Call for Papers
True Crime and Ethics
Symposium
University of
Portsmouth
29th May 2026
True crime is a mercurial genre. It shifts, adapts and transforms with and to the popular mediums, motivations and social concerns of the day. From high-budget, horror-infused dramatisations to self-shot Mukbangs, to unmissable Netflix series and 3-minute TikToks, the genre continues to fill production schedules, streaming platforms and social media feeds. Yet, as true crime’s influence has grown, so too have questions about its ethical implications. How should the makers of true crime frame these tragedies, and how should audiences respond to these images of death, abuse and grief? Who has the right to tell true crime stories, and is their commodification worth the very real trauma they can cause? How are social inequities related to gender, race and disability represented in true crime narratives?
As the genre continues to engage new audiences in innovative ways, its ethical questions become more complex. This one-day symposium, featuring a keynote lecture by Professor Tanya Horeck (author of Justice on Demand: True Crime in the Digital Streaming Era), will bring scholars together to consider these issues with the aim of developing an edited collection.
Proposals are invited for 20-minute papers on topics that explore true crime and ethics. Topics can include but are by no means limited to:
- Gender, ethics and true crime
- Race, ethics and true crime
- Disability, ethics and true crime
- Class, ethics and true crime
- The body in true crime
- Fictionalising true crime (from dramatisations such as Netflix’s Monster series or The Staircase miniseries to amateur-created fan fiction)
- Ethics of internet sleuthing
- True crime on different platforms (streaming, podcasts, and social media)
- Ethics and true crime fandom/audiences
- Survivor/victim-centred true crime
- True crime and social movements (#MeToo, Black Lives Matter, Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, etc.)
- The ethics of true crime aesthetics (from text to paratexts)
- True crime narrative tropes
Please send abstracts of 200-300 words along with a short biography by 2nd March 2026 to Dr Simon Hobbs and/or Dr Megan Hoffman at the University of Portsmouth.
Applicants will be informed on or before 20th March 2026.
This symposium is open to all academics and researchers who are interested in true crime and will be in person only. Registration will be free, and lunch will be provided. A number of £50 travel bursaries will be available for precariously employed academics/independent scholars/PhD students. Please indicate in your email if you would like to be considered for one of these travel bursaries.
If you have any questions, please contact Dr Simon Hobbs and/or Dr Megan Hoffman on the above emails.
No comments:
Post a Comment