This is a Call for Papers for a special issue of the online open-access double-blind peer-reviewed journal [Inter]sections,titled Laughing in the Face of Evil: Humorous Perspectives on Perpetrators in Contemporary American Literature and Popular Culture. We invite papers that ask what humor can contribute to our understanding of perpetrators by examining a selection of works from contemporary American literature and popular culture. Does humor help demythologize certain perpetrators whose international fame turned them into quasi-mythical figures? Can the ownership of humorous content about a traumatic situation or process endured by a specific marginalized community be transferred to other communities? How can humor successfully target perpetrators without inadvertently trivializing the suffering of the victims and survivors? What can different sub-genres of comedy and humor do differently when it comes to the representation of perpetrators and their deeds? 

[Inter]sections is the online open-access double-blind peer-reviewed journal of the American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest (www.intersections-journal.com).  It is indexed in the MLA Directory of Periodicals, Ulrichsweb, DOAJ, CEEOL, EBSCO, and ERIH PLUS.

Please send all inquiries and proposals (a title, 300-word abstract, and 100-word bio) to Mihaela Precup at mihaela.precup@lls.unibuc.ro.  The deadline for proposals is February 20, 2025. The deadline for articles between 4,000 and 8,000 words is July 10, 2025. All texts should be written in accordance with the 9th edition of the MLA citation style. 

This special issue is co-edited by a group of scholars from the American Studies Program at the University of Bucharest, namely Roxana Oltean, Dragoș Manea, Dana Mihăilescu, and Mihaela Precup.