Women and Language call for papers for a special issue

Women and Language call for papers for a special issue: Achieving interdisciplinary scholarship in communication, language and gender

Our call begins with the assumption that interdisciplinarity is critical to the study of communication, language and gender. A multiplicity of perspectives, theoretical traditions, methodological commitments, and political histories enrich our study. Journals like Women & Language and Gender and Language attest to the fertile intersections and conversations possible when scholars from multiple disciplines come together to address gender topics and issues.

And yet, is our work truly interdisciplinary? Too often, it seems that interdisciplinary intentions are enacted as multi-disciplinarity How might the conceptual developments in feminist scholarship contribute to or refashion our understandings of interdisciplinarity? How have feminist practices and politics reframed or resisted the conventions of academic work that hinder or even penalize interdisciplinarity? How can fertile sites of interdisciplinary engagement be nurtured in our programs, universities, and conferences? How might we understand interdisciplinarity and distinguish this goal from multidisciplinarity, cross-disciplinarity, and transdisciplinarity? What does it mean to create work that is, in its essence, interdisciplinary: what does that label require of us; how does it challenge, extend, threaten, revivify, shatter, bend, or recompose our research questions and methods? Is interdisciplinarity truly a goal across our studies and if so, why? How might it be achieved? Or, should this goal be abandoned, or replaced?

We invite scholars from diverse disciplines, experiences, and backgrounds to contribute to a special issue devoted to interdisciplinarity in order to consider such questions. We seek a wide range of responses: from research reports to theoretical speculation to personal experience; framed as poetry, poetic prose, or narrative; and in critical, analytical, argument or scientific forms. Possible topics include, but are not limited to, the questions we have raised above and the following:

Conceptualizing interdisciplinarity

Moving from multidisciplinarity to interdisciplinarity

Connecting disciplines and perspectives

Deconstructing interdisciplinary scholarship

Implementing interdisciplinarity

Recounting personal accounts, narratives, or case studies of interdisciplinary work

Modeling or representations of interdisciplinary scholarship

Those interested in submitting items for review are encouraged to discuss their ideas in advance with the editors at vbergval@mtu.edu or pjsotiri@mtu.edu.

Submissions should be prepared according to prescriptions of the publications manuals of the Modern Language Association (MLA) or the American Psychological Association (APA). Articles should be no more than 5,000 words; shorter pieces are welcomed.

To submit, mail three copies of materials to: Victoria Bergvall and Patricia Sotirin, editors, Interdisciplinary Issue Women and Language, Department of Humanities, Michigan Technological University, Houghton, MI 49931-1295.

Deadline for submissions is November 15, 2007. The special issue is scheduled for Fall 2008 (Vol XXXI #2).