The maternal figure has long been central to literary imaginings of the nation-state, shaping narratives of belonging, exile, and inheritance. As both metaphor and material reality, motherhood is entwined with national reproduction, kinship structures, and the regulation of bodies, often reinforcing but sometimes resisting dominant ideologies. At the same time, motherhood is a site of labor—both reproductive and economic—raising questions about care work, migration, and the feminization of labor within and across borders. Maternal grief, loss, and displacement further complicate the imagined continuity between mother and motherland, exposing fractures in nationalist and colonial narratives. How do literary texts negotiate the contradictions of motherhood as both a political and affective category? What happens when motherlands disown, commodify, or exile their maternal figures? How do intersecting forces of race, gender, and class shape maternal representations across literary traditions?

Building on the MLA presidential theme "Family Resemblances," this panel invites papers that explore the fluid, contested, and often contradictory ways in which literature constructs and reimagines motherhood, nationalism, and labor. We encourage interdisciplinary and comparative approaches, drawing from postcolonial feminism, affect theory, labor studies, and transnational studies. Please submit a 250-word abstract and a brief bio to Sameera Abbas (PhD, University at Buffalo) at abbas_sameera@yahoo.com