Call for Papers: Journal of Medical Humanities - "Queer in the Clinic"

CALL FOR PAPERS

Special Issue of the Journal of Medical Humanities: "Queer in the Clinic"

Guest Editors: Lance Wahlert and Autumn Fiester

We invite the submission of abstracts for a special issue of the Journal of Medical Humanities, which will consider queer perspectives on and queer experiences in the clinic. While all professionals and patients face dilemmas within the medical sphere, for LGBTQ individuals the stakes are especially pronounced and complicated. According to critical theorists like Michel Foucault and others, the clinic is an intensely problematic space for queers because many of their identities and categories were born there.  While debatable, such a historical and scholastic legacy hangs heavy over our readings and renderings of gay and trans persons in the medical realm.  Stated succinctly: Historically having been born out of medical pathology,
how do queer persons understand and even reconcile their relationships to the clinic today?

This special issue of the Journal of Medical Humanities will be concerned with the voices and perspectives of LGBTQ persons in the medical sphere – the dilemmas they face in the clinic, the influences that sexuality and gender identity have on a person’s patient-hood, and the factors that create distinctively queer perspectives on medicine.  Some over-arching questions that inform this special issue include:

 What does the experience of being lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, or intersex in a medical encounter look like – as either patient or health-care provider?

 How do queer sexualities and gender identities factor into clinical relationships, the experience of being ill, and the negotiations for treatment and care?

 Does a pervading heteronormativity impinge upon queer patients, their partners, families, caregivers, or health care providers?

 What does homophilic or queer-affirming clinical care look like?

 How do homosexuality and gender-nonconformity affect/effect some of the most vulnerable patient populations: children, adolescents, the elderly, and the disabled?

Submissions are welcome in a wide range of scholastic and methodological forms for this special issue on "Queer in the Clinic," including:

 Literary analyses
 Historical and historiographical studies
 Philosophical interventions
 Visual and cinema studies projects
 Photojournalistic pieces
 Autobiographical memoirs
 Anthropological and sociological studies
 Bioethical commentaries
 Religious studies perspectives
 And artistic representations of queerness

Abstract submissions should be 1,000-1,500 words in length and are due by
February 15, 2011. Abstracts should be submitted to: submissions@queerbioethics.org.

It is anticipated that this special issue will be published in Spring/Summer 2012.

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(h/t Lit&Med_ASBH listserv)