CFP: Gender Negotiations and Asian American Literature (3/15/05; MLA '05)

"Gender Negotiations and Asian American Literature"

We are seeking proposals for a special session for the MLA Convention in
Washington D.C. This panel will examine a key issue in Asian American
literary studies, i.e. the gender gap, in Asian American thinking and
articulation about ethnic identity. It is a well known fact that ever
since the early 1970s, Asian American feminists and nationalists have been
engaged in a heated exchange on the roles of gender, race, and culture in
the formation of an Asian American identity, with gender being the defining
element. While the debate has invigorated Asian American critical
discourse, the prolonged warring atmosphere has also divided Asian American
community. To this day, the question that remains to be asked is, How do
we theorize this phenomenon? Or better yet, What is to be gained or lost
by our effort to put this issue in critical perspective?

In recent years, scholars within the Asian American community such as
King-Kok Cheung, Sau-ling Wong, and Jinqi Ling have sought to move beyond
gender opposition in Asian American thinking and practice. This move is
part and parcel of the critical developments in recent gender and race
theories, masculinity studies, and queer studies. While we are aware of
the pitfalls of "essentialized gender/ethnicity" in Judith Butler's and
bell hook's sense, we are also eager for the possibility of negotiations
toward a "coalitional politics." We would like to see essays that
transcend the confines of binary oppositions of gender as the defining
model of articulating Asian American subjectivity and explore new
perspectives on Asian American self-definition and identity in the spirit
of gender reconciliation. As Judith Kegan Gardiner puts it, "both genders
can and should cooperate intellectually and politically . . . Women
contribute to masculinity studies, men to feminist theory as well as to
masculinity studies, heterosexuals to queer theory, and gay-identified
scholars to the study of heterosexuality even though the standpoints of
differently situated scholars will not be identical."
 
Proposals and brief vitae should reach Professor Wenxin Li
(wli79_at_yahoo.com) and Professor Chingyen Sawatsky (csawatsky_at_siena.edu) by
March 15.

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Received on Mon Feb 07 2005 - 17:00:30 EST