[URBANTH-L] CFP: Transnational Dialogues: De-centering the Academic Debate on Global Feminisms

[Angela Jancius]

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Call for Papers
2008 GLCA Conference on Transnational Feminisms

Transnational Dialogues
De-centering the Academic Debate on Global Feminisms

September 26-28, 2008
Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio

The internationalization of local feminisms has significantly impacted how, 
in recent years, research agendas are structured in the U.S. and elsewhere. 
Feminists from all over the globe are addressing how globalization brings 
about new forms of gender inequality that, in many cases, are rooted in 
older histories of colonialism and racism. These transnational approaches 
move across national boundaries to assess political, economical, and 
cultural shifts affecting women's lives, and emphasize connections without 
necessarily creating similarities. Within the U.S., feminists of color who 
had experienced first-hand race and class biases were the first ones to 
create a network that included new social movements and transnational 
alliances. The exclusion that women of color from different racial, ethnic, 
physical, national, or sexual identities experienced created the conditions 
that generated novel coalitional movements.

Academic debates have tended to ignore other overarching issues that have 
produced their internationalization. Local feminisms went global during the 
1990s and produced contentious debates over the goals and strategies of 
feminist politics. These transnational dialogues resist essentialism and 
universalism and propose theories and methods that go beyond the exclusive 
focus on gender to make visible other forms of oppression where issues of 
race, class, culture, and sexual orientation intersect.

This conference seeks to engage scholars from various areas of the globe in 
a dialogue to challenge exclusions and omissions of these debates in 
mainstream academia and college curricula. Papers, panels, and workshops may 
be on, but are not limited to, any of the following topics:

* Theories, Methods, and Challenges of Transnational Feminisms
* The Politics of the Global/Local Dynamic in Women's Literary and/or 
Artistic Productions
* Feminist Geographies and Transnational Flows: Globalization, Immigration, 
and Displacement
* Politics of Sexualities
* Women's Movements, State Building, and the Growth of Civil Society
* Community Building through Technology
* Building Academic Alliances Within and Beyond Women's and Gender Studies 
Programs

All individual papers should be limited to 20 minutes reading time. 
Proposals for panel discussion and teaching workshops will receive priority. 
Papers in languages other than English will be considered. Selected 
proceedings will be considered for publication.

Undergraduate research (papers or poster sessions) encouraged, faculty 
approval of final paper is required to assure students' participation. 
Students must submit an abstract by February 29 and paper by May 30.

Send a one-page abstract (300 words) submission by February 29, 2008 to:
Prof. Clara Román-Odio and Prof. Marta Sierra at 
tnr.callforpapers at kenyon.edu.