CFP: Sex Norms, Sex Agents (2/1/01; 5/4/01-5/5/01)

From: Samuel Baker (sebaker@midway.uchicago.edu)
Date: Thu Dec 07 2000 - 16:12:44 EST

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    The Working Group on Sexuality, Normativity, and Ethics at the University
    of Chicago's Center for Gender Studies invites submissions for a
    conference, "Sex Norms, Sex Agents," to be held at the University of
    Chicago on May 4-5, 2001. The conference will feature plenary addresses by
    Joan Copjec (SUNY Buffalo), Michael Thompson (University of Pittsburgh),
    and Michael Warner (Rutgers University).

    The purpose of the conference is to bring together people from a variety of
    disciplines who work on sexuality and normativity, and who find the topic
    of agency--conceived both as a matter of political concern and as a subject
    for conceptual analysis--particularly in need of rethinking in that
    context. The intersection of sexuality and normativity has been studied a
    great deal in recent years. In somewhat different ways, feminism, queer
    theory, anthropology, and post-Foucault cultural studies have explored the
    ways societies construct the norms that organize sexuality, norms that
    often get taken for granted as natural. At its best, such work brings with
    it a capacity to open new avenues of thought and desire. But many writers
    working both inside and outside these traditions of thought have begun to
    worry that analyses of the cultural construction of norms finally offer
    limited resources for thinking about agency. At the University of Chicago's
    Center for Gender Studies, the Faculty Working Group on Normativity,
    Sexuality, and Ethics has been attempting to address this worry. We also
    seek to ask broader questions about the potential for philosophical
    accounts of agency and normativity to inform analyses of sexuality, about
    the rich resources we continue to find in psychoanalysis, and about issues
    raised by sociological, historical, and aesthetic approaches. Perhaps most
    importantly, we seek to facilitate further conversations across often
    fractious disciplinary boundaries. The "Sex Norms, Sex Agents" conference
    is the latest and most public step in this attempt.

    We welcome submissions from people working in and at the intersections of
    philosophy, psychoanalysis, feminism, queer theory, literary and cultural
    studies, art history, anthropology, legal studies, and history. Submit 1-2
    page abstracts of 20-minute papers to: The Working Group on Sexuality,
    Normativity, and Ethics c/o Mark Miller Department of English The
    University of Chicago 1050 East 59th Street Chicago, IL 60637 or via
    email: jmmiller@midway.uchicago.edu Submissions are due by February 1;
    decisions will be announced by the end of February.

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