The call for papers and panels is now open for our second joint international annual conference. We welcome submissions from  members of these four networks whose work offers innovations in feminist and trans-disciplinary theory, research and practice relative to global social justice issues. This will be a two-day in-person conference.

The international feminist movement has used the principles of social justice to lobby governments for social change around women’s equality, human rights, reproductive rights and sexual autonomy. Similarly, the LGB social movements (later LGBTQ) used these principles to challenge dominant constructions of masculinity, femininity, homophobia and the primacy of heteronormativity, including hard-fought gains and legal protections being rolled back or under threat. Over time, these movements have sought equality through legislative change and by changing minds about their need for new rights, benefits and protections from harm and exclusion in all its forms. Although many of those involved in these campaigns disagreed about the meaning of sexuality and gender and the best ways to achieve political and legal goals; what united them was their commitment to political dissent and social transformation through full recognition of their identities and citizenship rights.

While we have made some important legal, political and social gains on these and other issues, our contemporary ‘moment’ shows that we have much to do. The recent incarnation of the #MeToo movement illustrates that patriarchy and the attendant institutional values that accept and normalise sexual assault and rape and facilitate a culture of white, male entitlement are, in the words of the World Health Organisation, ‘devastatingly pervasive’. Women remain under threat of violence and death. LGBTQ people continue to suffer intolerance, xenophobia, misogyny and homophobia. Thus, one of the key challenges that feminism faces today is keeping open spaces for the work of critique, contestation and challenge to injustice, inequality and violence in all its forms.

This conference invites papers that aim to contribute to new approaches to feminist theory, research and practice to address this and/or other issues that can advance knowledge in those fields and inform feminist activism through social justice.