Call for Papers
Gender and Sexual Difference in the Asia/Pacific: Paradigms and Approaches

A Researchers' Workshop, University of Technology Sydney, Broadway, Friday 16 February 2001

Sponsors:
The Centre for Critical & Cultural Studies, University of Queensland Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University Institute for Cultural Research, University of Technology Sydney & University of Western Sydney

Research on gender and sexual difference in Asian and Pacific societies and amongst immigrant Asia/Pacific diasporas is attracting increasing attention from university departments, publishers and journals. A growing number of academics and honours/postgraduate students in Australia working in Asian Studies, Cultural Studies, History, Anthropology, Health, Epidemiology and other disciplines are engaged in pioneering research in this field. However, researchers working in Australia face the dilemma of imagining gender/sex difference in an "Other" place from a site whose dominant culture is caught between a history of racist exclusion and recent aspirations for "Asian engagement" and regional inclusion. Exploration of these tensions is often inhibited by disciplinary and discursive divides that isolate scholars from each other, as well as by a continuing minoritisation of queer research within an academy in which the humanities and social sciences are suffering savage cuts.

This one day workshop will provide a crossdisciplinary-cum-postdisciplinary forum for researchers working on transgender and same-sex issues with an Asia/Pacific focus. The aim is to explore queer perspectives on the circuits of understanding which imagine Australia both as a site from which to analyse gender/sex difference in the Asia/Pacific and as a hybridised location whose popular and intellectual cultures increasingly reflect the aspirations of diasporas from "The Region".

It is hoped that the workshop will lead to the establishment of a national network of scholars working on gender/sex difference in the Asia/Pacific. Other possible outcomes include the establishment of an Internet Site with a BBS system for the sharing of ideas and expertise. The workshop is timed to coincide with Sydney's annual Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras Cultural Festival, and is envisaged as enhancing the profile of Australia's dynamic queer intellectual culture within that community event. If the workshop is successful then other AsiaPacifiQueer events may be planned as part of future queer cultural festivals.

Proposals are invited for presentations (30 minutes maximum including question/discussion time) for this informal one-day event focussing on the theme of Paradigms and Approaches. Preferably, presentations should address theoretical, methodological and/or institutional issues confronted by researchers working on gender/sex difference in the Asia/Pacific and/or among Asia/Pacific diasporas in Australia. Presentations may include read papers or be in audio-visual or other formats. Proposals should include a title and 250 word abstract and be forwarded to Mark McLelland and Peter Jackson (m.mclelland@mailbox.uq.edu.au) by 1 November 2000. The program will be determined and advertised by the end of November 2000. Due to time limitations not all proposals submitted may be able to be accommodated on the day. However, if the workshop is successful further events are likely to be organised in the near future.

This event is being run on a limited budget and unfortunately we are not able to provide financial assistance for travel or other costs.

Convenors:

Peter Jackson (ANU, peter.jackson@anu.edu.au)
 & 
Mark McLelland (UQ, m.mclelland@mailbox.uq.edu.au)
http://www.arts.uq.edu.au/cccs