[ecrea] CfP: Social Criticism in Women's Movements and (queer)Feminist Public Spheres

*feministische studien, Call Heft 1/2017: **Social Criticism in Women’s 
Movements and (queer-)Feminist Public Spheres*

Feminist interventions in social processes of transformation are 
essential in the fights for emancipation and gender equality. They are 
informed by feminist social criticism, pointing at many problems in 
social, cultural, political relations and developments. They stimulate 
the analysis of social inequality, but also the critique of capitalism, 
neo-liberalism as well as patriarchalism and heteronormativity 
(Wischermann 2013: 188).

Up until today, women’s associations and movements, as well as 
lesbian-feminist movements and queer activists are campaigning for 
emancipation and gender equality: they are fighting locally, 
transregionally, transnationally, and in solidarity against the lack of 
respect and insufficient support, as well as for the protection of human 
rights of all genders. They protest against inequality between men and 
women and advocate for participation in decision-making processes on all 
levels of politics, economy, health, education, environment, and 
peace-keeping.

During these fights, feminist movements have at the same time 
appropriated and shaped new symbolic and material (queer-)feminist 
spaces; changed the limits of what is visible and expressible; and they 
have found their own cultural forms of expression. This shift of borders 
coincides with a critique of rationalist conceptions of politics and of 
objectivist conceptions of knowledge.

The study of women’s movements has shown that media play a central role 
in feminist counter public spheres. From the pamphlet to twitter, media 
have been used as powerful tools to make their issues and demands 
subject of public debate, by not only letting them surface but also 
publically scandalising them. Inequality and exclusion are thereby 
uncovered and participation in the hegemonic public sphere is demanded.

Media and other cultural productions like magazines of the feminist 
movements, zines, and blogs, but also slogans and songs have also been 
important for networking and developing a collective understanding. They 
promote a feminist awareness, incite the desire to participate in joint 
debates and learning processes – even in controversy – and enable 
empowering experiences in the collective struggle for change.

Thereby, feminist public spheres suggest the expansion of feminist 
agency, since changing society was and is still related to processes of 
identity formation. The forms of access and the productive use of media 
play a role in the stabilization of old and in the establishment of new 
power relations and hierarchies; this holds true for feminist movements 
as well, which have been accompanied by multifaceted controversies and 
debates.

Feminist public spheres have always utilised the entire spectrum of 
media communication for gaining public access and networking; for 
example today, the results of the World Women’s Conference 2016 in Nepal 
are circulated via YouTube and other social media. Communication forms 
and forums of women’s movements and (queer-)feminist movements have 
without a doubt multiplied, yet the question remains whether this also 
goes along with a strengthening of their position.

Feminist movements have always been reflected and represented in 
hegemonic public spheres and mainstream media; mostly in a way that 
restricts their outreach and legitimises sanctions against their 
activists. Resistance against feminist demands is articulated in media 
that leads to feminists being threatened and villainized. Anti-feminist 
networks, which today are articulating themselves quite vehemently in 
many countries, are not a completely new phenomenon but have also been 
historically powerful, often being supported by conservative women as 
well. In addition, boundaries are raised between ‘good’ and ‘bad’ 
feminist positions; between feminists, who do get a word in mainstream 
media and those who have no voice. Demands of feminist movements 
therefore could be separated from their socially critical foundation and 
have been used for modernisations in neo-liberal capitalism. This for 
example holds true for the demands to radically reorganize the spheres 
both of production and reproduction in the 1970s, which in many ways has 
contributed to an increase of the number of working women and a greater 
equality at least in some professions but has not changed the low social 
status of domestic care work and reproductive work. This is also true 
for the public debates about sexual violence, which is appropriated to 
justify racist positions by right-wing, extremist movements in many 
Western countries. All this raises questions about the possible 
strategies of feminist movements to resist expropriations, separation, 
and anti-feminism. And it poses the question how a re-articulation of 
feminist movements and a loss of collective memory about feminist social 
criticism and its activists can be prevented.

We hope for responses to this call from authors who study women’s 
movements, (queer-)feminist movements, and feminist public spheres and 
raise questions about

     ·the role of media for the strategies of feminist movements and
     their articulation and intervention at different historical moments

     ·the significance of cultural and media productions, of
     performativity and affectivity for conquering public spaces and in
     the identity formation of their activists

     ·the changes digital media have brought about in regard to the
     formation, the charcter and development of feminist movements

     ·the historical and recent meaning of media use for and in movements
     and its immanent ambivalences

     ·specific practices of media use on the different levels of feminist
     public spheres

     ·the translocal (transnational) potential to network via media,
     which possibly at the same time irritates power relations and
     stabilizes them

     ·the potential of media but also their limits for organizing and
     expressing individual and collective experiences and for the
     development of feminist awareness

     ·the mediated opportunities of negotiating histories of feminist
     movements and their activists and anchor them more permanently in
     the social and collective memory

     ·feminist representations in media and their relevance for agency

     ·the character, the forms and causes of anti-feminist movements,
     their effects in limiting feminist public spheres and the strategies
     to confront them.

/feministische studien/(feminist studies), a scientific, blind 
peer-reviewed journal for interdisciplinary women and gender studies, 
will in its issue 1 in 2017 include 6 to 8 articles that focus on the 
issues raised in the call. We ask for scientific articles (up to 40.000 
characters) or discussion papers (up to 25.000 characters), which will 
be selected in a peer-review-process. We also welcome conference 
reports, as well as book reviews, which preferably – but not exclusively 
– relate to the focus of this issue.We kindly invite you to send an 
abstract of up to 2.500 characters until *3^rd July 2016*to the editors 
of the focus issue, Prof. Dr. Elisabeth Klaus (University of Salzburg), 
Prof. Dr. Tanja Thomas (University of Tuebingen) and Prof. Dr. Susanne 
Kinnebrock (Universtity of Augsburg).

Submission via: *(manuskripte /at/ feministische-studien.de) 
<mailto:(manuskripte /at/ feministische-studien.de)>*


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