The essays in this anthology participate in the Humanities' long-standing engagement with imaginary worlds and their relationship to lived experience. In a contemporary cultural climate increasingly marked by contested facts and competing narratives, the Humanities play a crucial role in interrogating how realities are constructed. Thus, the contributions in this volume explore how literary, linguistic, cinematic, and cultural practices help navigate, assess, and influence both political and personal understandings of the "real." The anthology is organized into four sections exploring how fictional worlds shape our conception of reality, fiction, truth, and visibility. The final section considers how language usage in the classroom and in media simulates and redefines linguistic "realities."

For more than thirty years, the Southeast Conference for Languages, Literatures and Film (SCFLLF) has been a premier platform for the discussion and dissemination of the latest scholarship in the Humanities, with an emphasis on non-English area studies. The current volume showcases some of the most impactful papers originally presented at the 26th Southeast Conference for Languages, Literatures, and Film (SCFLLF), held on February 22-23, 2025, at Stetson University in DeLand, Florida.