CALL FOR PAPERS
Forthcoming special issue of Feminist Theory
?Nonhuman Feminisms?
Editors: Myra J. Hird (Queen?s University, Canada) and Celia Roberts
(Lancaster University)
Feminist Theory is inviting papers for a special issue on feminism and
the nonhuman, to be edited by Myra J. Hird and Celia Roberts. Feminist
scholars and activists recognise that ?the human? materially
encompasses a very small proportion of the enormous diversity of
living and nonliving matter on Earth. Environmental feminists, for
instance, have long attempted to engage with the biosphere from the
perspective of humanity as a recently arrived, temporary and rather
unruly tenant. At the same time, feminists are cognizant that
fetishistic engagements with science and technology (for instance in
calls to address environmental crises through technological fixes and
in assumptions that solutions to world problems such as poverty will
come from scientific ?discoveries? such as genetically modified foods)
necessitate remembering the majority of humanity, whose poor material
conditions demonstrate that techno-scientifically-driven ?progress? is
unevenly distributed and can work to entrench existing inequities.
These tensions necessarily engage long-standing philosophy of science
debates concerning larger ontological and epistemological assumptions,
to which feminist scholars have provided significant, timely and
diverse inputs. We particularly welcome theoretical and/or empirical
interdisciplinary contributions from emerging and established scholars
interested in engaging different conceptualisations of what
constitutes the nonhuman (can the nonhuman be ontologically
differentiated from the human, for instance?) and different
epistemological approaches, including standpoint approaches to the
body, posthumanism and so on. We also encourage contributions
concerned with visual cultures (film, video, art and other media) and
the visual forms the non-human might take.
Some questions you might consider:
? What does feminist theory have to offer to debates about the nonhuman?
? Is there a nonhuman feminist perspective?
? What are the feminist implications of the nonhuman?
? How might feminist theory move beyond the conflation of nonhuman
with animal?
? How might a feminist ethics approach the nonhuman?
? How might we theorise sexual difference from a nonhuman perspective?
Does sexual difference make a difference from a nonhuman perspective?
? How might the nonhuman contribute to longstanding debates about
race, class, disability and so on?
? How might feminists visualise the non-human?
The deadline for submission of articles is 1 December 2009. Refer to
the journal for submission guidelines regarding length and format.
Please send your article electronically and with six hard copies to
Myra J. Hird, email (hirdm /at/ queensu.ca) and Celia Roberts, email
(celia.roberts /at/ lancaster.ac.uk). Mailing address: Myra J. Hird,
Sociology Department, Queen?s University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada, K7L
