Call for Contributions on "Choosing Mothering? The Gendering of Agency"

Verbatim from the source. All of the below.

The Women’s Studies International Forum has issued a call for papers on a special issue journal entitled “Choosing mothering? The gendering of agency”. The details below are copied from their website :

The aim of this Special Issue is to provide an international forum within which to pose and debate issues that arise in relation to agency and choice surrounding maternity.

In the current neo-liberal context in which ‘choice’ is offered to women as a panacea for differential access to power, the aim of this Special Issue is to examine the ways in which women position themselves and are positioned by others, in relation to motherhood. Manuscripts are invited that discuss ways in which women engage with choices ‘offered’ to them and how the status of ‘mother’ is implicated in these. Submissions may include discussions about the constitution of agency in relation to choices about issues such as entering (or not entering) motherhood, being a mother, practicing and performing motherhood in different arenas and accounting for different approaches to mothering.

We invite contributions from those working with a feminist perspective in a range of disciplines. We are interested in submissions that address ontological, epistemological and practical issues around agency and choice-making for women including, but not limited to, the following questions and topics:

• How is women’s agency in maternal choice-making constituted within and across different cultural, social and interpersonal contexts?
• How are understandings of (non)maternity implicated in the negotiation of agency for women?
• Is choice-making without consideration of maternal status attainable?
• What challenges do conceptualisations of mothering pose for theorisations of agency in designing and conducting feminist research?

As well as traditional formats, submission in non-conventional writing styles and as art or images are encouraged.

To be considered for this special issue, submissions must fit the requirements for submission of the journal.

Please follow guidelines to submit manuscripts for review by 30 November 2013.