[Commlist] CFP - "The Lara Croft 30th Anniversary Special Issue," Feminist Media Histories

*“The Lara Croft 30th Anniversary Special Issue”*

*Feminist Media Histories*

https://online.ucpress.edu/fmh/pages/cfp_2 
<https://online.ucpress.edu/fmh/pages/cfp_2>


Guest Editors:
Amanda Phillips ((amanda.phillips /at/ georgetown.edu))
Josef Nguyen ((josef.nguyen /at/ utdallas.edu))

This intersectional, international, and interdisciplinary special issue 
approaches the fictional figure of Lara Croft as a cipher for unpacking 
the shifting landscape of feminism(s) and media cultures over the last 
three decades.

The year 2026 marks the 30th anniversary of the 1996 release of /Tomb 
Raider/ and the introduction of the widely recognized and influential 
fictional figure of Lara Croft to players and audiences. Critics and 
publications immediately praised the /Tomb Raider/ game for its 
mechanics and controls, advances in 3-D graphics, virtual environment 
design, and atmosphere and pacing. Yet, as the protagonist of the 
series, Lara was immediately contentious and controversial. Unlike many 
women characters in video games at the time, she had a complex 
backstory, plenty of tools and skills at her disposal, and was the lead 
in her own game. She was also well known for her improbable bosom and 
short shorts.

Lara became a provocative global cultural phenomenon, beloved and 
reviled by audiences and critics. Her image spread rapidly across 
various non-gaming media, including films, television series, 
animations, novelizations, and magazines. In fact, she earned the 
Guinness World Record for Most Magazine Covers for a Videogame 
Character, from /Game Informer/ to /Playboy/. Like her creators, Lara’s 
audiences also objectified her through various means, including 
usercreated “Nude Raider” mods to reskin the Lara avatar in the nude.

Consequently, the most enduring lines of feminist inquiry directed 
toward the /Tomb Raider/ franchise debate the promises and failures of 
Lara as empowering representation, as gunwielding action heroine, and as 
hypersexualized woman. Academic and popular critics have endlessly 
debated her body’s curves, the contours of her personality, and the ups 
and downs of her narratives: she has been and continues to be a site of 
debate, of defense, and of refiguring feminist thought and politics in 
21st century media cultures.

Most previous commentaries on Lara Croft have left her racial and 
cisgendered identities unremarked upon and undertheorized, even though 
white savior, colonial looter, and cisnormative bombshell are core parts 
of her heroic appeal. Additionally, even though Lara’s reach and impact 
far exceeds gaming, most Lara Croft scholarship is centered in the field 
of game studies. This special issue hopes to bring together perspectives 
that can reevaluate Lara as a figure structured by and in tension with 
white supremacist cisheteropatriarchy, as well as an icon that exists 
across a broad spectrum of media formats and cultural contexts. We are 
particularly interested in critical race theory, trans studies, crip 
theory, and postcolonial perspectives on the past 30 years, and 
imagining the next 30 years, of Lara Croft.

In addition to traditional research articles, we are particularly 
excited about including videographic and other multimedia formats of 
critique. This can include but is not limited to videographic and 
photographic essays, interactive scholarship, critical game design, and 
fanvids as vernacular criticism. Criticism in forms beyond the 
traditional research article will still undergo peer review appropriate 
to their formats.

Potential Topics for Research Article and Media Submissions:
-Trans and queer interpretations of Lara Croft
-Critical race and ethnic studies critiques of /Tomb Raide/r
-Postcolonial and decolonial critiques of fantasies of archaeology in 
/Tomb Raider/
-Disability and crip critiques of Lara Croft
-Lara Croft as star and celebrity
-Actors and models performing and embodying Lara Croft (e.g., Angelina 
Jolie, Alicia Vikander, Minnie Driver, Shelley Blond, Nell McAndrew, etc.)
-Transmedia history and adaptations of /Tomb Raider/ (e.g., games, 
films, television series, novelizations, animations, etc.)
-Technological innovations of the /Tomb Raider/ franchise
-Marketing, advertising, and the consumption of Lara Croft
-Precursors to Lara Croft; Lara Croft as precursor (e.g., Indiana Jones, 
Ellen Ripley, Tank Girl, Sarah Connor, Rick Dangerous, Bayonetta, Nathan 
Drake, etc.)
-/Tomb Raider/, pornography, and the sexualization of Lara Croft
-Lara Croft-inspired fandom, fan practices, and fan media (e.g., 
cosplay, vidding, streaming, fiction, art, modding, etc.)

Interested contributors should contact Amanda Phillips and Josef Nguyen 
directly, sending a 500-word proposal and a short bio no later than June 
1, 2023 to both (amanda.phillips /at/ georgetown.edu) and 
(josef.nguyen /at/ utdallas.edu). Contributors will be notified by July 31, 
2023; article drafts will be due by March 1, 2024 and will be sent out 
for peer review. The special issue is planned for publication in Summer 
2025.

The guest editors are maintaining a working bibliography of feminist 
writing about Lara Croft and the /Tomb Raider/ franchise. Feel free to 
contact them via email to receive access to this reference or with any 
other questions: (amanda.phillips /at/ georgetown.edu) and 
(josef.nguyen /at/ utdallas.edu).

<http://www.josefnguyen.net>


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