Feminisms, Gender, and Theologies Section

2024 Call for Papers

Christina Astorga, University of Portland

astorga@up.edu

Cristina Lledo Gomez, BBI - Australian Institute of Theological Education (Australia)

cristina.lledogomez@bbi.catholic.edu.au

It is widely known that women live in a patriarchal world which often leaves them vulnerable to abuse and oppression and prevents their full flourishing as human beings (deserving of equal dignity and respect regardless of their sex and gender). Moreover, research on violence against women show their increased vulnerability to abuse, violence, and oppression when they belong to one or more of the following categories: a person of colour, living in poverty, a single mother, divorced or separated, an indigenous person, a migrant, from the LGBTIQ+ community, living in remote communities, and/or living with a disability. Feminist theological work alongside others such as disability theologies, migrant theologies, and trauma theologies have sought to bring to the fore these vulnerabilities but also to carve alternative methodologies, hermeneutical lenses, and narratives, to resist and protect against these vulnerabilities, but also to create new possibilities for the flourishing of all, including living with such vulnerabilities. The Feminisms and Gender section thus would like to invite proposals that address the conference theme of “Vulnerability and Flourishing” particularly in regard to feminist theological work on the following, among others:

1. Exploring the meaning of "vulnerability" and "flourishing" for women in different contexts, in different countries, and the role of local and/or the universal church; 
2. Grappling with the co-existence of vulnerability and flourishing for women;
3. Highlighting narratives of women's resistance to violence and oppression in and/or through the church;   
4. Exploring vulnerability and flourishing of women in Scriptures;
5. Addressing the violence against the indigenous and their ongoing vulnerabilities, especially in the case of Arapaho and Cheyenne people, in the light of the conference being held on the land of the Arapaho and Cheyenne peoples who experienced the Sand Creek Massacre in 1864 where women and children were not spared; 

• 6.     Using feminist theological work that addresses the issue of gun violence in light of the conference being held on the location (Denver) and on the (25th) anniversary of the Columbine high school massacre;
• 7.     Developing a theology of resistance based on narratives of women in their fight against abuse and violence in different ages and cultures, including those that take seriously the resistant Mary of the Magnificat;
• 8.     Doing a critical study of how women have been imaged in history and tradition as harlots, adulteresses, and witches and the effect not only on them but on their communities;
• 9.     Analyzing the social roots of domestic violence, of which many women are victims, and the church’s role in denouncing this;
• 10.   Deconstructing patriarchal images of Mary which promote submission and vulnerability rather than resistance and empowerment.

Please submit your proposal to Christina Astorga (astorga@up.edu) and Cristina Lledo Gomez  (cristina.lledogomez@bbi.catholic.edu.au) on or before December 15, 2023. You will  be notified of the status of your proposal by January 15, 2024.  Proposals should be 250-50Words in length and must include the following:

• ·       Name
• ·       Email address
• ·       Current Institutional affiliation and position
• ·       CTS membership status.

Scholars who are invited to present their work at a national convention of the College Theology Society must be current members of the CTS no later than April 1, 2023 in order to appear in the program.  No person may submit more than one proposal for consideration and nor will submissions to multiple sections be considered.  Failure to observe these policies may result in the scholar's disqualification to present a paper at the Annual Convention