CFP - Symposium 2023

The symposium schedule is now live! Download it here.

Call for proposals

(PDF available here)

Find a co-panelist using this spreadsheet.

 The Black Women’s Studies Association is thrilled to announce that our inaugural symposium will be held virtually on October 21-22, 2023. The theme, Looking Forward: Black Women’s Studies in the 21st Century, encourages those of us engaged in scholarship, activism, advocacy and creative work on Black women and girls to look ponder the future of Black Women’s Studies. In All the Women Are White, All the Blacks are Men, but Some of Us are Brave: Black Women’s Studies (1982) editors Akasha Gloria T. Hull, Patricia Bell Scott, and Barbara Smith set an agenda for Black women’s studies that repositioned Black women at the center of academic research, university curricula, and community engagement. At the time, women’s studies, more accurately defined as cis-heteronormative women’s studies, neglected the intellectual and artistic contributions of Black women and queer folks, and Black studies programs often centered straight Black men’s scholarly and creative contributions. Thus, Hull, Scott, and Smith were compelled to state that “Only a feminist, pro-woman perspective that acknowledges the reality of sexual oppression in the lives of Black women, as well as the oppression of race and class, will make Black Women’s Studies the transformer of consciousness it needs to be” (xxi).

 The question becomes then, has Black Women’s Studies become the transformer of consciousness that it set out to be? There is no doubt that the field of women’s studies writ large has grown and transformed over the past 40+ years, but to what end? As recently as 2022, “settled” law such as Roe vs. Wade has been overturned, and more than 428 anti-LGBTQ bills have been introduced all over the United States. Police violence against Black women is at an all-time high, and we have yet to achieve wage-equality. In light of these set-backs and the continued oppression of Black women, gender variant folks, and LGBTQ folks, what work lies ahead for Black Women’s Studies? Our inaugural symposium, Looking Forward: Black Women’s Studies in the 21st Century seeks to address these questions.

 Our virtual symposium will be held October 21-22, 2023.

 We invite proposal submissions on a range of topics that address the theme, including but not limited to:

  • Black Feminist Pedagogies

  • Black Feminist/Womanist Ethics and Praxis

  • Black Girlhood

  • Black Feminist Futures

  • Reproductive Justice

  • Black Trans Rights

  • Housing Insecurity

  • Black Feminist Ecologies

  • Black Feminist Community-Building Practices

  • Black Women’s Joy and Pleasure

  • Black Women’s Health and Wellness

  • Black Women’s Cultural Work (including literature, film, and visual arts)

  • Black Women’s Labor

  • Black Women’s Intellectual Thought

  • Black Women and the Law

SESSION PROPOSAL SUBMISSION FORMATS 

Panels examine specific problems or topics from a variety of perspectives given that they include 3-4 participants and perhaps a moderator. Panels may present alternative solutions, interpretations, or contrasting points of view on a specified subject or in relation to a common theme. Panel members are expected to prepare papers addressing central questions described in the proposal. 

Roundtables include 4-6 presenters and one moderator who makes brief, informal remarks about a specific idea or project. They allow for extensive discussion and audience participation.  

Workshops provide an opportunity to exchange information or work on a common problem, project, or shared interest. Workshops are typically experientially oriented, grounded in a specific methodology or research agenda, and include brief presentations that allow adequate time for reflective discussion and interaction.  
 
Individual paper proposals are submitted individually and arranged into sessions with 3-4 presenters by the Symposium Review Committee. In paper sessions, authors present  brief papers followed by audience discussion.

 Submissions will ONLY be accepted from current members of the Black Women’s Studies Association. To join BWSA or renew your membership, click here. If you are unsure if your membership is current, please email membership@blackwomensstudies.com. 

 To submit a proposal, please upload a single file with the following information to a secure Dropbox folder using this link by Friday, June 30.  Please direct any questions to Dr. Stephanie Andrea Allen, BWSA Conference Chair, at conference@blackwomensstudies.com.

 Your proposal should be no more than 400 words, including a separate 100-150 rationale and representative works cited (if appropriate).