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The journal Gender a výzkum / Gender and Research announces a call for abstracts for a special issue on Childhood, Adolescence and Sexualities edited by Lucie Jarkovská and Sharon Lamb.
Although sexuality is seen as an important part of the lives of individuals as well as a significant social issue with regard to the general health and well-being of individuals that derives from access to human rights and social justice, the idea of sexuality and children seems contradictory or even dangerous. Since the Romantic era childhood has been framed by a discourse of innocence. On the one hand, the concept of innocence brought about a higher level of protection and care of children; however, on the other hand, it denied them sexual agency. We see this problem in the debates on the sexualisation of girls by the media where girls themselves, their choices and critiques, are often made absent. This concept of innocence also tends to be more frequently activated around certain (privileged) groups of children, while other kinds of children are neglected based on their race, class, ethnicity, or geopolitical location. Child sexual innocence has also become an important point of contention in the culture wars invoking moral panics about loss of innocence. It has also recently become one of the main topics presented by conservatives in the global anti-gender movement. While in some places the rights of children in general, transgender children, and LGBTQ+ identified children and adolescents are discussed and legal rights debated and sometimes won, in other places parliaments discuss laws that would restrict sex education and legitimize legislation against LGBTQ+. They do this via the concept of sexual innocence.
Feminist research has always been closely connected with research in the field of sexuality and has helped to unpack the connections between sexual subjectivity, or agency, and the true protection of children, which would include the protection of human rights. Therefore, we see the examination of childhood and adolescent sexualities as a necessary focus for contemporary societies currently facing the conservative backlash.
We welcome articles from scholars in sociology, psychology, philosophy, education, media studies, political science, women’s/girlhood/gender studies, and related fields that focus on (but are not limited to) the following questions, tying theory or research to politics in these areas:
… and any paper that combines these topics.
If you are interested in publishing a paper in the forthcoming thematic issue, please submit your abstract (max. 250 words) by end of August 2020 to genderteam@soc.cas.cz and to the address of the guest editors: jarkovsk@mail.muni.cz and sharon.lamb@umb.edu. Please write ‘childhood sexualities’ in the subject line of your email. Articles may be submitted in English or Czech. We will communicate the decisions on accepted abstracts by September 16. The deadline for submitting full papers is January 31 2021. Papers will then be peer-reviewed. We also welcome book reviews and conference reports and relevant news on the topic of ‘Childhood, adolescence and sexualities.’ If you have a book that you would like reviewed, please suggest to us three potential reviewers and have your publisher send one of the editors a copy. The thematic issue is planned for publication in the journal Gender a výzkum / Gender and Research. There may also be an accompanying online session this Fall in which authors can hear about each others’ work.
Gender a výzkum / Gender and Research is a peer-reviewed transdisciplinary journal of gender studies and feminist theory. The journal is included in SCOPUS, ERIH PLUS, CEJSH, DOAJ and other databases. More information, including formal requirements for offered manuscripts, is available here.
