Gender Technologies and Utopias

Papers are invited for this special panel at ‘Return to Gender’, the forthcoming graduate conference at the University of Glasgow on 25th November, 2006. The panel will address how technological, scientific and medical advancements have affected perceptions of gender both culturally and socially. Are traditional notions of masculinity and femininity becoming irrelevant given the present diversity of possible alternative identities? How might we envisage gender utopias/dystopias in the later 21st century? How has technological/scientific research opposed or contributed to the existence of gendered power structures? Possible topics include, but are not limited to:

* Cyborgs and virtual bodies
* Gender and science fiction
* Androgyny and the internet
* Femininity/masculinity and plastic surgery
* Gender reassignment
* Body modification
* Technology vs. Biology
* Communication and consciousness
* Technological determinism
* Power and sexuality
* Reproductive technologies
* Artifical families
* Sexuality and genetics
* Biopolitics

We invite abstracts of 200-300 words for 20 minute papers to be submitted electronically by SEPTEMBER 12TH 2006 to returntogender_at_arts.gla.ac.uk, with institutional affiliation and contact details. Participants at the conference will be invited to submit their papers to eSharp, Glasgow's award-winning postgraduate journal. They will then be considered for publication in a Spring 2007 issue on gender. Please get in touch if you have any questions regarding the conference. A limited number of fee waivers and travel grants will be available, please apply in advance for information.

         ==========================================================
              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 Wed Aug 16 2006 - 19:57:21 EDT