[csaa-forum] CFP: “Constructing (Dis)Ability”

[Baden Offord]

Call for Submissions 

TransScripts, an interdisciplinary online journal in the Humanities and Social Sciences at UC Irvine 
Volume IV: 2014 
“Constructing (Dis)Ability” 

Journal Publication Date: March 31, 2014 
Deadline for the submission of abstracts/papers: January 10, 2014 

TransScripts – the interdisciplinary online journal in the Humanities and Social Sciences based at the University of California, Irvine – invites graduate students to submit their work for publication. The theme of our fourth volume will be “Constructing (Dis)Ability.” 

Who is “able” and who is “disabled?” Who decides, and based upon what criteria? In exploring the multiple and intersecting matrices of power these questions evoke, it becomes clear that discourses of ability are as ubiquitous as they are overlooked, as protean as they are embedded. 

On the one hand, we recognize the common distinction between “impairment” and “disability” advanced by disability studies scholars and codified in W.H.O., U.N., U.S., and U.K. disability laws. This distinction posits “impairment” as the reality of physical, emotional, or cognitive difference, and “disability” as the social understanding and implications of that difference. On the other hand, we acknowledge that ability is, in many ways, as elastic a concept as disability, and encourage submissions that problematize both sides of the binary, as well as the binary itself. 

The aging process and aleatory events alike render impairment a near certainty for the majority of the population. The experience of disability is—to a certain extent—blind to privilege. However, it is in examining disability that some of the most intransigent social justice issues come to the fore. What it means to be “disabled” is contingent on questions of access, be it access to healthcare, education, political representation or the judicial system. In the United States and around the world, race, class, and gender often function as gatekeepers, either facilitating or restricting that access. 

While the field of disability studies continues to gain traction within the academy, Trans-Scripts understands ability as a lens of analysis that resists compartmentalization. Accordingly, we encourage scholars from a wide range of backgrounds to contribute their ideas. We appreciate and will consider pieces that speak not only to the social construction of disability, but also to the material—and political—consequences of that construction. Our editorial collective will read submissions from disciplines including (but not limited to): history, art history, literature, philosophy, theology, psychology, education, political science, anthropology, sociology, informatics, public policy, public health, and bioethics. We also eagerly seek the perspectives of scholars working in fat studies, queer studies,women’s and gender studies, film and visual studies, urban studies, science and technology studies, cultural studies, and critical race studies. “We are happy to consider coauthored submissions, and especially welcome faculty-graduate student collaborations.” 

Possible paper topics include, but are not limited to: 
The gendering of disability 
The ethics of accommodations—specifically in sports 
Cochlear implants and Deaf culture 
The racialization of disability 
Norms and pathologization in the concepts of impairment, ability, disability 
Sexual norms and the "disabled" body 
The concept of normal functioning 
Disability and social justice 
Ontologies and epistemologies of disability 
Educating people with disabilities: challenges and opportunities 
The New Disability History 
Ability as rhetoric 
“Crip Studies” and Alison Kafer's Feminist Queer Crip. 
Rendering the subaltern body 
Selfidentification 
and selfadvocacy The disabled body in virtual space(s) 
Built environments as conditioning bodily norms and expectations 
The neurodiversity movement 
The relationship between transgender studies and disability studies 
The politics of designer babies 
Ethnographies of ability and disability 
The metaphysics and/or phenomenology of embodiment 
Disability as socioeconomic indicator 
Discussions of the recent US failure to ratify the U.N. Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities 
The politics of PostTraumatic 
Stress Disorder 
The therapy/enhancement distinction 
Recent changes to the DSM 
“Obamacare” and the disability community 
Theories of pain 

Trans-Scripts welcomes all submissions that engage topics related to “Constructing (Dis)Ability.” They may, but certainly need not, address the examples listed above. As we believe that scholarship from a variety of approaches can help inform contemporary understandings, submissions need not conform to any disciplinary, methodological, temporal, or other criteria. They need only be original, well researched, and properly cited. English language contributions from all universities in all countries will be considered. 

Faculty Contributors 
Selected graduate student work will appear alongside contributions from renowned faculty members,including editorial pieces and scholarly articles. Past contributors have included Étienne Balibar,Hortense Spillers, Lee Edelman, Roderick Ferguson, and Temple Grandin. 

Submission Guidelines and Review Process 
The deadline for submission is 10 January 2014. All submissions should be written in English. The total word count should be between 3,000 and 12,000 words, including footnotes. Explanatory footnotes should be kept to a minimum. Submissions should employ the MLA style of citation (for further information on the journal’s submission guidelines and mission statement, see the journal website at http://www.humanities.uci.edu/collective/hctr/trans-cripts/index.html). All pieces should be submitted as a word document attached in an email totransscriptsjournal at gmail.com. The email should include your name, institution, program/department,and an email address at which you can be contacted. Please also include a short abstract of less than 300 words describing the content and argument of the piece. 

Comments and General Inquiries 
Please direct all general inquiries about the journal or any comments on published pieces to our 2013 volume’s Editor-in-Chief, Andrea Milne, at milnea at uci.edu. 


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Baden Offord, Ph.D.
Professor of Cultural Studies and Human Rights
Acting Course Coordinator, BA
School of Arts and Social Sciences
Southern Cross University

PO Box 157, Lismore 2480 Australia

e: baden.offord at scu.edu.au
t: + 61 2 6620 3162
f: + 61 2 6622 1683

Staff Page: http://www.scu.edu.au/staffdirectory/person_detail.php?person=9217
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