CFP The Lives and Legacies of Medieval Comics: A Commemoration of Ninety Years of Hal Foster's Prince Valiant (Hybrid) (9/15/2026; ICMS Kalamazoo/Online 5/13-15/2027)

The Lives and Legacies of Medieval Comics: A Commemoration of Ninety Years of Hal Foster's Prince Valiant (Hybrid)

62nd International Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University (Kalamazoo, MI), Thursday, 13 May, through Saturday, 15 May, 2026

Co-sponsored by Medieval Comics Project, Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture

Co-organized by Michael A. Torregrossa, Bristol Community College, and Carl B Sell, University of Pittsburgh

Rationale

The comics have a long history of adapting aspects of the Middle Ages, and, while many series and characters have disappeared over time, Hal Foster’s comic strip Prince Valiant has persevered, continuing under a series of writers and artists over nine decades.


In commemoration of the ninetieth anniversary of Foster’s comic in 2027, we’d like to assess the ways that comics (and their adaptations across media) have contributed to the public’s understanding of the medieval past and to illuminate strategies for expanding knowledge of and interest in this corpus as creators, researchers, and teachers.

Submissions that look directly at Prince Valiant (or any of its adaptations) are especially encouraged; however, we will also consider proposals devoted to other characters, creators, and/or series that make use of medieval themes.


Do check out our expanding resource, the Medieval Comics Project Bibliographies, at https://tinyurl.com/MedievalComicsProjectBiblios, for information on prior studies of medievalist comics.

Submission Information

Please post paper submissions into the Confex site using the direct link https://icms.confex.com/icms/2027/prelim.cgi/Session/8806.

Do send any questions to the organizers at comics.get.medieval@gmail.com. Submissions are due no later than 15 September 2026.


For this event, individuals are invited to make ONE paper proposal to ONE session of papers: either the sponsored or special sessions OR the general sessions. You may propose an unlimited number of contributions to roundtables, but you will not be scheduled to actively participate (as paper presenter, roundtable discussant, poster author, presider, respondent, workshop leader, demonstrator, or performer) in more than six sessions. See the conference’s policies page for more information at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/policies-guidelines.


Please be aware that those accepted to the panel must register for the conference in order to present. Past registration costs can be viewed at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/registration. The International Congress on Medieval Studies does offer limited funding as travel awards and subsidized registration costs; details are available at https://wmich.edu/medievalcongress/awards.



For more information about the Medieval Comics Project, do check out our website at https://medieval-comics-project.blogspot.com/ and consider signing up for our listserv, The Medieval Comics Project Discussion List, at https://groups.io/g/medieval-comixlist.


For more information about the Association for the Advancement of Scholarship and Teaching of the Medieval in Popular Culture, do check out our website, Mass Mediævalisms: The Middle Ages of Popular Culture: https://medievalinpopularculture.blogspot.com/.