Call for papers for a special issue of the journal Labour History:
Gender, War and Coerced Labour
Proposals (500 words) due: 15 April 2021
In recent decades there have been growing bodies of literature on gender and war, on war labour, and on various forms and degrees of labour coercion. Yet rarely have these areas – gender, coercion and war labour – been brought together and analyzed as intersecting and interdependent themes. In addition, much of this literature focuses primarily on the 20th century. This special issue of Labor History will examine these intersecting themes from a broader historical perspective to ask new questions and propose new conceptual frameworks to help understand degrees, forms and sites of coercion and their gendered dimensions in connection with war-related work and labour (military or civilian).
The special issue will engage with labour and war in its many gendered forms, and will note that much of this labour is indeed coerced to various degrees. The time period is broad, inclusive of the early modern and modern periods, and there are no geographical limitations. Paper proposals for the special issue should address all key themes of (1) gender, (2) war-related labour and (3) coercion. The following text further details the aims of the issue in relation to each of the intersecting themes.
The editors welcome paper proposals that address and historicize the intersections between all key themes: gender, war labour and coercion. The time period is roughly the 17th-21st centuries and there are no restrictions on geographical area.
Some general examples of how contributions might address all key themes include:
- Gendered and racial dimensions of prisoners of war labour camps
- Men, masculinities and compulsory soldiering (conscription, devshirme, press-ganging, veterans, postwar disabilities etc)
- The meanings of voluntarism and coercion in women’s war labour
- Intersectional approaches to conscientious objection and/or desertion
- Forms and degrees of coercion in reproductive war labour
- Gendered sites of forced war labour
- Demobilization from coercive war labour.
Please send your 500-word proposal to the editors (contact details, see links below) by 15 April 2021. Ensure your proposal addresses the intersections between all three key themes. The editors will review the proposals and advise of the outcome by May 2021. If you are invited to submit a full paper for further review, the paper will be due by January 2022.
Further information about the special issue can be found here: https://www.worck.eu/2021/01/08/call-for-papers-gender-war-and-coerced-labour-special-issue-of-labor-history/
(For link to the CFP on the journal’s home page, click here)