2012 Conference Theme: “Women in Communes”
and Related Issues of Boundedness, Identity, and Standing
OCTOBER 4 – 6, 2012
Oneida Community Mansion House and Hamilton College, Oneida County, NY
The Oneida Community Mansion House provides the perfect setting to explore the lives, roles, and voices of women in communal situations everywhere. It was here that the radical group changed the lives of its female members by freeing them of “slavery through marriage,” removing the fear of pregnancy from sexual relations, and by recognizing and lessening the burden of women’s work.
To examine the lives of women in communes, we invite papers that might address, but are not limited to, such topics as: How were standards of gender constructed in communes and how did they differ from dominant, outside constructs? What were women’s expectations and experiences of community life? How do researchers get that information? Did the women have access to personal and/or political power? Did women experience greater or reduced opportunities for education and self-development in communes? To what extent did communal women control their own bodies and duties? How were decisions made—for them or by them?
In addition to communitarian femaleness and gender, we hope to see papers exploring more general issues of boundary formation in communal life. How are identities pertaining to social class, social roles, or ethnicity defined and signaled? Does such categorization affect status within intentional communities?
Deadline for Submission of Paper and Session Proposals
April 14, 2012
About the Annual Conference
The CSA holds an annual conference in the Fall. The unique feature of these conferences is that they always occur at a communal site. Conference locations have included Shaker Villages, Hutterite Colonies, Harmonist communities, and the Amana Colonies. Conferences often feature additional trips to contemporary intentional communities and historic communal sites. These trips offer conference participants an exciting opportunity to experience intentional community living.
