{"id":306563,"date":"2025-11-03T12:00:36","date_gmt":"2025-11-03T12:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=306563"},"modified":"2025-11-01T08:47:58","modified_gmt":"2025-11-01T08:47:58","slug":"call-for-essays-new-books-on-nonkilling-literature-and-nonkilling-nuclear-disarmament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2025\/11\/call-for-essays-new-books-on-nonkilling-literature-and-nonkilling-nuclear-disarmament\/","title":{"rendered":"Call for Essays: New Books on Nonkilling Literature and Nonkilling & Nuclear Disarmament"},"content":{"rendered":"

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20 Oct 2025\u00a0<\/em>– The Center for Global Nonkilling is preparing two new scholarly publications as part of its Nonkilling Studies series, which has released over a dozen titles. CGNK has established itself as a unique platform for promoting scholarship and activism focused on the nonkilling paradigm. The book will gain visibility among an international community of researchers, educators, and activists, ensuring that the contributors\u2019 voices reach both academic and activist audiences worldwide.<\/p>\n

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This call includes a collection of essays on Nonkilling Literature<\/em><\/strong> edited by Jocelyn Wright, Professor of English Language and Literature, Mokpo National University, and Balwant (Bill) Bhaneja, CGNK board member, and a separate edited volume on Nonkilling Activism and Nuclear Disarmament<\/em><\/strong>, coordinated by Roland Joseph, Executive Director of the Caribbean Center for Nonkilling, Peace, and Conflict Studies. Details can be found below and potential contributors can contact the editors to propose a chapter.<\/p>\n

Nonkilling Literature<\/h2>\n

Concept<\/h3>\n

Deliberate killing<\/span> is widespread globally and manifests itself in various forms (e.g. suicides, homicides, capital punishment, terrorism, wars, genocides). Moreover, the implications compound as the reality and possibility of taking human life is a \u201csource and sustainer of other forms of violence\u201d (Paige 9).<\/span><\/p>\n

Unlike its counterpart,<\/span>\u00a0nonkilling<\/span>\u00a0inherently contributes to nonviolence and peace (Bhaneja,\u00a0<\/span>Peace Portraits<\/span>\u00a040-41). Despite the existence of individuals who believe killing is natural, inevitable, and acceptable (Sponsel 269-274), this tangible, quantifiable, and unambiguous phenomenon, terminologically coined by American political scientist and founder of the Center for Global Nonkilling (CGNK), Glenn D. Paige (1929-2017), is both conceivable (see\u00a0<\/span>Nonkilling Global Political Science<\/span>) and has proven prevalent over space and time as demonstrated by cross-disciplinary research (see<\/span>\u00a0Towards a Nonkilling Paradigm<\/span>).<\/span><\/p>\n

In fact, more than the complimentary paradigms of\u00a0<\/span>nonviolence or peace<\/span>, Paige\u2019s innovative nonkilling offers a concrete vision and measurable direction towards achieving a just and killing-free world (Bhaneja,\u00a0<\/span>Peace Portraits<\/span>\u00a040-41). Such a world, one \u201cin which everyone has the right not to be killed and responsibility not to kill others,\u201d according to Principle 13 of the 2007 Nobel Peace Laureates\u2019\u00a0<\/span>Charter for a World Without Violence<\/span>, is also free of the consequences of killing.<\/span><\/p>\n

A\u00a0<\/span>nonkilling society\u00a0<\/span>reveres human life and values and protects its sanctity (Bhaneja, \u201cAspects;\u201d \u201cEpilogue\u201d 324). As Paige describes a nonkilling society, \u201c<\/span>It is a human community, smallest to largest, local to global, characterized by no killing of humans and no threats to kill; no weapons designed to kill humans and no justifications for using them; and no conditions of society dependent upon threat or use of killing force for maintenance or change.\u201d (21)<\/span><\/p>\n

Simply put, it is one committed to the achievement of zero killing (Bhaneja, \u201cEpilogue\u201d 322), which requires \u201cchang[ing] conditions conducive to lethality\u201d (Paige 77). This nonkilling paradigm necessitates\u00a0<\/span>praxis<\/span>\u00a0in the Freirean sense of \u201creflection and action upon the world in order to transform it\u201d (33).<\/span><\/p>\n

A nonkilling society is supported and legitimized by a\u00a0<\/span>nonkilling culture<\/span>, one that is universal, or in the words engraved on Paige\u2019s memorial, that \u201ccrosses all the lines\u201d (Bhaneja,<\/span>\u00a0Peace Portraits<\/span>\u00a058), transcending gender, race, religion, nationality, etc., raising us from tribalism to opening our hearts and minds in the broadest sense.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It has already been argued elsewhere that a nonkilling world can be achieved via nonkilling research, policy, action, and education aimed at both preventing and reducing, if not altogether eliminating, deliberate killing at all levels from micro to macro (Bhaneja,<\/span>\u00a0Peace Portraits<\/span>; Pim 15). Paige also highlights the important, transformative role of the\u00a0<\/span>arts<\/span>, with their ability to \u201cuplift the human spirit and imagination\u201d (123), in contributing to nonkilling cultures (96). Nonkilling art, specifically as Paige states, \u201cexplores the spirit and practice of how to prevent, respond to, and to improve individual, social, and global well-being beyond killing\u201d (Bhaneja,\u00a0<\/span>NKARC Letter<\/span>, Sept. 2015 10).<\/span><\/p>\n

Intending to build off the central question,\u00a0<\/span>Is nonkilling literature possible?<\/span>, addressed previously by Balwant (Bill) Bhaneja in his article \u201cAspects of Nonkilling Literature\u201d and through the Nonkilling Arts Research Committee (NKARC) newsletters (<\/span>https:\/\/nonkilling.org\/center\/publications-media\/nonkilling-arts\/<\/span><\/a>) he curated for the CGNK for over a decade (2012-2022), this modest collection of<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>original essays<\/span>\u00a0on nonkilling works<\/span>\u00a0<\/span>aims to clarify what makes nonkilling literature\u00a0<\/span>(i.e. nonkilling nonfiction and nonkilling fiction)<\/span>\u00a0a genre in itself and its subsets<\/span>\u00a0and, thereby,\u00a0<\/span>show that nonkilling literature\u00a0<\/span>also<\/span>\u00a0has a role to play\u00a0<\/span>in the necessarily creative and open-ended endeavor that is\u00a0<\/span>nonkilling<\/span>.<\/span><\/p>\n

Through each thought-provoking and heart-stirring piece, the reader should expect to discover the \u201cprincipled nonkilling spirit\u201d (Bhaneja, \u201cAspects\u201d) within the\u00a0<\/span>artist<\/span>s who work intentionally or unintentionally \u201cto hold mirror to us on what brings killing and nonkilling, and move us to contemplate on possibilities of transformation\u201d (Bhaneja,\u00a0<\/span>NKARC Letter<\/span>, Feb. 2014 1).<\/span><\/p>\n

In search of parameters of nonkilling literature, Bhaneja reports on a discussion with Paige about the four-part logic of nonkilling political analysis he suggests could be applied to arts (<\/span>NKARC Letter<\/span>, Apr. 2016 1). Paige\u2019s typology emphasizes an understanding of the causes, conditions, and consequences of killing, nonkilling, and transitions between the two, as well as characteristics of nonkilling societies (73). This allows for ample imagination, creation, identification, analysis, recognition, and promotion of works with a nonkilling ethic, something Bhaneja advocates for (\u201cAspects\u201d), and these unique essays strive to showcase.<\/span><\/p>\n

This anthology, the first intentionally devoted to nonkilling literature, strives to recognize the primacy of existence, deepen our understanding of (non)killing, and call for a paradigm shift to \u201creplace the assumption of lethal inescapability with the premise of nonkilling potentiality\u201d (Pim 21) in a way never done before. \u201cNonkilling is the measure of human progress\u201d (Paige,\u00a0<\/span>CGNK<\/span>), and the emergence of this new literary genre and its field of inquiry hails another promising advancement in that direction. Thank you for joining this movement!<\/span><\/p>\n

Categories<\/h3>\n

PART 1: <\/span>Essays on\u00a0<\/span>Nonkilling Fiction<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n