Octopus solicits submissions for our fourth volume, “Surface.” Surfaces mediate a first encounter, and are often posited in opposition to the “authenticity” or “depth” of what lies below them. The question of surface encompasses a wide variety of practices and perspectives, including art practice and theory, film and media studies, historiography, the question of virtual interfaces, topography, urban studies, architecture, race and ethnicity, and the sciences of knowledge, optics, and biology. Octopus invites essays that question, examine, and engage with the encounter between subject and surface or surface and depth, as well as those that challenge or contribute to the epistemology of “surface.” ...

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Submission Guidelines:
Submissions should be sent as Microsoft Word (.doc) or Rich Text Format (.rtf) attachments to octopusjournal@gmail.com. Please put the word “submission” somewhere in the subject line.

All submissions must include a detachable cover page including the following information: the title of the work, the name(s) of the author(s), a brief biographic entry about the author(s), and contact information including a mailing address, e-mail address, and phone number. Manuscripts should also be accompanied by an abstract of no more than 150 words. Because Octopus follows a policy of blind peer-review, no material identifying the author(s) should appear anywhere other than the detachable title page.

Manuscripts submitted to Octopus should not be under consideration at any other journal. It is the responsibility of the author to obtain written permission to reproduce film and video stills, artworks, photographs, song lyrics, or any other copyrighted material from the copyright holder before publication.

Octopus is an interdisciplinary, peer-reviewed journal published by the graduate students of the Ph.D. Program in Visual Studies at the University of California, Irvine. We are committed to publishing work by emerging scholars engaged with visuality, culture, history, and theory from a range of contexts, disciplines and methodologies.