CALL FOR PAPERS
(please circulate widely)

Women and Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory
PERFORMING REPARATION: PRACTICE, METHODOLOGY, AND PROCESS

Co-Editors: =20
Joshue Chambers-Letson Robert G. Diaz
Performance Studies English
New York University The CUNY Graduate Center
=20
Reparation as a concept is laden with multivalent cultural significance. =
If
the most basic definition of reparation is an act that mends, repairs, =
and
restores a loss, rupture, or break, what other complex ways has =
reparation
been defined and enacted, particularly by feminists, queers, and people =
of
color? Melanie Klein, for example, defines the act of making reparation =
as a
psychic process of making good injuries =97 both real and in phantasy =
for
which we remain unconsciously guilty and in pain =97 towards a sustained
seeking of pleasure. What would an act of reparation look like and what
would such an act be capable of doing? Which is to say, what are the
performative effects of reparation? What is the performance value of
reparation? Assuming that reparation has often been a method for =
surviving
and living against elision, for asserting a presence deserving of
recognition, or for coping with insurmountable losses, what are the =
other
potentials for reparation?
=20
Our first concern in this issue is to perform an in-depth inquiry into =
the
many ways that reparation is defined as an individual and collective
process. For example, in relation to the traumas of geopolitical =
violence,
=93reparations=94 as a political and economic concept has been linked to =
the
emergent demands by marginalized and/or subjugated groups for
acknowledgement and redress of abuses. An example of this paradigm might =
be
the activist labor of Korean and Filipino =93comfort women=94 forced =
into sex
slavery during the occupation of Japan during World War II. In turn, for =
the
individual subject, how might reparation manifest itself as a personal =
and
everyday process of reintegrating a fragmented self into a =
not-necessarily
unified =93whole=94 or totality (both socially and internally)? Second, =
we
consider the ways in which reparation has been manifested in the work =
and
practices of various groups and individuals including artists, =
activists,
and intellectuals. By this, we might consider the performance work and
publications of a group like the Guerilla Girls, a collective that has
sought to restore the place of unacknowledged women artists to the =
=93canon=94
of art history. Our third primary concern is to consider the utility of
reparative acts and readings of reparation to changing the conditions of
possibility in our critical acts. This is to say, what are the protocols
that critical theory has come to abide by, and how the reparation as
critical methodology take us down new critical avenues: politically,
artistically and intellectually? What means might various approaches to =
and
enactments of reparation serve? How and when is reparation productive?

This issue of Women and Performance: A Journal of Feminist Theory =
addresses
the above concerns about the performativity and utility of reparation =
(as a
practice, methodology, and process). We invite papers concerned with
reparative performances and acts as well as papers that provide =
reparative
approaches to critical inquiry, especially in relation to the work of
feminists, people of color, and queers. What are the potentials for
reparation and what might some of the limits be? Can reparation be =
employed
(or co-opted) as a means of insincere alleviation, substitution, or
displacement? How have groups and individuals engaged in reparative acts =
and
processes? How do different and sometimes contradictory notions of
reparation work in relation to each other? How do theoretical
conceptualizations of reparation function relational to practical or
material uses of the concept? We encourage contributions from a range of
disciplinary approaches, including but not limited to performance =
studies,
literature, American studies, psychoanalysis, economy, law, art history,
cultural studies, women=92s studies, as well as other activist or =
artistic
approaches to, or representations of, reparation.

Possible Topics could include: Melanie Klein and the theory of =
reparation,
feminism and psychoanalysis, anti-oedipal psychoanalysis, =
economic/political
reparations (including the Japanese-American internment of WWII, =
slavery,
Comfort Women, the Holocaust, etc.), reparative feminist performance, =
health
and economic policy, the law, reparative criticism, queer theory. =
Specific
artists, performance artists, figures and writers whose work could be =
read
as reparative or necessarily in need of a reparative approach could =
include=20
but are not limited to: the Guerilla Girls, Le Tigre, Theresa Hak Kyung =
Cha,=20
Billie Holiday, Ana Mendieta, Yoko Ono, Oprah, Eve Sedgwick, Joan =
Riviere,=20
Sandra Day O=92Connor, Kara Walker, Suzan-Lori Parks, Sarah Kane.

Essays should be approximately 5000-6000 words in length and should =
adhere
to the Chicago Manual of Style. Please send completed essays as MSWord
attachment to both of the editors at jcl310_at_nyu.edu and =
rdiaz1_at_gc.cuny.edu
by November 15, 2005. Expressions of interest prior to the deadline are
encouraged.=20

         ==========================================================
              From the Literary Calls for Papers Mailing List
                        CFP_at_english.upenn.edu
                         Full Information at
                     http://cfp.english.upenn.edu
         or write Jennifer Higginbotham: higginbj_at_english.upenn.edu
         ==========================================================
Received on Tue Aug 02 2005 - 12:20:48 EDT