Changing Feminist Paradigms and Cultural Encounters, Conference in Istanbul

Deadline: 15 January, 2013
Open to:  proposals about gender and history in the eastern Mediterranean and/or middle eastern region. Submissions from feminist activists in the wider region of the Middle East are welcomed too.
Venue: Boğaziçi University, Istanbul 7-9 June 2013

“Changing feminist paradigms and Cultural Encounters” is a conference taking place is Istanbul in June 2013.  The conference refers to a shift from a Turkish-oriented historiography of women’s experiences to an emphasis on diversity in both the late Ottoman Empire and the modern Middle East.

Tackling this challenging project requires reconsideration and reformulation of key terms and concepts introduced by feminist scholars in North America.  In addition, this conference aims to rethink the interaction between feminist activism and scholarship with the purpose of bringing new perspectives to women’s and gender history in the Middle East and around the world.

Topics

Papers on such topics as below are welcomed:

  • efforts to canonize the field
  • challenges to existing chronologies of nationalist historiographies
  • links between and legacies of the Ottoman and post-Ottoman worlds
  • sources for researching women’s and gender history
  • the impact of emergent nation-states on diverse women’s experiences in the region
  • binaries between public and private, state and society, tradition and modern, etc., and the ways these binaries are reproduced or challenged by “emancipatory projects”
  • the interaction between women’s activism and scholarship on women’s history
  • historical patterns of women’s activism in the region
  • the potential of activism to  bring new perspectives to women’s studies and vice versa
  • different forms of feminism in the history of the modern Middle East
  • rethinking women’s “agency” in the realms of crime, health, sexuality, and urban life

Eligibility

The Conference is open to proposals about gender and history in the eastern Mediterranean and/or middle eastern region. Submissions from feminist activists in the wider region of the Middle East are welcomed too.

Costs

The organizers will be able to defray some travel and hotel expenses for conference participants but ask that each person chosen to participate seeks other funding, from his or her host institution for example.

How to submit your proposal?

If you would like to present at this conference, submit a short summary of your proposed paper, or contribution, of around 1,000 words, along with an updated curriculum vitae by January 15, 2013. Submissions should be sent to the conference coordinator, Professor Gulhan Balsoy, via email at gerkaya@gmail.com.

The select papers will be published in a Special Issue of the Journal of Women’s History.

The conference and Special Issue represent the unique and pioneering collaboration between an American – based journal (one devoted to publishing the best work in the international field of women’ s history) and women’ s historians in Istanbul, Turkey.

Contact person:

Professor Gulhan Balsoy, email:  gerkaya@gmail.com.

4 thoughts on “Changing Feminist Paradigms and Cultural Encounters, Conference in Istanbul

  1. Dear Sir/Madam!

    Is this phrase "wider region of the Middle East are welcome too" mean that Afghanistan is also included in eligibale countries or not, cuz according to the Middle east difinations, it includes Afghanistan too.

    Regards

    1. Dear Nisar,

      Since there is no specification given, you might want to check with the responsible contact person (the e-mail is given in our post) and check for sure if Afghanistan is eligible country.

      Kind regards,
      Mladiinfo team

    1. Dear Marie,

      Unfortunately not. As it is specified in the eligibility section of our post, the Conference is open to proposals about gender and history in the eastern Mediterranean and/or middle eastern region + submissions are also welcomed from feminist activists in the wider region of the Middle East. However, you can check again for sure with the responsible contact persons.

      Kind regards,
      Mladiinfo team

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