[Commlist] Call for Papers - Pornographic Subjectivities: Sexuality, Race, Class, Age, Dis/Ability

Call for Papers
Pornographic Subjectivities: Sexuality, Race, Class, Age, Dis/Ability

Porn Studies Conference

FilmForum 2020
XVIII Gorizia International Film Studies Spring School
Porn Studies Section

Gorizia (Italy), March 28th-31st, 2020


Deadline for proposals: December 31st, 2019.

The 2020 edition of the Porn Studies section of the MAGIS – 
International Film Studies Spring School aims to investigate pornography 
as a dispositive of subjectivation (Foucault 2001), that is as a complex 
and heterogeneous assemblage of technologies, institutions, discourses, 
practices, ideologies (Agamben 2009) able to create subjectivity through 
«a mixed economy of power and knowledge» (Rabinow and Rose 2003). The 
main goal of the section is therefore to understand what kind of 
subjects are produced by pornography and how they are constructed, with 
particular attention to the intersections between sexuality and race, 
class, age, dis/ability.
Drawing loosely on Jacques Derrida’s philosophical reflections, we could 
say that pornography-as-dispositive is informed by a 
carno-phallogocentric logic, that is by «the scheme that governs the 
production of the subject in Western culture» (1992). According to 
Derrida, this subject is produced by means of a process of exclusion (of 
other subjects) and through the construction of a structural Otherness. 
Pornography has always established complex and contradictory relations 
with this scheme. On the one hand, pornography (or, a specific kind of 
pornography) seems to reiterate (and reinforce) the logic of 
carno-phallogocentrism, in that it seems to create the quintessential 
«sovereign subject»: white, male, heterosexual, able-bodied, young, and 
(upper) middle-class. On the other, pornography (or, another kind of 
pornography) seems to undermine the carno-phallogocentric scheme from 
the inside, deconstructing some of the central nodes on which it is 
based, building instead heterotopic spaces in which subjects seem to 
develop new and decentralized subject positions.

With this in mind, we invite proposals that explore, but are not 
restricted to, the following topics:

- pornographic representations of race, class, age, dis/ability, present 
and past
- pornographic stereotypes about race, class, age, dis/ability and their 
«changing historical contexts» (Rosello 1998)
- «marked bodies» (Holmes 2012) in pornography
- re-appropriation of representation by decentralized subjects
- «oppositional modes of production and perverse viewerships» beyond 
«the framework of visibility politics organized about the nexus of 
positive-negative images» (Nguyen 2014)
- essentialist vs. constructivist readings of race, class, age, 
dis/ability and naturalization vs. denaturalization of difference in 
pornography
- fetishization of race, class, age, dis/ability in pornographic production
- industrial niches (such as, for instance, interracial, “chav porn”, 
granny porn, disability porn, etc.) and commodification of race, class, 
age, dis/ability within long-tail economy (Anderson 2004)
- stars and performers, present and past (for example, Jeannie Pepper, 
Lexington Steele, Nina Hartley, Long Jeanne Silver, Brandon Lee, Asa 
Akira, etc.)
- specialized films, film series, websites, platforms channels and 
categories on porn aggregators based on race, class, age, dis/ability.

The deadline for the submission of papers and panel proposals is 
December 31st, 2019.

Proposals should not exceed one page in length. Please make sure to 
attach a short CV (10 lines max).
The conference fee is €150.

Selected papers will be considered for an edited collection within the 
book series “Mapping Pornographies: Histories, Geographies, Cultures” 
(Mimesis International, Milan-London).

Address questions and proposals to: (goriziafilmforum /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(goriziafilmforum /at/ gmail.com)>, (e.biasin /at/ libero.it) 
<mailto:(e.biasin /at/ libero.it)>, (g.maina /at/ gmail.com) 
<mailto:(g.maina /at/ gmail.com)>, (federico.zecca /at/ uniba.it) 
<mailto:(federico.zecca /at/ uniba.it)>.

The Porn Studies section of the Gorizia International Film Studies 
Spring School (Italy) is now one of the most important conferences in 
the field of porn studies, opening space for innovative approaches and 
methodologies for investigating the relationships between sex, commerce, 
media and technology. Drawing together the work of leading scholars from 
around the world (including Peter Alilunas, Feona Attwood, Lynn Comella, 
Kevin Heffernan, Peter Lehman, Alan McKee, John Mercer, Susanna 
Paasonen, Eric Schaefer, Clarissa Smith, Thomas Waugh, Linda Williams) 
as well as emerging scholars, the School has mapped a transformed 
landscape of sexual representations and coordinated a new wave of 
research. The section is also specifically focused on the relationship 
between production and dissemination of knowledge and related 
industrial/archival/artistic practices: artists, performers, archivists, 
curators, and media practitioners in general have been involved in the 
debate through screenings, curator talks, artist talks, and panel 
discussions (among others, the School has hosted talks by directors such 
as Bruce LaBruce, Ashley Hans Scheirl, Anna Span).


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