This isn’t our usual type of post lately as we have been trying to stick to information that is submitted directly to PhillyACCESS and truly local. But the below was on a listserv recently, and it seemed genuinely different than the typical “call for papers” that are generally sent out. Obviously, local writers are able to submit.

Call for Papers for an Edited Collection on Disabled Mothers

Demeter Press is seeking submissions for an edited collection Disabled Mothers

Co-Editors: Gloria Filax and Dena Taylor

Publication Date: 2014

While there are several books on raising children with disabilities, the literature is scant on experiences of disabled women who are raising children OR the experiences of those parented by a woman with disabilities. Bringing together disability with mothering has the potential to challenge dominant narratives of both mothering AND disability. Noticing dominant ideas, meanings, and/or stories/narratives (normative discourses) regarding both 'mothering' and 'disability' expose the limits beyond which disabled mothers live their daily lives.

The goal of this edited collection is to add to literatures on mothering and disability through providing stories by disabled mothers or their children as well as chapters of scholarly research and theorizing. We intend that both stories and research in this collection will raise critical questions about the social and cultural meanings of disability and mothering. Whether a birth mother, an adoptive mother, a foster mother, a co-mother, someone mothered by a disabled woman, or someone whose research explores disabled mothering, we invite you to submit to this collection.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

How are disabled women discouraged from having children? How does the medical model of disability shape the meanings assigned to disabled mothers? How do chronic illnesses affect mothering? Are disabled mothers healthy mothers? How do the social and cultural models of disability shape how we understand disabled mothers and mothering? Are disabled mothers oppressed? How do issues of race, class, and sexuality affect disabled mothers and their families? Should disabled mothers 'pass' as normal? How are pregnancy and birth experiences shaped by disability? How do children experience and understand a disabled mother? What support is needed and received by disabled mothers? How does the built environment, both public and private, shape the experiences of disabled mothers? What kinds of issues are there with children's schools, health professionals and/or children's attitudes? What form, if any, does social and political activism take? Do legal remedies work to assist disabled mothers (for example, disability as a protected category in the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms or the Americans with Disabilities Act)? How does a mother's disability expose the expectations of mothering? How does a mother's disability expose the assumptions about disability? How is society disabling of mothering? How can we 'do' disabled mothering differently?

Submission Guidelines
Abstracts should be 250 words. Please also include a brief biography (50 words) with citizenship.

Please send to xxxxxx@xxxxxxx and xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxx

Deadline for Abstracts is December 31, 2011

Accepted papers of 4000-5000 words (15-20 pages) will be due October 15, 2012 and should conform to MLA citation format.

Demeter Press
140 Holland St. West, PO 13022
Bradford, ON L3Z 2Y5
www.demeterpress.org / xxxxxx@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx