15/06/2026
📚✨ Can children’s literature change the world?
On 9–10 June, the Centre for Theoretical Research in the Humanities, together with the Croatian team of the Liminal Waterway Countercultures project, organised the conference Bending the Rules: Social Radicalism, Wanderlust, and Utopianism in Children’s and YA Literature at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences.
🌍 The event brought together researchers from Croatia, Serbia, Slovenia, Hungary, Italy, the Czech Republic, and the United States to explore the rich histories and transformative potential of radical, subversive, and utopian writing for young readers.
🚀 The conference opened with a book talk on The Unpredictable Past of the Future: The Political Potential of Utopia (2024), a bilingual edition presenting A Walk Through the Future—the first socialist and ecological science-fiction utopia in South Slavic literatures. Originally published in 1924–1925 in Budućnost, the magazine of the “children of organised workers”, the text offers a fascinating vision of a more just and sustainable future.
💡 The second day began with a keynote lecture by Julia Mickenberg (University of Texas at Austin) and Philip Nel (Kansas State University): In Dreams Begin Possibilities: Can Children’s Literature Change the World? Their inspiring talk examined how literature and the arts can nurture hope, imagination, and democratic values in an era marked by democratic backsliding, censorship, and self-censorship.
📖 From Croatian literary classics and working-class literature to peace activism and science fiction, the conference highlighted the many ways children’s and YA literature can challenge conventions, inspire social change, and imagine alternative futures.
🤝 Bringing together scholars from across borders and disciplines, the conference created a space for lively discussion on the political, social, and imaginative possibilities of literature for young readers.
🙏 Thank you to all participants for two days of stimulating discussions, new connections, and thought-provoking insights into the power of stories to shape the world.