Call for Papers

Gender Studies are enriched by interdisciplinary, diverse and multiple theoretical and methodological perspectives and approaches, which becomes simultaneously analytically challenging and epistemologically captivating. By infusing other disciplines with foundational gender theories that cover the deconstruction of binary sexes or the analysis of gender as a social category, Gender Studies have sharpened the theoretical grounds of other theories, such as discourse analysis or Marxism. At the same time new theoretical approaches have emerged, such as Butler’s ground-breaking study on gender performativity, intersectional approaches to analysing oppressive social mechanisms or feminist interventions into objectifying gazes. Gender studies did thus not only generate new perspectives on materiality, relations of power and social structures, they also established themselves as a critical and overarching discipline that affects and shapes multiple fields of research.

The conference of the German Gender Studies Association invites all scholars to critically engage with current epistemological, theoretical, methodical, methodological and ontological approaches and to reflect and discuss their potential to further develop the field of gender studies. Particular areas of interest are:

• What is to be learned from the complex and often contradictory development of founding theories?
• Which areas contribute to and negotiate feminist and gender theoretical approaches?
• In what way do critical gender studies influence other disciplines?
• How do various ‘turns’ (performative, spatial, ontological and material) influence the approach to gender studies?
• Which inter- and transdisciplinary alliances appear to be constructive and productive?
• How can theories and methodologies react to and negotiate current developments in social structures?

The 2019 conference of the German Gender Studies Association aspires to unite scholars of different disciplines in order to discuss pressing issues, cornerstones and future approaches to gender studies. Presentations, panels, forums, workshops and other forms of discussion will enrich a productive, interdisciplinary exchange between established scholars and junior scientists. We welcome topics from diverse disciplines and fields of study as well as contributions explicitly focusing on methods and methodologies within gender studies. Topics may be:

• Psychoanalysis, Discourse Analysis, gender performativity
• Theories of Intersectionality: questions, criticisms, new approaches as well as revisions of Gender and Queer Studies in relation to other social differences (e.g. race, class, religion, ethnicity, education, disability studies or migration)
• Post- und Decolonial Studies, Anti-Semitism Studies, Diaspora and Critical Whiteness Studies
• Trans*Inter* Studies
• Queer Studies
• Feminist Techno-Science- und Cyborg Studies
• Ontological Philosophy, Speculative Realism and/or New Materialism
• Gender and genre, gender and media and gender and literature
• Border Studies

Contribution may be published in the Open Gender Journal

Closing date for abstract submission: February 28 2019

Submitting abstracts (and short CV) will soon be available via this page.