Race and Ethnicity in Fandom
Transformative Works and Cultures, an online-only, peer-reviewed journal
focusing on media and fan studies, broadly conceived, invites
contributions for a special issue on race and ethnicity to be published
in summer 2011. Academic scholarship on fan cultures and fan productions
over the past few decades has focused primarily on gender as the sole
category of analysis. There has been little published scholarship on fan
cultures and productions that incorporates critical race theory or draws
on the rich array of methodologies that have been developed during the
past century in both activist and academic communities in order to
incorporate analysis of the social constructions of race and ethnicities
in fandoms.
In contrast, fan activism and fan scholarship (at cons, workshops, and
on the Internet) has produced a growing body of work (personal
narratives, essays, carnivals, and in recent months, a press) focusing
on not only analyzing but also confronting hierarchies of race and
ethnicity and their relationship to gender, sexuality, class, and
disability. Submissions by academics, acafans, fan scholars, and fans
are encouraged. In all categories, people of color are especially
encouraged to submit.
The deadline for completed submissions is October 1, 2010.
The editors would like to encourage pre-proposal abstracts and drafts
for early feedback by March 1, 2010.
Topics might include but are not limited to:
Online activism and the circulation of critical race theory and women of
color feminisms in fan communities, in particular the relationship
between fan online discourse and other online activist
communities.
Critical analysis of the instantiation and critique of racial
hierarchies in fan communities and the surrounding cultural productions.
Racist and antiracist issues in commercial transformative works (comics,
film, mashups, remixes, machinima, etc.), especially recuperative race
readings (e.g., Randall's The Wind Done Gone,
Rhys's Wide Sargasso Sea).
Race concerns in source texts (characters of color and their fannish
reception, fandoms for work by authors of color, writing fannish
original characters, etc.) and fannish responses (such as the Carl
Brandon Society, Verb Noire, and other panfannish and professional
projects).
Intersection of race and ethnicity with gender, sexuality, class, and
ability in fannish contexts in fan works and fan communities
(pre-Internet, Internet, conventions, vids, fan fiction, artwork, etc.).
Complete information available in PDF form here:
US letter paper:
<http://journal.transformativeworks.org/docs/twc-race-cfp-2009-04-30-us.p>http://journal.transformativeworks.org/docs/twc-race-cfp-2009-04-30-us.p
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A4 paper:
<http://journal.transformativeworks.org/docs/twc-race-cfp-2009-04-30-a4.p>http://journal.transformativeworks.org/docs/twc-race-cfp-2009-04-30-a4.p
df
The announcement on TWC's site is here:
<http://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/announcement/view/9>http://journal.transformativeworks.org/index.php/twc/announcement/view/9
