[ecrea] CFP: Feminist Ghosts: The New Cultural Life of Feminism - Diffractions - Graduate Journal for the Study of Culture: Issue 6

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*Call for Articles*

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*Diffractions - Graduate Journal for the Study of Culture*

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*Issue 6 | Feminist Ghosts: The New Cultural Life of Feminism*

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*Deadline for articles: November 30
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Over the last two decades, feminist scholarship has consistently drawn
attention to the “post-feminist sensibility” (Gill, 2007) overtaking
cultural imagination, wherein feminism is only alluded to “in order that
in can be understood as having passed away” (McRobbie, 2011). Deemed
responsible for disavowing feminist politics and for encouraging a
disidentification with feminist struggles on the part of (younger)
women, this postfeminist turn shifted attention to individual success,
financial satisfaction and heterosexual realization, ousting the
plurality of feminist subjectivities.

Recently, however, feminism seems to have reentered the sphere of public
awareness, both in political discourse and popular culture. As McRobbie
put it, “in endless conjuring up a demon that must be extinguished (in
this case feminism), that demon demonstrates something of its lingering
alfterlife and its ghostly power” (2011: 183). Phenomena such as
Beyoncé’s appropriation of Chimamanda Adichie’s talk “We Should 
All be
Feminists”; Emma Watson’s speech at the UN Women HeforShe campaign
launch, in which she urged men to stand up for women’s rights; several
Hollywood actresses coming forward to denounce the gender pay gap and
other inequalities in the film business; Facebook CEO Sheryl Sandberg’s
bestseller Lean In on the work-family balance; the controversial success
of Lena Dunham’s Girls on HBO, among many other instances, have not only
contributed to a renewed visibility of feminism in social life, but also
to bring forth the new contradictions and challenges (radical) feminism
is facing today.

Within this framework, some authors propose to rethink postfeminism as
one word “for a productive irritation that helps keep feminist discourse
alive in contemporary popular culture” (Driscoll, 2015). Others,
however, argue that this reappearance of feminism in contemporary
cultural life is concomitant with “an amplification of control of women”
(McRobbie, 2015), in line with Catherine Rottberg’s diagnosis of a “rise
of neoliberal feminism” (2013), where classical feminist foundations,
such as gender equality and emancipation, are made compatible with
neoliberal ideas of competition, leadership, profit, and accomplishment,
while other feminist claims and geographies are marginalized and denied
visibility. Moreover, the very history of feminist thought is being
rewritten along these lines, and “hijacked” (to borrow Rottberg’s
expression) by new interpretations unaware of the plurality of feminist
subjects and devoid of concerns with social justice.

At a time when a new visibility of feminist imagination seems to be
making “old” struggles relevant again, but also to coexist or even to
contribute to new forms of capture and exclusion, how can cultural
change be envisioned and what kind of practices can bring it into
existence?

This issue aims to reflect on the new cultural life of feminism through
topics that may include but are not restricted to the following:

- The representation of women and feminism in the media and the arts

- Feminism and popular culture

- Feminism, capitalism and neoliberalism

- Feminism and social media

- The history of feminist thought and the subject(s) of feminism

- Feminist knowledge politics

- Transnational feminisms and feminist geographies

- Intersectionality, collectivity and solidarity

- Feminism and sexuality (sex tourism; sexual trafficking; gendered
violence)

- Feminist pedagogies

- Activism, political participation and performativity

- The body politic.

We look forward to receiving full articles of no more than 7000 words
(not including bibliography) by November 30, 2015 at the following
address: (info.diffractions /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(info.diffractions /at/ gmail.com)>.

Diffractions welcomes articles written in English, Portuguese and Spanish.

Please follow the journal’s house style and submission guidelines at
http://www.diffractions.net/submission-guidelines.
<http://www.diffractions.net/submission-guidelines>


<http://www.diffractions.net/submission-guidelines>

Diffractions also accepts book reviews that may not be related to the
issue’s topic. If you wish to write a book review, please contact us at
(info.diffractions /at/ gmail.com) <mailto:(info.diffractions /at/ gmail.com)>.

*About Diffractions*

DIFFRACTIONS is an online, peer reviewed and open access graduate
journal for the study of culture, published bi-annually under the
editorial direction of graduate students in the doctoral program in
Culture Studies at the Lisbon Consortium - Universidade Católica 
Portuguesa.

Find us online at www.diffractions.net <http://www.diffractions.net>.


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