Queering feminist geography
Queering feminist geography:
Dialogues among feminist and genderqueer/trans geographers
Call for panelists
Kelsey Emard, Oregon State University
Eden Kinkaid, University of Arizona
We are seeking participants for a panel (or series of panels) exploring the relationship between feminist and genderqueer/trans geographies, past, present, and future. Our hopes are that the panel(s) will facilitate a conversation about connections and divisions between feminist and genderqueer/trans geographies, identify obstacles to the inclusion of genderqueer/trans people in feminist geography, and reflect upon the shared intellectual and political projects between feminist and genderqueer/trans geographers.
The intellectual and political genealogies linking feminist and queer geographies are shaped by shared lines of influence and spaces of collaboration, as well as divisions and erasures. Both feminist and queer theory share somewhat parallel and intersecting trajectories, with early work from the 1970s and 80s in both feminist geographies and geographies of sexuality (largely gay/lesbian geographies) remaining rooted in essentialized notions of gender and sex (Knopp 2007). From the 1990s onward, both subfields embraced poststructuralist approaches that allowed for the critical deconstruction of these concepts and a greater focus on how gendered and sexed bodies and spaces are mutually constituted (Johnston 2018).
Reviewing the literature in feminist and queer geographies, Wright (2010) shows that the two threads of geographic scholarship share a focus on the politics of everyday life and organizing subversive action against daily subjugation and violence. Knopp (2007) argues, however, that despite these shared geneaologies and commitments, one notable difference has been feminist geographers’ tendency to foreground cis-women’s experiences as the uniting thread for forming a coherent political project. While that project may include gay women, the status of genderqueer and trans people within it is unclear. According to Knopp (2007), feminist geographers have not drawn on the tools provided by queer theory as much as queer geographers have done with feminist theory, highlighting the need for a deeper engagement within feminist geography with queer and trans approaches and experiences.
While that judgement was made some time ago, the rise of “gender critical feminism” and the mainstreaming of feminist transphobia requires renewed dialogue to make feminist geographies responsive to queer/trans experience. Accordingly, we echo Gökariksel et al.’s recent call for a more expansive feminism that engages more “widely, expansively, and intentionally with sites of struggle and erasure… within feminist geography,” including those of genderqueer and trans geographers (2021, 1). In the context of renewed assaults on reproductive freedom and ongoing transphobic backlash from the state and public, we are eager to speak across our subfields to find spaces of commonality and to identify the obstacles that might frustrate intellectual, political, and personal solidarities.
In this panel, we will thus continue to explore and deepen these relations between feminist and queer/trans geographies. We invite anyone with an interest or investment in either or both of these intellectual traditions to join us. You need not be queer or trans to participate, and in fact, we encourage participation by cis and/or hetero feminist geographers as panelists and attendees. Engagement across our differences is required to dialogue about and identify shared intellectual and political aspirations. The active and engaged participation of cis and/or hetero feminist allies is also required to make geography more inclusive of queer and trans people.
Some questions we are interested in engaging:
What is the place of genderqueer and trans people in feminist geography?
What common intellectual and political goals unite feminist and queer/trans geographies?
How can feminist geography respond to a current intellectual and political climate inflused with transexclusionary feminism, feminist transphobia, and “gender critical” feminism?
How might key feminist principles (e.g., care, positionality, coalition, etc.) be expanded, revised, or activated to more authentically respond to the situations of genderqueer and trans people?
How is gender theorized in feminist geography, and how can these theorizations better center racial, gendered, and sexual difference?
How can we move toward a more queer/trans inclusive feminism, and intersectional feminist geographies more generally?
Submit this Google form to indicate your interest in participating by November 15. On the form, we ask you to provide a brief statement about what part of this conversation you are excited to engage, how you have encountered these questions/concerns in your work and/or experience, etc. This will help us construct a well-balanced panel, and will help us organize multiple panels if needed. We are uncertain if the panel will be in-person/online/hybrid. Please indicate your preference on the Google form.
P.S. This panel is the starting point of a broader dialogue and working group being convened by Eden Kinkaid (ekinkaid@email.arizona.edu) and Kelsey Emard (kelsey.emard@oregonstate.edu) to do collective thinking, learning, and writing about queer and transfeminist geographies and a transfeminist praxis for geography. Please do get in touch if you would like to be a part of these conversations beyond this panel.
Works cited
Johnston, L. (2018). Intersectional feminist and queer geographies: A view from ‘down-under’. Gender, Place & Culture, 25(4), 554-564.
Knopp, L. (2007). On the relationship between queer and feminist geographies. The Professional Geographer, 59(1), 47-55.
Gökariksel, B., Hawkins, M., Neubert, C., & Smith, S. (2021). Feminist geography unbound: Discomfort, bodies, and prefigured futures. West Virginia University
Press.
Wright, M. W. (2010). Gender and geography II: Bridging the gap—feminist, queer, and the geographical imaginary. Progress in Human Geography, 34(1), 56-
66.