The chapters should follow the MLA 9th edition formatting.

Only contributors who hold PhD degrees and have institutional affiliations will be considered.

The book is under consideration by a major international publisher, which will be announced at a later date.

The proposed chapters have been outlined. Prospective contributors could make a selection from the outline, but they are also welcome to propose works not listed, should they fall within the scope of the volume. The criteria for consideration are threefold: 1. adaptations for the screen or for the TV, 2. adaptations pertaining to the 21st century, and 3. adaptations produced outside of the UK.

Contributors are expected to send an abstract of 300 words and a short biographical note of 150 words (written in the 3rd person) by the submission deadline.

For all inquiries and submissions, please contact: adaptingfrankenstein@gmail.com



Schedule

Deadline for Abstract Submission: December 1, 2025

Notification of Acceptance: December 31, 2025

Deadline for Chapter Submission: March 1, 2026

Anticipated Publication Date: Summer 2026



Provisional Outline

Preface

Introduction: “Reimagining Frankenstein on Screen and on Television”

USA: The Angry Black Girl and Her Monster (2023)

Blending science-fiction and horror, reversing/resisting stereotypes.

USA: Guillermo Del Toro’s Frankenstein (Nov. 2025)

Blending folklore, horror, and humanism, rewriting monstrosity.

USA: The Bride (Mar. 2026)

Reimagining gender, agency, and monstrosity.

German Refractions

Post-WWII memory, horror, and monstrous embodiment.

Hungarian Perspectives
Cultural reinterpretations of the myth.
South Korean Adaptations

Ethical dilemmas of biotechnology and societal anxieties.

Canadian Reconsideration: Dead Lover (2025)
Revisiting horror traditions through a modern lens.
Spanish Postmodernism

Fragmented narratives and existential dread in the contemporary context.

Nordic / Dutch Representations

Blending folklore and bioethics through cinematic interpretations.

Mexican Horror
Gender, monstrosity, and social marginalization in horror.
South American Gothic

Exploring racial and environmental tensions through a Frankenstein-inspired narrative.

New Zealand Horror: Marama (2025)
Representing Maori Gothic fiction.
Japanese Cyber-Gothic

Technology, identity, and the body through animation.

Australian Adaptations

Interpreting indigenous perspectives and ecological themes.

Turkish Adaptation

Frankenstein as metaphor for social alienation and modernization.

Eastern European Gothic

Post-Soviet cultural anxieties and the legacy of scientific hubris.
Czech Speculative Fiction: Ghoul (2015)

Reimagining the monster through speculative fiction.

Chinese Adaptation

Reimagining creation and consciousness.

Russian Adaptation

Modernity and the ethics of creation in Post-Soviet Russia.



For all inquiries and submissions, please contact: adaptingfrankenstein@gmail.com


Last updated October 19, 2025