National Women's Studies Association conference

Dates: June 19-22, 2008
Location: Millennium Hotel, Cincinnati (downtown location)
Call for submissions deadline: November 1, 2007
Website: http://www.nwsaconference.org/

Resisting Hegemonies: Race and Sexual Politics in Nation, Region, Empire

From its role in the time of slavery as a borderland space between North and South to its recent history of racist police violence, community uprisings, federal oversight, and homophobic statutes (subsequently repealed), Cincinnati reflects contemporary political struggles that are regionally unique as well as representative of how politics are manifested in many regions nationally and internationally.

Confronting racism and homophobia are central to the theoretical work of women’s and gender studies and constitute ongoing struggles among the field’s practitioners. In the past, Black feminist thought and LGBT, queer, and sexuality studies have offered productive and important challenges to the field of women’s studies. Emphasizing race and sexual politics in this conference theme serves to honor these major theoretical contributions and to remind us that undoing the long history of racism and homophobia in women’s and gender studies, Cincinnati, and beyond is an ongoing process that requires further study and action.

Foregrounding local, national, and international politics allows us to examine power relations and the differences they construct. This Call situates race and sexual politics in relation to nation, region, and empire in recognition of the importance of contemporary postcolonial and transnational feminist inquiry to such examinations. For example, feminist inquiry can focus on the structural building blocks of empire, namely regional integration projects that support neoliberal globalization while militarizing borders to keep migrants out. Likewise queer scholarship helps identify heteronormative policies as methods by which exclusionist nationalist and hegemonic imperial projects are carried out. And putting feminist area studies in conversation with feminist ethnic/diaspora studies in conversation also enable us to make the connections necessary to resist empire “at home” and “abroad.” Finally, these foci can also extend to the arena of electoral politics in this presidential election year, where race and gender issues will play a critical role.

The overall theme of “resisting hegemonies” is broad enough to invite various forms of interdisciplinary and disciplinary feminist inquiry as well as the full array of feminist pedagogical, activist, cultural, and spiritual work. Possible proposal topics from interdisciplinary or disciplinary perspectives in contemporary or historical contexts could include but are not limited to:

• Theorizing race and racism across national boundaries
• Queering women’s and gender studies
• Regionally specific approaches to feminist activism
• Women resisting empire through the arts
• Black feminist thought and politics
• Revisiting Collins’ “matrix of domination”
• The cultural work of empire in popular discourses
• Postcolonial sexuality studies
• Feminist critiques of militarization
• Feminist politics and women in politics
• Comparing the political work of feminist counter cultures to feminist direct action
• Anti-racist and anti-homophobic work in women’s centers
• From Katrina to Lebanon to Iraq: the politics of displacements, migrations, and movements
• Global perspectives on girlhood
• Transnational perspectives on transgender identities
• Women’s movements in/side and outside the lines of imperialisms, fundamentalisms, and terrorisms
• Empire building and the politics of feminist alliances
• Internships, study abroad, and international exchanges in women’s studies
• Women’s and gender studies on the academic job market
• Transnational consortia of national women’s studies organizations

NWSA invites all of those interested to submit proposals for panels, papers, workshops, and performances that represent the wide rage of anti-hegemonic scholarship in the US and beyond. The Association also welcomes proposals that do not directly address the theme, but are relevant to women’s and gender studies today.

For registration and paper submission information please visit the conference website.