cfp.english.upenn.edu

Contributions are sought for a book on women in spaces of transit in Anglo-American literature from 1860 to the present day. The projected edited book sets out to explore representations in literature of the presence of women in spaces of transit such as trains, hotels, bedsits, cafés, hospitals, parks, paths, rivers, seas etc. in which the familiar distinction between public and private space is eroded or suspended.

Among the questions we would like to address are the following:
- the significance that spaces of transit have had in shaping women’s identities and ways of expression;
- the ways in which women have negotiated their presence in spaces of transit, with the opportunities, surprises and dangers these spaces may entail;
- the currency of the public/private dichotomy and the equation public/male: private/female implicit in the ideology of ‘separate spheres’, a framework which has proved to be useful but limiting in the understanding of gender relations.

The book is intended as a follow-on to Inside Out: Women negotiating, subverting, appropriating public and private space, eds. Teresa Gómez Reus and Aránzazu Usanizaga (Amsterdam: Rodopi, 2008).

If you are interested in contributing a chapter of 7000 words, please send an extended abstract (700-900 words) of your proposed essay, together with a brief CV, to Teresa Gomez, University of Alicante, Spain. Deadline for submissions: 15 January 2010.

Email: mt.gomez@ua.es