Gender and the body are inextricably connected, and it could be argued that within any given filmic context, they are also closely related to genre and generic traditions. Moreover, genres often use genders, gender stereotypes and bodies in diverse and specific ways, and gender and its relationship to the body performs different functions in the context of any given genre. In horror, for example, the body is typically tortured, ruptured and made abject, as evidenced in films such as Human Centipede II (dir. Tom Six, 2011), Prevenge (dir. Alice Lowe, 2016) and Raw (dir. Julia Ducournau, 2016). In action/adventure films, for instance, the body and the performance of gender is usually spectacular, robust and is tested to the limit, in films like The Expendables (dir. Sylvester Stallone, 2010), White House Down (dir. Roland Emmerich, 2013), and Atomic Blonde (dir. David Leitch, 2017). 

With this in mind, this collection aims to critically examine and interrogate the representation of the body and its relationship to both gender and genre in contemporary North American and European films. For the sake of clarity,  we are interpreting contemporary to mean post-2010 films, and films included and under discussion should have been produced and circulated in any North American or European country or countries. Moreover, we are specifically using the term ‘film’ instead of ‘cinema’ as we are interesting in accepting chapters that not only examine and discuss theatrically-released films, but also underground and avant-garde films, and we have also included a section dedicated to pornographic films too.

The collection itself will be structured around popular genres, as follows:

We aim to secure 3 chapters for each section, with each chapter being around 6,000 words long. In regards to hybrid genres (such as the rom-com or the ‘thriller’) it will be at the discretion of the editors to decide where to best place the chapter, and this decision will revolve around which films are being used as case studies, as well as how the author of the chapter frames their argument. In other words, we do not discourage applications which are concerned with hybrid films, even though we do not have dedicated sections to hybrid genres or sub-genres.

Furthermore, chapters may centre on (but are not limited to):

The editors have been in contact with Edinburgh University Press, for this to be included in their ‘Gender and the Body in Contemporary Literature and Culture’ series, which the series editors have responded enthusiastically to. Once abstracts have been accepted, a formal proposal will be sent to EUP in December 2019, with publication of the collection hopefully being early-to-mid 2022.

Please send abstracts of 250 – 300 words, with a supporting bio of no more than 100 words, to [log in to unmask] by Friday 18th October 2019. If you have any questions, or we can help you in any way, please do let us know via email.

Best wishes,

Connor Winterton [BCU], Daisy Richards [DMU], and Darren Elliott-Smith [Stirling] (the Gender/Genre/Bodies team!).