[Candrama] FOOT35: Roots - Call for Proposals

[Drama Communications]

Could you please share the University of Toronto's Centre for Drama, Theatre & Performance Studies Festival of Original Theatre Conference CFP on your listserv.


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The call for proposals is now open for FOOT35: Roots
FOOT35 online application form<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdYGtzU-oirKnSQ1Y9iaUBIYiNlQm9ABQdxywXQmU-tosdBFQ/viewform?usp=header>
Now in its 35th year, FOOT, the Festival of Original Theatre, at the University of Toronto’s Centre for Drama, Theatre & Performance Studies(CDTPS), invites reflection on the systematic relationship between origins and sustenance that is symbolized by various imaginations of, in and around the root system. Roots stabilize growing organisms in soil and fire their metabolic processes. Typically hidden to the naked eye, root systems’ tracery both sustains life and forms a record of life’s development. For these reasons, roots are powerfully suggestive of lineage and history. As the CDTPS celebrates its 60th anniversary in 2026–27, this theme also offers an opportunity to reflect on the histories, legacies and evolving futures that have shaped the Centre over six decades.

Roots are symbols of time and “development” in many world cultures – traditional, ancient, and modern. Not all root systems work in the same way, however, nor do they give rise to the same stories. The enduring rhizome of Deleuze & Guattari, for instance, emblem of the post-structural knowledge-situation, is a root system possessing no trunk, no centre. And since the turn of the millennium, roots have taken new forms and explanatory functions in the humanities by way of mycology and neurology. We might feel ourselves embedded in root systems. Even competing ones.

So what roots root us in the present? What systems, what models, support and sustain in our era of polyvalent crisis? How do theatre and performance––the doomed search for continuity––make use of the root as a model of knowledge, as a model of time, as a story about what is past and what is up ahead?

FOOT35: Roots invites proposals for papers, panels, workshops, and roundtables that reflect on the roots of ideas, practices, and lineages found in drama, theatre, and performance studies.

Conference Dates: Jan 28th & 29th, 2027.

Submission Guidelines

Please submit:

  *   A proposal (250 words)
  *   A short biography (100 words per participant)

via our online submission form<https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdYGtzU-oirKnSQ1Y9iaUBIYiNlQm9ABQdxywXQmU-tosdBFQ/viewform?usp=header> by the deadline of Oct 18, 2026.

FOOT is committed to creating space for experimental formats and approaches that expand how we share and engage with research. We encourage proposals that incorporate performance, practice, or other creative modes of research-creation. While we cannot provide technical support beyond standard AV equipment, we are eager to collaborate with participants on realizing inventive and feasible presentation formats.

If you have questions or accessibility requests, please contact us at footconference at gmail.com<mailto:footconference at gmail.com>.

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