The Wake of Latency
Saturday, April 18, 2026
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, USA
—
Keynote speaker: Dr. Corrado Confalonieri
Associate Professor, Bernardino Telesio Endowed Professor in Italian Studies
Wilkinson College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences, Chapman University
Conference events: Musical interlude by Sarah Le Van, professional Classical Violinist & Pop-up Exhibition of rare book manuscripts and archives at the Kislak Library
—
The term latency finds its etymological root in the Latin latere, meaning “to lie hidden, to lurk,” which conceptually resonates with the Greek λανθάνω (lanthánō), “to escape notice.” Both terms evoke a state of concealment, something that is not immediately manifest. In Aristotle’s distinction between dynamis (potentiality) and energeia (actuality), the latent is that which possesses the ability to become. Plato’s concept of anamnesis, instead, posits that innate knowledge of universal truths lies dormant within the soul, which possesses it before birth. In Dante’s Purgatorio, the Lethe, the river of forgetfulness, purifies the mind by erasing the memory of having committed sins, suggesting that latency serves as both a cleansing and a loss, a necessary veil that allows redemption.
Since the end of the 19th century, the concept of latency has been largely set aside in favor of a psychoanalytic hegemony, in which it refers to a developmental phase, a temporary dormancy of instinctual drives, during which a predetermined form is presumed. This approach appears to privilege only the visible and conscious endpoints of a drive, rather than interrogating the structures that keep certain forces concealed. It is therefore necessary to reimagine latency not only in its repressed state, but also as a mode of being, knowing, and creating.
The FIGGS 2026 conference aims at articulating a multifaceted concept of latency and the various questions it raises across French and Francophone, Italian, and Germanic literature, thought, history, cinema, and culture. We invite you to (re)examine the concept of latence, latenza, and Latenz and to ask not just what lies hidden, but also how and why it hides and what its hiding makes possible. We welcome submissions from a variety of perspectives and fields, including but not limited to:
• Cinema and Media Studies
• Digital Humanities
• Ecocriticism and Environmental Humanities
• Gender and Sexuality Studies
• History of Science and Medical Studies
• Manuscript Studies and the History of Material Texts
• Medieval and Renaissance Studies
• Mediterranean and Transnational Studies
• Narratology Studies
• Performance Studies and Performativity
• Philology, Linguistics, and Translation Studies
• Philosophy and Political Theory
• Postcolonial Studies
• Post-/Transhuman Studies
• Religious Studies
• Romanticism, Horror, and the Gothic
—
Please fill out this form to submit a 250-word abstract with a title and a 100-word biography by January 18, 2026.
Preference will be given to presentations in English. Acceptance will be communicated by February 2, 2026. Presentations should not exceed 15 minutes.
The 2026 FIGGS conference will be held in person on the University of Pennsylvania campus on Saturday, April 18, 2026.
For any questions, please email us at upennfiggs@gmail.com.