[Commlist] Call for Papers: 'Motherplay'

Call for Papers: Journal of Gaming & Virtual Worlds

Special Issue: ‘Motherplay’

To view the full call click here>>

https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-of-gaming-virtual-worlds#call-for-papers 
<https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-of-gaming-virtual-worlds#call-for-papers>

JGVWinvites you to contribute to a collective project exploring 
motherhood and play. In qualitative studies of mothers and play, focus 
often centers on early child development, such that the play of the 
mother is eclipsed by serious, education-oriented, child-centric 
analyses. Within game studies, topics surrounding motherhood have 
largely been studied in terms of their representation in video games: 
maternal monstrosity and mothers as horror figures (Kirkland 2010, Stang 
2018, Vanderhoef and Payne 2018, Stang 2019, Stang 2020, Goad 2022, 
Caroca 2023, Muiños García 2024, Stang 2026), pregnancy and birth 
(Cruikshank 2015), wombs (Green 2022, Zarzycka 2023) and child and 
pregnancy loss (Harrer 2018, Mendelytė 2024).

With this project, we would like to investigate the playfulness of the 
‘immanent’ (Beauvoir 1949), pervasive, embodied experience of mothering 
from pregnancy onwards, recognizing and inviting perspectives from 
non-binary and trans birthing parents who do not identify as mothers, as 
well as non-birthing mothers. How do mothers play, act as players and 
see themselves as elements of playful systems?

We use the term ‘Motherplay’ to encompass (1) how mothers play, (2) how 
they are played with, (3) how they perceive their own playfulness and 
(4) how their playfulness is perceived by others. How can motherplay be 
contextualized within the broader discipline of game and play studies, 
as a near-constant form of play that adult parents engage in? Where 
'motherwork' and 'reproductive labour' are already established areas of 
enquiry in critical motherhood studies, motherplay is missing. Some 
possible forms of motherplay to investigate include:

  *

    motherplay as body play;

  *

    mothers as the game rather than the player; mother as toy,
    playground, platform, or game system;

  *

    motherplay and the magic circle; how mothers establish and delimit
    play, and how mothers are (sometimes, involuntarily) pulled into play;

  *

    motherplay as gamification and optimization (e.g. digital
    technologies packaged as cheat codes, strategy guides or game hacks
    to win at the implied, competitive game of intensive mothering);

  *

    motherplay as work/play interimbrication; how mother's lives upend
    all definitions of play that rely on distinguishing between play and
    work, play as consensual, play as free from consequence;

  *

    mother as facilitator and gatekeeper of future play;

  *

    motherplay as relational, ritualistic, repetitive and routine;

  *

    roleplay, gender roles and identity transformation during matrescence.

Methodology

We are interested in a range of methods, as well as methodological 
experimentation in order to devise new forms of data assembly and 
analysis that account for the lived experiences of motherhood. As a 
starting point, we believe these critical approaches could be adapted 
and brought to bear on ‘Motherplay’:

  *

    autoethnography and microethology (Giddings 2014);

  *

    biopolitics, ‘body criticism’ and somaesthetics. Embodied
    phenomenology and the idea of the ‘body as text’. (We are keen to
    theorize how the neurobiological transformations that birthing
    mothers undergo interact with motherplay, but we know that
    non-birthing mothers and birthing parents who do not identify as
    mothers also experience significant physical shifts ranging from the
    neurological effects of sleep deprivation to the hormonal changes
    that occur when one spends extended periods of time caring for a 
baby.);

  *

    critical approaches from the medical humanities to understand play
    and the perinatal period in relation to health, pathology, medicine,
    and ‘wellness’;

  *

    approaches from material culture and artifact analysis, including
    toy theory;

  *

    consumer culture and marketing criticism;

  *

    close readings of the ‘playfulness’ of digital apps marketed to 
mothers;

  *

    critical-making as part of, or in response to, motherplay;

  *

    community-based/collective approaches such as community concept
    mapping, collective biographies, choral/polyvocal/ensemble
    phenomenology;

  *

    more traditional and more experimental methods also welcome.

Formats

JGVWis soliciting the following forms of submission for the Special Issue:

 1.

    traditional research articles of 6000–8000 words;

 2.

    essays of 2,000–4,000 words (structurally freer writing with a
    narrower focus and lighter citational framework);

 3.

    book reviews of up to 2000 words.

The deadline for submissions to the Special Issue is 31December 2026and 
the issue will be published in Summer 2027. Submit via the 
JGVWsubmissions 
portal:https://submission.pubkit.co/submissions/publisher/29/journal/305/login 
<https://submission.pubkit.co/submissions/publisher/29/journal/305/login>.

Broader motherhood project

For a broader project beyond the Special Issue, we are soliciting 
traditional forms of writing and research, as well as work in 
experimental forms that respond to the lived experiences of motherhood, 
including:

  *

    epistolary forms;

  *

    reflexive journals and ‘play diaries’;

  *

    fiction-based research/social fiction;

  *

    reflexive poetry including found poetry and concrete poetry;

  *

    polemics, satires, calls to action;

  *

    fragments that record the interruptions, distractions, and the
    push-and-pull of caring responsibilities;

  *

    dramatic scripts;

  *

    rulebooks;

  *

    audio or visual experiments.

To contribute to this part of the project, please send a 300–500-word 
abstract to the editors on (emmajoyreay /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(emmajoyreay /at/ gmail.com)>and (mkagen /at/ wpi.edu) 
<mailto:(mkagen /at/ wpi.edu)>by 15November 2026.Full pieces will be due by 
15June 2027.


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