Dear current and future Women, Gender and Sexuality network members and affiliates,
It  was a pleasure to see so many of you in Montreal this year. Next year’s  conference will take place from November 8 to 11, 2018, in Phoenix, AZ.  The theme is "Histories of Disadvantage: Meanings, Mechanisms, and  Politics.” Please find attached our network’s informal Call for Papers  for next year’s meeting. At our WGS network meeting in Montreal many of  you have suggested possible themes for panels that would complement the  overall theme of the conference. Great! Please note that our thematic focus does not foreclose submissions on other themes on women, gender and sexuality.  In  fact, we hope to organize several Author- Meets- Critics panels  featuring the excellent work of network participants as well as panels  that connect the overall conference motto, histories of disadvantage, to  historical meanings, mechanisms, and politics of the meeting place of  Arizona.
We also are excited to announce a Second Call for Papers, inviting you to join our one-day pre-conference with a focus on Border Crossings: Gender, Sexuality, and Rights at the University of Arizona in Tucson, AZ (about  1.5 hours from Phoenix). The pre-conference theme is inspired by Gloria  Anzaldúa’s seminal contributions to Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies  and will give us the opportunity to engage with the geographical  location of the conference.
While we encourage  contributions related to regional themes of borders and borderlands,  histories of rebellious actions, and mobilization for rights (widely  defined), we will be happy to consider papers or panels from all  geographical regions that address related themes, offer new theoretical  frameworks, and present materials that allow us to compare, contrast,  and illustrate the complexity of rights (including, but not limited to  legal concepts of gender/sexual power and norms, international/national  dimensions of social/cultural/political/legal constructs of human  rights, refugees and power/empowerment) as well as border  crossings (including but not limited to the complexities of physical  trespassing of nation-state borders, cultural ruptures, gendered and  sexual transgressions).
Please note that we invite presenters and  participants to arrive on Tuesday, November 6, 2018 for an informal  reception; we plan to offer one night at a hotel to conference  presenters pre-ceding our one-day conference on Wednesday, November 7,  2018. 
Submission Deadline: February 16, 2018
PLEASE SUBMIT ALL PRE-CONFERENCE PANELS AND PAPERS DIRECTLY TO THE NETWORK REPS:
Dominique Grisard     dominique.grisard@unibas.ch
Jadwiga E. Pieper Mooney   jadwiga@email.arizona.edu
Martin Gössl  martin.goessl@fh-joanneum.at
Reminder regarding SSHA conference submissions (to be done online): a  full panel should have a chair, discussant and four presenters (ideally  four papers, though we will accept panels with five presenters as  well).  Preferably, panels should unite presenters from more than one  discipline. We encourage panel organizers to bring together graduate  students and scholars at different stages of their careers. If your  panel is short of authors, discussant and/or chair, please let us know  and we will do our best to help you complete the panel. Panel organizers  should make sure potential participants are aware of the registration  fees and are prepared to attend even if their potential travel grants  fall through. As always, we are happy to help out with whatever query  you might have.
*For additional general information, please see www.ssha.org.
Pre-Conference Submissions (please send directly to network reps): we accept papers and panels and plan to collaborate with Arizona faculty.
For network-specific information, and FOR ALL QUESTIONS AND SUBMISSIONS REGARDING THE PRE-CONFERENCE PLEASE CONTACT US DIRECTLY.
PLEASE SUBMIT ALL PRE-CONFERENCE PANELS AND PAPERS DIRECTLY TO THE NETWORK REPS:
Best wishes,
Dominique, Jadwiga, and Martin
Contact Info: 
Dominique Grisard     dominique.grisard@unibas.ch
Jadwiga E. Pieper Mooney   jadwiga@email.arizona.edu
Martin Gössl  martin.goessl@fh-joanneum.at
Contact Email: jadwiga@email.arizona.edu
