A Conference to Celebrate International Womens Day

The Ideal Woman: Interrogating Femininity across Disciplines and Time Queens University Belfast
Friday 11 - Saturday 12 March 2011
International plenary speaker to be confirmed. Historically, there have been various constructions of what is to be an ideal woman. Across disciplines, cultures, spheres and societies the ideal woman has become associated with modes of femininity and proper behaviour. Political theories, ideologies, legal institutions and religious faiths have defined rights and duties; virtues and vices and condemned those who do not conform. World literature presents a full array of models and characters which personify both the ideal woman and those women who subvert the archetype. Contemporary popular culture still disseminates ideas and presents women of different nationalities and age with models of proper sexuality, behaviour, style, and appearance. This interdisciplinary postgraduate conference seeks to interrogate constructions of ideal femininity and how such models have been reiterated, reinvented, manipulated, and challenged. We welcome (20 minute) papers that include, but are not limited to, the following themes: Marriage and the domestic sphere including issues surrounding childbirth, childcare, and household management. Women in public roles local/transnational Constructions of femininity within religious, ethnic and national discourses The female voice reimagining/challenging/reiterating dominant modes Women and popular culture contributions and representations Travel, international encounters, missionary work Female madness, melancholy and hysteria Heterosexuality and Queer theory Please submit an abstract of not more than 250 words by Friday 17th December to Maria Deiana, Laura Gallagher and Rachel Wilson at rwilson24@qub.ac.uk A conference of the First Mondays International Research Forum on Women, QUB