Call for papers for RC05/RC32 Joint Session at the 17th ISA World Congress of Sociology, 11-17 July 2010, Gothenburg, Sweden; RC05 (Racism, Nationalism and Ethnic Relations)/RC32 (Women in Society-host committee)
Session organizers: Sirma Bilge, Université de Montréal, Canada; Paul Scheibelhofer, Central European University, Hungary
Submission deadline: October 1st 2009
Questions of gender and sexualities are essential to understand politics of race and nation at different levels of analysis, whether the local, the national, or the global. Drawing on what David Goldberg called the ‚liberal paradox‘, i.e. how the commitment of modernity to idealized principles of liberty and equality goes hand in hand with a multiplication of racialized identities and the sets of exclusions they prompt and rationalize, enable and sustain (Goldberg 1993), the proposed session will tackle the ways in which ethnocultural exclusion and racialization processes in western liberal democracies currently operate through the problematization of minority/migrant gender relations and sexualities. We are particularly interested in the current mobilizations of women’s rights and gay rights to construe the ‚civilized‘ space of western freedoms and their ‚enemies‘. Besides the critique of these exclusionary discourses and practices, we welcome contributions engaging with questions of resistance/emancipation and counter-hegemonic practices, and providing frameworks for developing knowledge that lessen domination.
Identified thematic areas for papers include but not limited to:

• Articulations of sexuality and nationalism: recent developments and historical legacies
• The ‚war on terror‘ and ‚progressive‘ politics of sexuality
• Regulatory controls over migrant gender norms, sexualities and bodies
• Discourses on sexual freedoms/gender equality and (cultural) racism
• Minority/Migrant challenges to regulatory practices and hegemonic discourses
• Representing and regulating minority/migrant masculinities and femininities
• The class politics of racializing sexualities
• Regulating controversial practices (hijab, arranged marriage, polygamy, ‚honour‘ crimes, excision, etc.)
• [Discourses on]’Human trafficking‘ and the control of mobility
• [Discourses on] ‚urban riots‘; the ‚war on drugs‘, the ‚war on gangs‘
• Conjunctions of racism and technologies of sex

Submitting your paper proposals:
We invite all submitters to make explicit in their proposals the following two points in order to facilitate the evaluation process: How does the question to be discussed in the paper relate to the general theme of the Joint Session? In which theoretical and/or methodological debates is the paper situated?

• Paper proposals should be approximately 350 words.
• Please be sure to provide the full name, institutional affiliation, phone, fax, and email address for all authors.

Please submit your paper abstract by email directly to session organizers: Sirma Bilge (sirma.bilge@umontreal.ca) and to Paul Scheibelhofer (scheibelhofer_paul@phd.ceu.hu), with a Cc of your submission to the conference program coordinators within RC32: Margaret Abraham (MAbraham2010WC@hofstra.edu) and Esther Ngan-ling Chow (echow@american.edu).
Submission deadline: October 1st 2009.
For more information on submission procedures you can visit the website of the Congress and the specific information given on the page of our host committee RC32.