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Call for Papers

JOFIS 2026 - vol10 no1 - Special issue: Slowness/ la lenteur

Guest Editors: Taylor Still and Camille d’Alençon (Université Rennes 2)

The Journal of Franco-Irish Studies is pleased to announce a Call for Papers for its upcoming 2026 issue.

Slowness is an arresting idea. As both Irish and French societies move increasingly faster, the effort to slow down or allow oneself to become slowed down indeed opposes the many societal pressures we experience – from the ever-expanding digital landscape, the ever-increasing levels of productivity, and the ever-growing demand to work faster and think quicker. At its core, the concept of slowness implies a level of friction: an object that moves slowly through air or water encounters mechanical resistance. Can slowness represent a form of resistance, by going against the grain?

Resisting the reader’s urge to go faster; the viewer’s insistence on consuming media more quickly; the traveller’s urge to move at high speeds; the musician’s demand to increase the tempo; or the need to speed up dining experiences with fast food. As we try to resist these quicker forms of poetics, we realise that we have, in fact, become accustomed to them. While slowness invites us to think upon the merits of patience and contemplation, it also poses the risk of inertia, passivity, apathy, or paralysis: each can be whittled down to some form of resistance. Slowness is relative; the perception of slowness depends on multiple factors, and may be influenced by an individual’s position within systems of labour.

Study of the transdisciplinary concept of slowness has been – in some regions more than others – slow to get off the ground. It remains underexplored in Irish studies in particular. To our knowledge, there is no published volume nor journal issue devoted exclusively to slowness as a theme within Irish studies. On the contrary in France, la lenteur, with all its merits and drawbacks, has recently emerged as a subject of debate and intellectual focus. This raises questions as to why such a gap exists between the pace of study of slowness in France and in Ireland. This makes the question of slowness all the more relevant: our aim is to help bridge the French and Irish perspectives while exploring a theme that is relevant to both.

Questions of ethics are also fundamental to the very nature of slowness – modes of slow living can be seen as a remedy to the aggressive destruction of climate change and capitalism, in terms of fast fashion and fast economies. In this regard, advocating for slow fashion and slow travel can be positive, ethical acts. Yet the resoundingly slow politics – seen for instance in the painfully stagnant bureaucracies in both Ireland and France – can bear deeply negative impacts on those deemed to be forever ‘waiting’, such as residents of Direct Provision Centres. Bureaucratic inertia may also be witnessed in access to healthcare, in the State’s implementation of environmental measures, or in handling post-Brexit borders.

In this issue, we hope to bring together papers from various fields to explore the ethics, the poetics and the politics of slowness in Ireland and/or in France. Contributors are encouraged to choose topics that align with their expertise and interests while contributing to the overarching theme of the issue. Submissions may explore, but are not limited to, the following themes:

  • Slowing down on digital media: slowness in the age of information overload; slow news and slow journalism; social media influencers and slow living
  • Environmentalism: slowness and climate; eco-criticism; slowness and capitalism; fast fashion
  • Slow living: resisting pressures of urban life and capitalism; ways of living and lifestyles; slow rhythms of pastoral life; slow tourism
  • Slowness and art: challenging artistic modes of over-production and over-consumerism; resisting the speed(s) of artificial intelligence and its impact on art; slowness and artisanal practices; reliance on recycled and sustainable materials
  • Slowness and cinema: aesthetics of slowness and cinematic technique; temporal stillness as resistance against Hollywood; nonlinear, circular and recursive narratives; silence and minimalism
  • Slowness and food: the Slow Food movement; artisan craft products; reclaiming heritage; temporality and seasonality; rituality and cooking as a slow practice; pubs as spaces of slowness (vs. fast food); slow rituals of state dinners and diplomacy
  • Slowness and literature: slow-paced narratives in prose, poetry and drama; slow and close-reading as literary study; temporal structure in narratives; non-linear, fragmented forms
  • Slow music and dance: slow airs and Irish traditional music; slow-moving traditions of fast tempo music and Irish traditional dance; slow rituals of Celtic dances - the Breton fest noz and the Irish céilí; blending slow music and poetry in chansons à texte
  • Slow politics: bureaucratic inertia; slow waiting lines for State services; slow migration and growth of diaspora; slow execution of new policies
  • Societal concerns related to slowness: slowness in education and/or research; asymmetrical politics of temporality; the slowness of or resistance to cultural change (amendments, referendums, value systems…)

    • Deadline for submission: 01 May 2026 | To be published in volume 10, issue 1 (November 2026)

    Submission Guidelines
    JOFIS accepts proposals of articles (4000-8000 words approximately excluding references) about any aspect related to the call. For any inquiry, refer to jofis @ tudublin.ie.
    Please submit your article through the JOFIS website - click "Submit Article" in the sidebar.
    You can find the guidelines to prepare your paper as indicated, using the Chicago Manual of Style 17th edition, here: https://arrow.tudublin.ie/jofis/policies.html

    Book Reviews
    The Journal of Franco-Irish Studies also welcomes book reviews of relevant publications [1,000-1,500 words; must indicate the title of the book, the names of the author(s) and the publication information (place of publication, publisher, year of publication, page numbers and ISBN)].

    Spontaneous article submissions are also always welcome.

    Suggested bibliography for this special issue:

    ANTOINE, Philippe (ed.). Voyages de la lenteur. Classiques Garnier, 2021. Revue des lettres modernes.
    BERG, Maggie. SEEBER, Barbara K. The Slow Professor: Challenging the Culture of Speed in the Academy. University of Toronto Press, 2016.
    BRADY, Alison M. ‘Cultivating Slowness as Contemplative Practice: Literature, (Dis)Enchantment and the Modern University’. Philosophy of Education, vol. 80, no. 2, 2024, pp. 109–25.
    BROADWAY, Michael. “Implementing the Slow Life in Southwest Ireland: A Case Study of Clonakilty and Local Food”, Geographical Review, Vol. 105 (2), 2015, pp. 216-234.
    CARACCIOLO, Marco. Slow Narrative and Nonhuman Materialities. Lincoln University of Nebraska Press, 2022.
    CRAIG, Geoffrey. PARKINS, Wendy. Slow Living. Berg Publishers, 2006.
    DE LUCA, Tiago. JORGE, Nuno Barradas. Slow Cinema. Edinburgh, Edinburgh University Press, 2016.
    ERIKSEN, Thomas Hylland. Tyranny of the Moment: Fast and Slow Time in the Information Age. Pluto Press, 2001.
    GODILLON, Sylvanie. LESTEVEN, Gaëlle. MALLET, Sandra. ‘Réflexions autour de la lenteur’. Carnets de Géographes, vol. 8, 2015.
    HAALS Brosnan, N., et al. ‘Where Are You Going? Lessons Learned from Irish ECEC Educators’ Intuitive Implementation of Slow Pedagogy during the COVID-19 Pandemic’. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal, 2025, pp. 1–15.
    HAN, Byung-Chul. La Société de La Fatigue. Presses Universitaires de France, 2024.
    HONORÉ, Carl. In Praise of Slow. Orion Publishing, 2005.
    JOHNSTON, Megan. “Slow Curating: Re-thinking & Extending Socially-Engaged Art in the Context of Northern Ireland”, On-Curating, Vol. 24, 2014, p.22-33.
    L’HEUILLET, Hélène. Eloge Du Retard. Albin Michel, 2020.
    ROSA, Hartmut. Alienation and Acceleration: Towards a Critical Theory of Late-Modern Temporality. NSU Press, 2010.
    ROSA, Hartmut. Social Acceleration: A New Theory of Modernity. Translated by Jonathan Trejo-Mathys, Columbia University Press, 2013.
    SANSOT, Pierre. Du bon usage de la lenteur. Rivages, 2000.
    SHARMA, Sarah. In the Meantime: Temporality and Cultural Politics. Duke University Press, 2014.
    VIDAL, Laurent. Les Hommes Lents : Résister à La Modernité, XVe-XXe Siècle. Flammarion, 2020.
    VIRILIO, Paul. Vitesse et Politique. Galilée, 1977.
    WELLESLEY-SMITH, Claire. Slow Stitch: Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art. London, Batsford, 2015.