If you’re interested in attending WisCon in person but need a little financial help to get there, you have until March 31 to apply to the WisCon Members Assistance Fund!
Please apply at: https://bit.ly/WMAFrequest
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WisCon Member Assistance Fund now taking applications
The WisCon Member Assistance Fund (WMAF) provides financial assistance to people who would like to attend WisCon but for whom the costs of con attendance are a barrier. Anyone can apply to request funds that can be used to cover airfare or other travel costs, hotel costs, childcare, or any other prohibitive expense. Members may also nominate friends or others who they know would like to attend WisCon but who may need a bit of help to do so. You can find more information on the WMAF here.
Applications are now open and the form is here: https://bit.ly/WMAFrequest. You can nominate yourself or a friend, and people who have received funds in the past can request them again. The deadline for applying is March 31st. If you have questions or trouble using the form, e-mail fund@wiscon.net.
If you would like to donate to help someone else attend WisCon, THAT WOULD BE AWESOME. You can donate to the WMAF via PayPal, here. (SF3, WisCon’s parent organization, is a 501(c)3 nonprofit, so contributions are tax-deductible.) You can also donate via the Registration Page! If you’re not registering, you can simply add “Donate to WMAF” to your cart and add whatever amount you’d like to donate, and pay by the means of your choice. Finally, if you would like to send a paper check, make it out to SF3 with WMAF in the memo line and mail to: SF3 / Attn: WMAFund / P.O. Box 1624 / Madison, WI 53701.
If you request funds, you should hear by mid-April whether we will be able to meet your request.
Call for Academic Papers! (Deadline Extended)
Wiscon approaches! The deadline for submission of proposals for Wiscon’s academic track has been extended to March 15th. We welcome a wide variety of passionate, thoughtful voices about the genres that bring us joy, hope, enlightenment, and reflection about the complex worlds of which we are all part.
Given our current political moment, we invite papers and panels that explore themes echoing the American Studies Association’s 2022 Annual Meeting, “The roof, the roof, the roof is on fire” as well as the National Women’s Studies Association’s 2021 Annual Conference: “killing rage: resistance on the other side of freedom”. With these themes in mind, we encourage proposals to consider science fiction as a site of connection, survival, and protest. For example, how can feminist speculative fiction help us fight for a more just world? What lessons can be learned from Indigenous, Black, POC, and diasporic speculative fiction, to advance decolonial and anti-racist change? How can we use speculative fiction genres to respond to the threats of white supremacy, dispossession, militarization, and extractive capitalism? How might speculative fiction help us come together amidst collapsing structures to enable better futures?
These themes offer opportunity both for work that deals specifically with social and cultural questions about the radical politics of futures as they relate to feminist speculative fiction and for work on the histories and dream making of freedom-oriented fan communities.
Further, we invite proposals from anyone with a scholarly interest in the intersections of gender, gender identity, sexuality, race, class, and disability with speculative fiction—broadly defined—in literature, media, and culture. We encourage contributions that emphasize WisCon’s focus on how speculative fiction has played an important role in the exploration and creation of socially just futures: futures where people of all colors and backgrounds flourish, where women’s rights and women’s contributions are valued, where gender is not limited to one of two options, where no one is erased out of convenience, hidden by discrimination, or experiences bigotry.
Art Show Deadline extended to March 15
The WisCon Art Show deadline is being extended to March 15! Artists can apply using the form at http://wiscon.net/events/art-show/. If you’ve applied and not received a reply from us, please email artshow@wiscon.net.
#SaveWisCon Updates
Thank you to everyone who responded to our call for help in November! We’ve made some AMAZING progress:
- We’ve raised over $21,000 in donations out of the potential $30,000 we have in matches. If we can raise $9,000 more, that will mean $30k donated + $30k matched = a total of $60k for WisCon! You can donate via PayPal or make a contribution to the General Fund when you register for WisCon.
- We have over 180 registrations for WisCon 2022 (in person plus online). We’d love to get to 1,000 total memberships! If you’re able to register now, either for in person or online, that’s a big help. If you know you want to do WisCon but aren’t sure whether you’ll be able to make it in person, please consider registering for an online membership now — it’s easy to upgrade to an in person membership later.
- We’ve had over 50 people complete our volunteer interest survey. The Personnel Committee is hard at work reaching out to everyone who’s expressed interest in helping out (thanks, Personnel folks!). We’ll keep you posted about additional volunteering opportunities, including at-con opportunities, in the coming weeks.
- We have over 175 new email subscribers towards our goal of 200 new subscribers. Welcome!
Again, thank you to everyone who’s registered, donated, volunteered, signed up for this newsletter, and helped us spread the word: together, we can #SaveWisCon!
Feminists of the Future Book Discussion Series with the Madison Public Library
The Madison Public Library is running a four-part book discussion series featuring titles by the four WisCon 2022 Guests of Honor. These book discussions will happen virtually and are open to interested participants from any location. The first one is coming up on February 28th from 7-8 p.m. CST and will be a discussion of Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse. You can register to get the Zoom link on the Madison Public Library site.
Register for the February 28 discussion of Black Sun by Rebecca Roanhorse.
Register for the March 28 discussion of Phoenix Extravagant by Yoon Ha Lee.
Register for the April 25th discussion of Nine Bar Blues by Sheree Renée Thomas.
Register for the May 23rd discussion of Black Water Sister by Zen Cho.
WisCon 2022 Panel Interest Survey now live
The Panel Interest Survey is Now Live!
It’s that matchmaking time of year. The panel interest survey is live, which means you can dive in and tell us what panels you want to attend or participate in for WisCon 2022. The results of this survey are especially important this year as it tells us not only what panels to schedule, but whether they will be in person or online. The survey will be open until the end of February. Panel suggestions from both this year and suggestions for the pivoted 2020 Con have been included for consideration. Once the survey closes, the con staff will begin matching requests with scheduling and doing the exciting work of putting together the con schedule. Check out the survey here. You will need to log in, but you do not need to be registered for the con to indicate your interest.
If you’re still mulling over whether you’d like to come to the con in person, our Health and Safety plans for WisCon 2022 are also now available.