Call for Papers

Accelerofeminisms
A special issue of Inter/Alia: A Journal of Queer Studies (http://interalia.org.pl) Edited by Rafa Majka and Michael ORourke

In her meticulous studies of patriarchy Luce Irigaray has amply demonstrated the peculiar urgency of the feminist question, although the political solutions she suggests are often feebly nostalgic, sentimental, and pacifistic. Perhaps only Monique Wittig has adequately grasped the inescapably military task faced by any serious revolutionary feminism, and it is difficult not to be dispirited by the enormous reluctance women have shown historically to prosecute their struggle with sufficient ruthlessness and aggressionNick Land, Kant, Capital, and the Prohibition of Incest, Fanged Noumena: Collected Writings (1987-2007) An oceanic accelerationism, wired through [Sadie] Plant and Luce Irigaray, is a marine violence Send out the distress call for cyberfeminismBen Woodard, Oceanic Accelerationism, Dark Trajectories: Politics of the Outside The choice facing us is severe: either a globalised post-capitalism or a slow fragmentation towards primitivism, perpetual crisis, and planetary ecological collapse. The future needs to be constructed. It has been demolished by neoliberal capitalism and reduced to a cut-price promise of greater inequality, conflict, and chaos. This collapse in the idea of the future is symptomatic of the regressive historical status of our age, rather than, as cynics across the political spectrum would have us believe, a sign of sceptical maturity. What accelerationism pushes towards is a future that is more modern an alternative modernity that neoliberalism is inherently unable to generate. The future must be cracked open once again, unfastening our horizons towards the universal possibilities of the OutsideNick Srnicek and Alex Williams, #Accelerate: Manifesto for an Accelerationist Politics

What would a high speed collision between feminism, queer theory and accelerationism look like? Has it already happened? Or, if it hasnt yet, what kind of futures might an accelerationist feminism/queer theory promise in a world seemingly without promises? If we look back to the early roots of accelerationist theory and politics in the dark Deleuzoguattarianism of Nick Land, we can see that feminism is acknowledged as a key tool in the war against both patriarchy and capitalism. Land doesnt see Irigaray as going far enough but does credit Wittig as an ally in the fomentation of an aggressively revolutionary feminism. Much later Ben Woodard appeals to Irigarays elemental, oceanic feminism as he calls for a renewed cyberfeminism. Alex Williams and Nick Srnicek also glance towards feminist theorists in their
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#accelerate manifesto and for Land, Woodard, Srnicek, Williams (and many others) the cyberfeminist endeavours of Sadie Plant have been path-breaking. Yet, despite the many nods to, and debts being paid to, earlier feminist work which has paved the way for recent accelerationist thought, it has been a consistent criticism of proponents in this field that they both fail to acknowledge their feminist forebears and that certain key names (Luciana Parisi, J.K. Gibson-Graham, N.Katherine Hayles for example) get left out of these genealogies of accelerationist trajectories. Would not, for instance, the project of J.K. GibsonGrahams alternative community economies, their deconstructing of the global vs. local binary, their furthering of heterodox Marxisms theories of class processes , or their critical intervention into the for-a-long-time-taken-for-granted metaphysical, organismic, essentializing and totalizing scripts of thinking capitalism; or Judith Butlers work on subjection or Eve Kosofsky Sedgwicks on strong vs. weak theories ; or Lauren Berlants and Sara Ahmeds takes on affects; or Jack Judith Halberstams reworkings of success and failure and critique of the logics of orderliness in producing theories for action to name just a few provide productive ground for reworking and furthering certain issues bothering contemporary accelerationisms? Another robust criticism that has been advanced against this admittedly newly emergent discourse is that it is profoundly masculinist and male-dominated, which, as many feminist, gender and queer theories have shown, often translates itself into particular (culturally gendered and dominant philosophical tradition-influenced) ways of conceptualizing the social world as well as into the emergence of particular political horizons to pursue. And such an embeddedness might result in the politics compulsively acting out a political positioning most productive of the feelings and emotions of awe, power and might that come with the affects of masculinist Promethean heroism and Capitalism-total vs. Socialism/ Communism/ etc.-total binary antagonism. A further criticism, although less easy to sustain, is an equation between accelerationism, speed and a virile, phallic politics (Shannon Bells Fast Feminism is an obvious countertendency). This special issue aims to open up a number of questions about accelerat ionisms debts to earlier feminist and queer theory, its development alongside and in the work of contemporary feminist and queer theorists, the potentially fertile links between accelerationism and gender/sexuality, and critiques of accelerationist thinking about work, neoliberalism, capitalism and futurity from feminist and queer perspectives.

Among topics potential contributors might focus on are: Critiques of or extensions to the #accelerate manifesto The resources for feminist accelerationism in the early work of Nick Land (the figures of the woman and sister in the early articles on Kant and Trakl for example) and in his later work too (the figure of the lesbian vampire for example) Feminist thinking on antiwork (eg Kathi Weeks, Federico Campagna) and feminist work on technology (eg N. Katherine Hayles, Sadie Plant)
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J.K. Gibson-Grahams work on class processes, becoming-postcapitalist and alternative economies Queer and feminist writing about reproduction (eg Shulamith Firestone) and reproductive technology Beatriz Preciados theories on sex and labour in the pharmacopornographic era The debates about queer futurity, Blochian hope and utopia (in Jos Muoz, Lisa Duggan, Kathi Weeks, Lauren Berlant among others) The gender politics of the nihilist strains of accelerationism Accelerationist art, ethics and aesthetics (Patricia MacCormacks Michel Serres-inspired efforts for example) Accelerationism, sex and sexuality Postcolonial feminisms and queer theories interventions into accelerationisms/ Critique of Eurocentrism in accelerationist thought Drone Theory and feminism Critiques and/or defences of the masculinism/phallocentrism of accelero-thought Queer readings of and with Reza Negarestani, Ray Brassier, Mark Fisher, Steven Shaviro, Benjamin Noys Queer cosmism Accelerationism and camp (eg Ivor Southwoods book on non-stop inertia and queer sedition as escape) Deleuzoguattarian accelerationism and becoming-girl Housing, infrastructure and the gendering of social organization Geoengineering and the environment Accelerationist transhumanism Accelerationist posthumanism and new perspectives for feminism, gender and queer studies Feminism, queer theory and critical climate change Synthetic biology Periphery studies
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Eurocentric

Fast Feminism (in Bataille, Cixous, Derrida, Virilio and others)

Deadline for abstracts: July 1st, 2014 Deadline for paper submissions: January 31st, 2015 The Accelerofeminisms issue is scheduled for late Spring 2015.

Paper proposals should be sent to: interalia_journal@yahoo.com AND tranquilised_icon@yahoo.com The guidelines for contributors can be found at : http://interalia.org.pl/en/artykuly/guidelines_for_contributors.htm

Image source: http://trojantopher.wordpress.com/