How do cultural discourses of monstrosity enable us to bear witness to atrocity and social injustice? In a recent NPR story on the role of university communities in confronting the unfolding atrocities in the Middle East, Professor Eddie S. Glaude describes his own sense of compassionate responsibility using the language of monstrosity: every dying child, he says, is “just as valuable, just as innocent, just as cherished” as every other dying child, and “you can become the monsters that you despise if you lose sight of that.” Humanists, he says, must “bear witness to the conditions under which human beings can become monstrous, [and do] that without hesitation or fear.” This mandate of care and empathy underpins our 2024 Festival of Monsters as we explore how discussions of monstrosity enable us to bear witness and, by such witnessing, to envision empathetic forms of resistance and a more just future for everyone.
UC Santa Cruz is the only institution in the world that has a Center for Monster Studies: a group of artists and scholars dedicated to the investigation of monsters and how they are defined throughout history and culture. The interdisciplinary center, which also now hosts a UC-wide faculty working group, is a growing hub for research, creative work, and teaching that posits monsters as a unique site for analyzing geopolitics, popular culture, scientific discovery, technology, and understandings of the human. Monsters—and the media in which they prowl—reveal our deepest fears and greatest hopes. They are mirrors that allow us to confront our own biases, and to develop the empathy we need to combat them.
Our 2024 Festival of Monsters provides several different kinds of participatory activities across a full week in October. A weeklong festival will enable us not only to host readings, performances, and discussions that appeal to both public and scholarly audiences, but also to produce events that emphasize conversation, enable participation through gaming and workshops, and feature student work and student communities. The academic conference that concludes the festival will be larger this year—our 2023 CFP received over 100 proposals, so in 2024 we are planning a conference that can include twice as many scholars as last year. Our Monster’s Ball will again be open to all members of the UCSC community.