Abstracts Submission

Here's a list of Future Issues that are open to abstract submission in this journal.

Ocean Pop: Marine Imaginaries in the Age of Global Polycrisis

Academic Editors: Academic Editors: Anja Menzel (University of Bamberg) and Charlotte Gehrke (Nord University)

Submission of Abstracts: 1-15 April 2025
Submission of Full Papers: 15-30 September 2025
Publication of the Issue: January-March 2026

The ocean has long been a source of fascination, myth, and meaning in human culture. In an age defined by global polycrises—such as the escalating climate emergency, biodiversity loss, and disruptions to the global liberal order—marine spaces and their representations in popular culture have taken on heightened significance. Not only do artefacts and discourses reflect how ongoing and overlapping crises are reflected in popular culture, but they also shape public understanding and policy responses to these challenges.

This thematic issue examines how oceanic spaces, actors, and entities are represented, imagined, and understood in popular culture. Utilizing the concept of marine imaginaries, contributions analyze a wide range of media—such as art, film, gaming, music, and newspapers—to highlight the real-world implications of marine imaginaries and their reflection in societal social debates. In doing so, contributions span across diverse geographical contexts and cover a wide range of themes ranging from pirate codes to conservation measures. They analyze how popular cultural texts convey messages about marine imaginaries and their respective media forms, engaging not only with the content of these texts but also considering how their choice of medium influences perceptions of the ocean and its crises.

The thematic issue welcomes submissions from a wide range of research fields and practices. Potential research questions include, but are not limited to:

How do representations of oceanic spaces in popular culture reflect and respond to contemporary global crises?
In what ways do marine imaginaries shape public attitudes, behaviours, and policies related to environmental protection and sustainability?
How useful are marine imaginaries in providing a productive framework for the (social) construction and maintenance of peaceful and healthy ocean spaces?
How do historical narratives inform marine imaginaries in popular culture, and how do they influence current social discourses?
What role do underrepresented voices and non-Western perspectives play in diversifying and challenging dominant marine imaginaries?

Ultimately, this thematic issue aims to advance Ocean and Society’s mission of exploring the social, cultural, and political relationships between society and the sea by offering a deeper understanding of how marine imaginaries shape, and are shaped by, global polycrises.

Authors interested in submitting a paper for this issue are asked to consult the journal's instructions for authors and submit their abstracts (maximum of 250 words, with a tentative title) through the abstracts system (here). When submitting their abstracts, authors are also asked to confirm that they are aware that Ocean and Society is an open access journal with a publishing fee if the article is accepted for publication after peer-review (corresponding authors affiliated with our institutional members do not incur this fee).

Readers across the globe will be able to access, share, and download this issue entirely for free. Corresponding authors affiliated with any of our institutional members (over 90 institutions worldwide) publish free of charge. Otherwise, an article processing fee will be charged to the authors to cover editorial costs. We defend that authors should not have to personally pay this fee and encourage them to check with their institutions if funds are available to cover open access publication costs. Further information about the journal's open access charges can be found here.

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