Increasing the number of female submissions at your conference

Over at Feminist Philosophers there is an interesting post/thread on putting on conferences in line with the goals and aims of the GCC. The GCC, for good reasons, has focused on the keynote and invited speakers at conferences. And the Feminist Philosophers have provided some helpful strategies for avoiding an all-male or mostly male conference.  What I am interested in is the other side, how to increase female applications to your conference. This is particularly focused on smaller conferences. The type that that may have one or two invited speakers (if any), and might get 20-50 abstracts (if even 20). I've organized or help organize a few conferences of that size and scope, and I have never had any real issues with mostly all male submissions. So, what follows are some strategies I believe may have lead to that conclusions. More ideas, and criticisms of my ideas, is very much welcomed. This is list is numbered in no particular order of importance.

(1) When writing the CFP, explicitly invite women to submit papers.
(2) Do you do that thing in your CFP where you suggest possible themes to be addressed, or possible thinkers to think alongside/against? Well, make sure to include feminist themes and women thinkers in those lists.
(3) Okay, your cfp is written. How do you send it out?  Think about posting in places you know feminist and women philosophers might be more likely to see it. Think about posting in SWIP-L if it has specific feminist overlaps. Find listservs, websites, blogs, facebook groups, and newsletters that may not be where you would normally post your cfp, and that can expand the diversity of the applicants to your conference.
(4) Like many CFPs, there are mass distribution channels (as I just talked about), and there are more informal social network channels. Social networks, particularly professional ones, often become gendered. If you are dealing with a field that is already heavily gendered, that is even more true. As Matt Yglesias explained so well:

Unless you can say that your personal network is well-balanced between men and women, then you need to take some moments to step back and look beyond that circle to find some women who'd be well-suited to the job. Otherwise a "gender blind" search process will, over the years, put women in an entrenched position of disadvantage.

This means when you look at who you send your CFP too, you might need to do a bit of research, and send it to people who might be strangers. So, if you are running a conference that you know will be geographically small (like a small state philosophy conference) make sure to send your CFP to female professors and instructors within that geographic region. Encourage them to share the CFP. Encourage their students to apply. If your conference is narrow in terms of focus, look for women doing work within your focus. Send the CFP to those women, encourage them to share, and for their students to apply.

(5) Encourage your female students (if appropriate) to apply. Encourage your colleagues to have their female students apply. 

(6) Have you thought about arranging child care for your conference? Look into it, and if possible, make it happen, and put that on your original cfp.

(7) If you are going to have one or two keynotes, try to make sure they are female keynotes. I know that with the funds of your conference, that might not be possible. But before asking that guy you know, and are sure will say yes and for cheap, think if there are women you can at least ask and try to coordinate with. Maybe it doesn't work, but it is a good idea. 

(8) I am just going to steal this from poster "mm" at the Feminist Philosopher thread I indicated before:

Suppose you are soliciting papers for a conference and these papers will be anonymously reviewed prior to acceptance. Suppose you have slots for 8 papers and receive 80 submissions. Don’t select what you take to be the top 8 papers and stop. Rather, first select the top, say 15 papers. In my limited experience, when there is a sufficiently high number of submissions I have very little confidence that the small subset of papers selected is in any sense “the best”. But I am usually pretty confident that a larger subset consists of papers all of which are worthy of being presented. Once you have selected that larger subset, then de-anonymize them and then narrow the selection further by considering factors like inclusiveness.

In general, these ideas can be boiled down to three major ideas: (1) Invite, and be inviting, for women to send abstracts to your conference. (2) Break out of your normal social network and places for posting conference materials, and try to find places that will draw upon a diverse group of philosophers. (3) Make diversity an avowed goal in your conference planning. 

Concerned Philosophers for Peace Conference CFP

Unruly Creatures I&II

Backdoor Broadcasting has the recordings up of Unruly Creatures (which they have had up for a while), and the more recent Unruly Creatures II. If you click the links, you will get the talks, plus sometimes other things. You will also get a quick summary of the talk.  [sidenote: I am not done with the Feminists Encountering Animals event, just thought I would put this up first].

Unruly Creatures I: The Art and Politics of the Animal. June 14th, 2011. Hosted by The London Graduate School.


Participants include: Cary Wolfe, Vinciane Despret, Steven Baker, and Phillip Warnell (there are also important respondents and introductions).

Unruly Creatures II: Creative Revolutions. June 18th, 2012. Hosted by The London Graduate School.

Participants include: André Dias, Erica Fudge, Jonathan Burt, and Anat Pick (and again, there are also important respondents and introductions).

On a certain generalized anxiety, or, on Tim's presentation

Still at the Non-Human Turn. The conference has been great, but physically exhausting. I haven't slept well, and I was getting over a nasty infection right before coming here, and I think a lot of that is still anchoring me. Anyway, I went back to the hotel and crashed right after the conference yesterday, so I wasn't able to get any reflections up. I have things I want to say about all the plenaries yesterday, but I am going to do them in reverse order, starting with Tim (which you can find here, and I highly suggest it).

There is something about the nature of Tim's presentation that makes you (well, me) want to respond in kind. In a sort of fragmentary series of alliances and connections (also, I'm still not really awake).

***
Alien phenomenology creeps us out, it produces anxiety. It does this because it disturbs, fundamentally, that we are the center of the world, the universe, the cosmos, life. I was raised occasionally in the Unitarian Universialist church, and the idea of the interconnectedness of the world (the web of life) that is the UU creed is completely backwards. UUs find comfort from this, they find safety and connection. But to be interconnected--to be entangled and enmeshed--is profoundly anxiety producing. As Tim pointed out, we have mercury in our body, we strange chemicals in our bodies, we have CO2 in the atmosphere, etc etc. The waste products and the reproductive products of the world criss-cross through us and in us.

So, the meshwork of existence produces anxiety (and hell, Tim's presentation was an experiment to produce a moment of homeopathic anxiety). Anxiety, as Tim put it, is connecting. This is opposed, very much, to the security apparatus of American and international agencies and media. To tie this to my work on Butler, this is what it means to stay with our vulnerability and our precarity. Security recognizes our vulnerability and our anxiety, but demands that we run away from those conditions, that we try to protect and immunize ourselves. If you have read your Hobbes, the machine of the Levithan is created in order to respond to our anxiety about our shared vulnerability which produces a state of fundamental equality.  Equality is not easy to live in, oddly enough. Anyone who has read Ranciere understands this part of the hatred of democracy. Or the unease some of finds with ethics that extends to the non-human, which produce profound states of anxiety and huge autoimmune responses from many people (I was explaining to Steven Shaviro today some variation of my own historical feelings in that regard to panpsychism).

So, we need to figure out ways to stay with our anxiety and vulnerability. This requires, from Tim, magic.

PhiloSophia Conference wrap up

I think it was a splendid conference, and I think all the conference organizers should be proud of a job well done. I saw a lot of great papers, sat on an excellent Judith Butler panel, and many wonderful conversations. I am also firmly of the belief that more conferences need to end in margaritas, veggie tacos, and a dance party. I treated the conference like a secret animal conference, and I think it says a lot about changes in the field that I can go to a conference not on animals and still manage to see about a paper a panel on animals. Though a lot of that, no doubt, is do to the influence of Kelly Oliver, whom I wished I had a chance to speak to. And all the Vanderbilt students I meet were considerably friendly and I think a lot of smart things are going on with those students. I did get to meet Dr. J, though sadly briefly. Though I just heard about potential flooding in Memphis, so I hope everything is all right. Lastly, I did get to meet Cindy Willett, who is remarkably nice person and doing very interesting work. Indeed, all the Emory students I meet and talked with generous and intelligent.

I know that because of change in geography the make up of the conference will be different next year, if I can find the funds to go, I will certainly plan to try and attend next year's PhiloSophia.

Will I see you at PhiloSophia?

I will be at PhiloSophia hosted this year at Vanderbilt all day on Friday and Saturday. I am really looking forward to it. If any of you are going to be there, let me know. I will also be presenting on Judith Butler and non-anthropocentric ethics.

PIC Conference Thank Yous!

The PIC Conference is now over, and I am safely back in GA writing up exams and editing papers. The conference itself seemed to go well from my perspective. It was my first time organizing a conference, and there are changes I would make, but I think it went well regardless.

There are many, many thanks I need to give out:

First of all, a huge thank you to Cecile Lawrence, who was called a conference co-organizer but who actually took on the lion's share of work for the conference. It would have been nothing but a CFP without her tireless work at the conference.

Matt Applegate, who gave me a place to crash, drove me around, picked up Peter Gratton when my flight got canceled, help set up everything, and generally kept me sane and grounded.

Gabriel Piser, who became a tech support person for the conference, with zero warning or official training.

The various PIC students who came, asked questions, moderated panels, and generally helped make the conference run.

Peter Gratton, who was an excellent choice for a keynote. He wrote a very smart address for the conference. He looked over the abstracts accepted before hand, and tailored his address to take up themes from various papers that were given. He helped promote the conference on his blog, in person, and over emails. He came to panels, asked questions, socialized with presenters, and treated everyone in an egalitarian fashion. He was also remarkably nice about all issues concerning payments and what have you. So, think about asking him to keynote at your conferences.

Besides those thank you, I met lots of people I really enjoyed. Glad to meet you (and I hope you know who you are if you are reading my blog). In general, the blogging community was really great in person. Devin Shaw was a delight to meet and hang out with, though he encouraged my drinking more than I should! Ben Woodard gave an excellent presentation, and my only regret was not getting to talk to him more. Dan Barber was remarkably fun to spend time with, and has convinced me to the virtues of the phrase "buying back in" as opposed to "doubling down".


Anyway, now that it is over, I hope to get back to my regularly scheduled blogging. Email if there are important posts I have missed, and also email if I have forgotten to respond to your comments or emails!

More on Sex, Gender, Species Conference

I've been really busy since I got back from the SGS conference, but I wanted to expand on the awesomeness, and give out some much needed thank yous.

First, thank you to my Judith Butler panel mates: Eric Jonas and Stephanie Jenkins. They were amazing to work with and plan with. Stephanie also deserves a special thank you for helping me with logistics, picking me up from airports, letting me crash at her place, etc. Eric deserves a special thank you for getting himself there in the face of opposition and adversity.

Also, a big thank you to the two organizers: Lori Gruen (who has a new book out), and Kari Weil, who will shortly have a new book out via Columbia UP. I am gaining new and profound respect for conference organizers, and this one was particularly well done.

I also want to thank all of the participants. Missing were all of the carefully practiced put downs and ego-centric 'questions' that do nothing to advance the other person's project. Instead, there was a real generosity of thought. The type you wished you saw at conferences but so frequently don't find. The conference, really displayed the robust and rigorous depth of animal studies (critical and otherwise).

All that, and excellent vegan food.

Awesome conference

I am currently at the SGS conference, and it, simply put, amazing. I am sure I will have more later. Two weird/cool things: Tim flew into the same airport on the same day I did. Also, someone asked about OOO during the very first q&a period.

More later.