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Trauma and Recovery - Challenges to Motherhood in the 21st-Century (Georgetown Univ., Washington D.C.)

Trauma and Recovery - Challenges to Motherhood in the 21st-Century (Georgetown Univ., Washington D.C.)

Publié le par Université de Lausanne (Source : American Comparative Literature Association)

Appel à communications pour le séminaire

"Trauma and Recovery - Challenges to Motherhood in the 21st-Century"

Georgetown University, Washington D.C.

7-9 mars 2019

This panel seeks at investigating experiences of trauma and recovery related to motherhood in literature, film, and the arts in the 21st Century in an interdisciplinary and transnational perspective. In the wake of current debates around motherhood (France’s recent political debate around the legalization of medically-assisted procreation for single and lesbian women; the recent Italian campaign on fertility and the wave of protests it arose; the different laws on assisted reproductive technology, and ethical discussions around surrogacy, among others), we would like to explore how the traditional notion of “motherhood” is constantly redefined and challenged. The experience of motherhood is often considered as a natural and “normal” destiny for women, and the traditional association of motherhood with various types of transmission (social, cultural, linguistic, traumatic…) places a heavy burden on women’s shoulders. In recent years, many scholars, writers and artists have tried to challenge these common conceptions (Hirsch 1996; Letherby 2002; Pitt 2004; Throsby 2004; Gedalof 2009; O’Reilly 2016; Edwards 2015).

In the field of Francophone studies, several women’s voices have emerged on this topic since the turn of the century: Linda Lê’s À l’Enfant que je n’aurai pas (2011) and Jane Sautière’s Nullipare (2009) are autobiographical texts detailing the author’s arguments for remaining childless, while writers such as Cécile Wajsbrot and Chantal Spitz have published narratives revolving around their narrator’s childlessness as a way to put an end to the vicious cycle of (post-)memory and as a refusal to pass on trauma. In Italian literature, after a revolt against maternity (Amoia 2000), a new front has appeared: women who claim their right to become mothers at any cost (Mazzoni 2012). On the other hand, in the new media, childless and childfree women are given the opportunity to fill an identity void. The project Lunàdigas gives voice to childless and childfree women, often considered incomplete and scorned in the Italian society (Nesler and Piga 2015).

In this perspective, we are seeking papers that explore one or several of the following themes in any language:

  • Motherhood in a (post)-colonial context
  • Motherhood and migration
  • Motherhood and war
  • Motherhood and (post)-memory
  • Motherhood and genocide.
  • Motherhood versus non-motherhood
  • Denial / refusal of motherhood
  • Post-partum depression / Baby-blues
  • Infanticide (metaphorical or actual)
  • Physical and/or mental illness and motherhood
  • Motherhood through adoption, IVF, surrogacy, gamete donation
  • Miscarriage and baby-loss
  • Abortion
  • Sadness, grief and sorrow in the experience of motherhood
  • Single motherhood (by choice or not)
  • Motherhood in academia
  • Involuntary childlessness
  • (Non)-Motherhood in the digital age (blogs, online discussion forums, new media…).

We welcome proposals for papers dealing with any genre and linguistic tradition.

Please submit 200-300 word proposals for twenty-minute papers through the ACLA portal (http://acla.org/seminars) during the submission period (Aug 30 at 12pm EST – Sep 20 at 9am EST).  Interested individuals are encouraged to contact the seminar organizers by email with inquiries: Nathalie Segeral (nsegeral@hawaii.edu) and Laura Lazzari (lazzari@cua.edu). Seminar organizers will review all submitted papers and propose their rosters to the ACLA by Oct 4. The ACLA Program Committee will review all submitted seminars for consideration for inclusion in the program by the end of October.