Histories of Sexuality and Religion in the 20th Century United States

Call for Proposals October 1, 2013

Editors: Gillian Frank, Bethany Moreton, and Heather White

The time has come to think about the intertwined histories of religion and
sexuality in the 20th century United States. In this twenty-fifth
anniversary year of D’Emilio and Freedman’s landmark *Intimate Matters*,
the study of the history of sexuality has become one of the most exciting
and challenging areas of intellectual inquiry. Historians have investigated
how sexuality has been central to the political, social, and cultural
history of the United States. Yet few historians of sexuality have attended
to the important ways that religious practices, identities, beliefs,
institutions and politics have shaped sexual politics, sexual communities
and sexual identities over the course of the twentieth century. Likewise,
historians of religion in the twentieth century have only recently begun to
account for the changing meanings of sexuality to religious identities,
politics, practices and beliefs. To that end, this anthology is accepting
proposals for historical scholarship that places the categories of religion
and sexuality at the center of its analysis in order to map the
interrelation of changing religious and sexual landscapes. We welcome
chapters—new or previously published in article form—that take religion as
a starting point for rethinking American sexual history and sexuality as a
starting point for rethinking American religious history. Submissions that
respond to the following questions are particularly encouraged:

• How does focusing on religion enrich our understanding of the histories of sexualized racial formations; GLBTQ identities, communities and politics; sexual health or disease, eugenics, and social hygiene; commercialized sexuality (e.g., sex work, pornography, performance, popular culture); sexuality and technology; contraception and abortion; courtship, marriage, and divorce; reproduction and adoption; sex advice and sexual therapy; sexual subcultures; the law and sexuality (e.g., immigration, workplace discrimination, criminal sexuality); abstinence or chastity; and heterosexuality?
• How does nuanced attention to sexuality reshape conventional narratives of twentieth century religious history—the formation of “Judeo-Christian,” “Abrahamic” and similar categories for understanding inter-religious relationships; the meanings and influence of non-Western and indigenous practices in U.S. culture; the meanings and influence of secularity, secularization, and the secular; practices and narratives of therapeutic spirituality; religious formations of racial, ethnic, sexual, gender identity/ies; and religious practices and narratives of “tradition” and “modernity” alongside historical continuity and change?
• What discursive and material contexts and practices constructed the relationship between religion and sexuality?
• In what social institutions did religious and sexual experiences and ideas intersect?
• How have sexual and religious identities been constructed in relation or opposition to each other?
• In what ways did sexual subcultures and communities engage with mainstream religions?
• How did religious authorities, ideas and institutions respond to or shape sexual values, meanings, practices and identities?
• How did religious authorities’ ideas about (and policing of) sexual norms and deviancies change over time?  How did religious authorities,groups or institutions inform or enforce social rules about sexual behavior? How did they shape and reshape dominant sexual meanings?
• How did religious groups create alternative sexual subcultures?
• How did religion shape discourses of sexuality, whether normative or oppositional?
• In what ways did changing sexual values reshape religious groups, identities and practices?

Please send an abstract of no more than 500 words to
sexualityreligionhistory@gmail.com by October 1, 2013, along with a 1-page
CV. Authors will be notified of decisions by January of 2014. The due date
for completed drafts (of between 5000 and 8000 words) is September 1, 2014.

Please do not hesitate to contact us with preliminary inquiries.

Gillian Frank, PhD
ACLS New Faculty Fellow
Department of History
Stony Brook University
gillian.frank@stonybrook.edu

“Fighting Women” during and after the Second World War in Asia and Europe

This is a call for papers for the above conference, to be held on June 12-13, 2014, at the Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide Studies (NIOD) in Amsterdam, the Netherlands, in close cooperation with Kwansei Gakuin University (KGU), Japan. This conference seeks to go beyond the static “passive/pacifist” portrayal of women in the Second World War. We are interested in recovering the history of women who transgressed normative, peacetime gender boundaries by choosing to be masters of their own fate in abetting and perpetrating violence, in collaborating with or resisting aggression, or in actively furthering or frustrating the war goals of their own side. We aim to examine the actions and image of “strong,” “active,” and/or “violent” women in the various theaters of the Second World War, contrasting European, East Asian, and Southeast Asian cases for greater insights into the relations between gender, culture, and the Second World War. Please submit a 300-word abstract and a 100-word biographical note to the conference coordinators (NIOD: Eveline Buchheim, Ralf Futselaar; KGU: Timothy Tsu,) at info@niod.knaw.nl and indicating ‘Fighting Women’ as subject matter by September 1, 2013. Authors will be notified by November 1, 2013. Please direct your inquiries to the coordinators at the same e-mail address.

NIOD: Eveline Buchheim, Ralf Futselaar
KGU: Timothy Tsu

Email: info@niod.knaw.nl

http://www.h-net.org/announce/show.cgi?ID=203786

Call for Papers:

45th Annual Convention, Northeast Modern Language Association (NeMLA)
April 3-6, 2014
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania
Host: Susquehanna University

Two decades ago, Judith Butler’s “Critically Queer” asked what it might mean to make “queer” an object of critical inquiry and, equally, what it might mean for the queer to become critical of her identification as queer. “Comically Queer” echoes Butler’s formulation in order to ask how the comic might be deployed to do queer work and how the queer can be located in relation to the comic. This panel welcomes papers that draw from queer theory as well as disability, post-colonial, and critical race studies in order to query normative regimes that determine what it means to be (and which bodies are) taken seriously. In particular, this panel aims to ask how laughter and the comic might work to disrupt or (re)configure the category of, to borrow another phrase from Butler, the “recognizably human.” Please send 250-word abstracts to James Mulder at jamie.mulder@tufts.edu by September 30, 2013.

Deadline: September 30, 2013
Please include with your abstract:
Name and affiliation
Email address
A/V requirements (if any; $10 handling fee with registration)

The 2014 NeMLA convention continues the Association’s tradition of sharing innovative scholarship in an engaging and generative location. This capitol city set on the Susquehanna River is known for its vibrant restaurant scene, historical sites, the National Civil War museum, and nearby Amish Country, antique shops and Hershey Park. NeMLA has arranged low hotel rates of $104-$124.

The 2014 event will include guest speakers, literary readings, professional events, and workshops. A reading by George Saunders will open the Convention. His 2013 collection of short fiction, The Tenth of December, has been acclaimed by the New York Times as “the best book you’ll read this year.” The Keynote speaker will be David Staller of Project Shaw.

Interested participants may submit abstracts to more than one NeMLA session; however, panelists can only present one paper (panel or seminar). Convention participants may present a paper at a panel and also present at a creative session or participate in a roundtable. http://www.nemla.org/convention/2014/cfp.html

James Mulder
English Department
Tufts University
Email: jamie.mulder@tufts.edu

http://www.h-net.org/announce/show.cgi?ID=204719

CALL FOR PAPERS

Religion, Spirituality, and Inequality in Communities of Color

A Special issue of Women, Gender, and Families of Color

Guest Editors
Assata Zerai, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
Sandra Weissinger, Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville

Recent public discourse on women’s reproductive rights and abortion, full-time homemakers and working mothers, and LGBTQ partnership and marriage, has highlighted the pervasive role and power of organized religion and spirituality in daily life, as well as related issues of oppression and resistance. For this special issue of Women, Gender, and Families of Color (WGFC), we seek historical, and social science manuscripts that explore the intersectionalities of race, class, gender, sexuality, and other socioeconomic categories in U.S. religious and spiritual settings. Topics may address, but are not limited to, the following:

Spheres of social inequality, such as race, class, gender, and sexuality and their reproduction and/or practice in U.S. religious/spiritual organizations or spaces;

The use of resources (e.g. human and financial) to impede or promote the reproduction of inequalities;

The meaning of relationships, and the practice of religion/spirituality, in these organizations and spaces for women, men, and LGBTQ communities;

The practice of social and/or economic privilege among groups in U.S. religious/spiritual organizations and spaces;

U.S. religious/spiritual structures as intransigent sites from which to challenge persisting inequalities;

U.S. transnational comparisons on any of the above.

Please send queries and electronic versions of manuscripts (Microsoft Word) to:

Assata Zerai
Department of Sociology, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign E-Mail: azerai@illinois.edu

SUBMISSION DEADLINE: AUGUST 16, 2013

Manuscripts should be a maximum of 30 pages, inclusive of title page, abstract (150 words or less), main body of text, figures, tables, and Chicago Style, 16th edition references. Only title pages should contain authors’ names, affiliation, phone & FAX numbers, in addition to the email address of the corresponding author.

WGFC is a multidisciplinary journal that centers the study of Black, Latina/o, Indigenous, and Asian American women, gender, and families. In addition to special issues, WGFC welcomes general submissions on a rolling submission policy.

Please visit www.womengenderandfamilies.ku.edu for more information.

Saturday 18th January 2014, Institute of Irish Studies, University of Liverpool

The Women on Ireland Research Network invite paper proposals for a symposium on Irish Women, Religion and the Diaspora. This Symposium seeks to understand not only the shifting role that religion has played in the lives of Irish women but the role that Irish women themselves have undertaken in religious institutions and organisations and how this role has changed over time. Although the idea of diaspora assumes a shared experience, Irish migrants were of different social, economic, political and even religious backgrounds. Their experiences were coloured by their end destinations which included the United Kingdom, North America, Australia and New Zealand, Argentina, Mexico, South Africa, Brazil, Chile, Jamaica, Bermuda, Puerto Rico, India and continental Europe. This symposium aims to tease out the significance of religion to Irish women at home and abroad.

Within this framework of Irish women, Religion and Diaspora, topics could include, but are not limited to:

· Religious and social networks and the significance of place · Religion and cultural transfer
· Material culture and Irishness
· Experiences of religion expressed through literature
· Irish women’s religious institutes and diaspora
· Irish lay women and faith-based organisations
· Irish women and global religious dynamics
· Diaspora, place and missions
· National and transnational religious networks

Each paper should be no longer than 20 minutes and 300 word proposals should be send to both Dr Maria Power (m.c.power@liv.ac.uk) and Dr Carmen Mangion (c.mangion@bbk.ac.uk) by 30th June 2013.

Austin, Texas, November 3-6, 2013

The 2013 Digital Library Federation (DLF) Forum is seeking proposals for presentations, panel discussions, workshops, research updates, and hands-on, problem-solving sessions. The Digital Library Federation is a robust and diverse community of practitioners who advance research, teaching, and learning through the application of digital library research, technology, and services. The Forum is a working meeting where DLF members come together to discover better methods of working through sharing and collaboration. It serves as a resource and catalyst for collaboration among digital library developers, project managers, and all who are invested in digital library issues.

Participation is open to all those interested in contributing to and playing an active part in the successful future of digital libraries, museums, and archives services and collections. In that spirit, and to maximize the Forum’s benefit and better facilitate the community’s work, the Forum’s schedule will provide many opportunities to actively engage and network.

For the 2013 DLF Forum, the Program Planning Committee is requesting proposals within the broad framework of digital collections and their effect on libraries, museums and archives services, infrastructure, resources, and organizational priorities. Proposals should strive to contribute to the following topics:
• Digital technology design
• Management and assessment
• Data
• Collaboration

We welcome proposals on these and other areas from current community members and non-members who are interested in joining the DLF community. For more detailed examples, please see the 2012 DLF Forum schedule:  http://www.diglib.org/forums/2012forum/2012-dlf-forum-schedule/.

Session genres include:
• Presentations and Panels
Traditional lecture format with question-and-answer sessions. Speakers are requested to use only half of the allocated time for the presentation, including how they wish to engage the DLF c community in their work. The second half of the session should focus
on conversations about next steps, engagement with the community, and clarification of points raised during the presentation.

• Workshops
In-depth, hands-on training about a tool, technique, workflow, etc. You can recommend a topic or trainer, or you can volunteer to share your own expertise.

• Research Updates
An opportunity for those working in digital collections research to present their preliminary findings for community feedback and discussion.

• Working Sessions
Creative problem solvers, including project managers, developers, and/or administrators, gather to address a specific problem. This does not have to be a computational problem. The approach
can be applied to workflow issues, metadata transformations, or other complex problems that would benefit from a collective, dynamic solution approach.

• Community Idea Exchange
A modified poster session. Presenters will have the opportunity to interact with Forum participants to discuss their current research projects, and/or demonstrate tools or services they have
developed or are using in their digital library environment. Demos must include a poster element.

Proposal Submission Guidelines and Evaluation Procedures
Complete proposals should be submitted using the online submission form (http://www.diglib.org/forums/2013forum/proposals/) by 11:59 PM on June 28, 2013.
Proposals must include a title, session leader, session genre, proposal description (maximum 300 words), and proposal abstract (maximum 100 words).

After an initial review by the Program Planning Committee, all proposals will be posted on the DLF website for community polling. The community vote will be taken into consideration, and the Program Planning Committee will make the final decisions. Those that submitted complete proposals will be notified of their status by August 9, 2013. Presenters will be guaranteed a registration place.

The 2013 DLF Forum will be held in Austin, TX at the AT&T Executive Education and Conference Center, November 3–6, 2013. More information about the 2013 DLF Forum can be found at http://www.diglib.org/forums/2013forum.

Louisa Kwasigroch
Digital Library Federation
Council on Library and Information Resources
lkwasigroch@clir.org www.clir.org | www.diglib.org

After the success of 2012 Women of Appalachia: Sisters in Science conference, the planning committee is moving forward in organizing this year’s conference around the theme of “Sisters in STEM” scheduled on October 17-18, with the possibility of extension to October 19, 2013.

The Keynote
speaker for this year’s conference is Dr. Sharon Denham, Professor of Nursing at Ohio University. Dr. Denham is a renowned and dedicated scientist, nurse scholar and educator leading research and community efforts to promote and advocate for family health in Appalachian Ohio. Over the years she has led and conducted a number of research studies with Appalachian populations about topics related to family health issues including, bereavement, abuse and violence, tobacco use, and family routines. Her current work focuses on diabetes prevention in Appalachia.

We are now calling for proposals/abstract submissions for consideration for the October conference. Proposals can be submitted for paper presentations, full panel presentations, and/or roundtable discussions. Suggested topics might include, but are not limited to “Communicating information to educate about a topic, issue or concept, with focus on not only formal classroom learning, but also community education in and outside the classroom”. This could take the form of (or a combination of) the following categories:

Science, Technology, Engineering and/or Math Education Community Education (environment, health, biodiversity, conservation) Music and/or Visual Arts Education Language Arts Education (poetry, song lyrics, screen plays)

Please submit a 250- to 300-word abstract to Dr. Mawadda Al-Naeeli al-naeel@ohio.edu or Ms. Chris Shaw shaw@ohio.edu by Monday, July 15, 2013. Presentations should run only 20 minutes in length for each presenter.You will be asked to provide your audiovisual needs upon acceptance of your proposal. If you have any questions, email Mawadda or Chris.

Dr. Mawadda Al-Naeeli
Email: al-naeel@ohio.edu
Visit the website at http://www.ohio.edu/zanesville/womenofappalachia/callforpaper.cfm