(Re)reading feminist speculative fiction post-Roe v. Wade (2024 Northeast Modern Language Association )

In the introduction to the collection Technologies of Speculative Fiction (2022), Sherryl Vint writes, “The same technologies that now give women more options regarding reproductive choices are simultaneously utilized by the Christian Right to agitate for regressive legislation that would limit reproductive options even more.” As we experience the continued narrowing of legal access to abortion as enabled by reproductive technologies, such as the attempt to overturn the FDA’s approval of mifepristone, how do feminist envisionings of the future help us re-frame our current political reality? This session seeks paper proposals that explore the experience of (re)reading feminist speculative fiction in the current post-Roe v. Wade climate.

How has feminist speculative fiction prepared us for this moment? How do we understand fictional visions of ectogenesis in retrospect? In what ways has feminist speculative fiction provided future intersectional possibilities for addressing the post-Roe era? How has feminist speculative fiction reproduced or challenged an exclusionary “we” that defines reproductive rights? What does the technology of (re)reading offer our reproductive futures? Preference will be given to underread/analyzed authors or texts that grapple with intersectional implications and imaginings of living in the post-Roe moment. 

Upload 300-500 word abstracts to the NeMLA cfp list: https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/20386

 https://www.cfplist.com/nemla/Home/S/20386

 jdymond@springfieldcollege.edu

 Justine Dymond