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July 11, 2007
Call for Papers and Creative Submissions for a Special Issue of the National Women’s Studies Association Journal: WOMEN AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE
WOMEN AND CRIMINAL JUSTICE:
POLICING, PROSECUTION, AND INCARCERATION
Call for Papers and Creative Submissions for a Special Issue of the National Women’s Studies Association Journal
Despite the fact that women constitute the fastest growing segment of the U.S. prison population, the ways in which women encounter and are affected by the criminal justice system remain largely understudied. In an effort to make a significant contribution to the scholarship in this arena, “Women and Criminal Justice: Policing, Prosecution, and Incarceration” is a special issue of the NWSA Journal dedicated to exploring the global connections among the many ways in which women experience various aspects of the criminal justice system. This issue will examine the broad range of specific challenges faced by women encountering the courts, police, and prisons. It serves as a means of documenting and bearing witness to the struggles of women whose voices are frequently silenced, while at the same time providing theoretical and analytical frames with which to discuss these issues.
The questions we are interested in exploring include but are not restricted to the following: How have shifts in laws and police procedures contributed to the rapidly rising numbers of women being sent to prison in the U.S. since the 1980s? In what ways do criminal justice systems intervene in, and even sever, legal and emotional ties between mothers and children? How are women engaging criminal justice issues as community leaders and activists? In instances when incarceration displaces significant numbers of women from a single community, how does their absence affect whole communities and also shape the ways in which people perceive and construct individual and group identities? We seek explorations and answers to these questions that engage notions of gender, place, and culture as well as documentation and analysis of leadership and activism.
The following topical areas broadly outline the subject matter that we see as most relevant to the documentation and analysis of women’s experiences with various criminal justice systems around the world. These can be used as starting points for papers, but authors are not restricted to them:
The incarceration of women
How the parole system affects women
Laws which specifically target women, such as anti-prostitution laws
Police brutality against women
Families and criminal justice, including the high divorce rate among prisoners, single parenthood caused by incarceration, and the loss of parental rights because of incarceration
Social relationships among incarcerated women
Mothering incarcerated children
Healthcare in women’s prisons
Women’s labor in prisons
Educational opportunities, or lack thereof, for incarcerated women
Scholarly neglect and/or institutional exclusion of issues relating to women and criminal justice
The pedagogy of teaching about or to women prisoners
Representations of incarcerated women in the media
Representations of incarcerated women in various art forms
How women prisoners represent themselves
Women and the death penalty
International/transnational struggles and movements connected to women and criminal justice
The failures of law enforcement and legal systems to effectively respond to crimes against women
Comparative studies of issues related to women and criminal justice in different parts of the world
Women prisoners displaced by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita and subsequently housed in men’s prisons
International responses to crimes against women, including the on-going murders of women in Juárez, México
The particular challenges which face women who work as prison guards, attorneys, and police officers
We are interested in both academic papers and creative explorations of the above topics. Creative submissions could include but are not limited to poetry, autobiographical or narrative writings about women and criminal justice, and visual artwork. We encourage currently and formerly incarcerated people and their families to submit.
Guest Editors: Jodie Lawston, Department of Sociology, California State University San Marcos
Ashley Lucas, Department of Dramatic Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Submission Process: Proposals for academic papers and creative submissions, no longer than two pages, should be emailed to Jodie Lawston at jlawston@csusm.edu by October 15, 2007. Author(s) must include all identifying information on the proposal, including name, title, institutional affiliation, address, phone numbers, and email. After the deadline, we will review proposals and contact authors as to which manuscripts we will pursue for the special issue. Manuscripts that we decide to pursue will be subject to blind review and must adhere to the publishing guidelines of the NWSA Journal, found at: http://www.nwsaj.engl.iastate.edu/.
Feel free to contact either Ashley (lucasa@email.unc.edu; 919-962-2496) or Jodie (jlawston@csusm.edu; 760-750-4623) with any questions or concerns about the submission process.
People without access to email may submit proposals by mail to:
Ashley Lucas, Center for Dramatic Art
CB#3230
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3230
DEADLINE FOR ALL PROPOSALS: October 15, 2007 to Jodie Lawston at jlawston@csusm.edu
Posted by lois at July 11, 2007 09:40 AM