CFP Gothic Maternities (Special Issue of BAS Journal, 10/1/2025)

Call for articles: GOTHIC MATERNITIES

deadline for submissions:
October 1, 2025

full name / name of organization:
West University of Timisoara/ B.A.S. Journal

contact email:
loredana.bercuci@e-uvt.ro

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2025/07/26/call-for-articles-gothic-maternities

A great number of Gothic fiction productions explicitly address themes such as gender roles and reproduction from diverse perspectives, which at times hold opposing viewpoints on certain aspects of these topics. The ability to gestate is often considered one of the key indicators of sexual difference. However, the subject of gestation and child-upbringing is not usually addressed in Gothic fiction, aside from iconic examples such as Rosemary’s Baby (1968). As Russ (2007: 25) has stated, these processes are often not described in many texts. Frequently, the women in these stories are either young and childless or middle-aged, with their children already grown and secure (ibid.). The reason for this may be the desire to avoid misogynistic attacks on fiction that dealt with these themes, a theory proposed by critics such as Shulamith Firestone (1970) and Jennifer Allen (1984), who concluded that pregnant women and mothers were, in a sense, biologically trapped.

However, as Adrienne Rich (1976) pointed out, in contrast to more traditional motherhood, which can be experienced as a patriarchal institution within this type of fiction, motherhood defined and centered on women can be understood as an empowering experience for women, which later paved the way for matricentric feminism (O’Reilly, 2016). In short, while motherhood as an institution is often a site of male-defined oppression, women’s own maternal experiences can become a source of power (O'Reilly, 2021). It is, therefore, essential to look into the representation of themes such as gestation, childbirth, breastfeeding, and the physical, psychological, and emotional changes that the gestating mother undergoes after childbirth, as well as the various forms of motherhood and gestating bodies (consider, for instance, the masterfully depicted confrontation between Sigourney Weaver and the creature in Alien: The Eighth Passenger, 1979).

The relationship between mothers and their progenies might be fraught with myriad uncertainties, fears, and sometimes outright hatred. These controversial aspects of childbearing, childbirth, and childrearing are addressed by countless unnatural creations, violent births, and terrified women—depicted as doubly vulnerable and trapped in situations of extreme danger (Harrington, 2018: 87). This preoccupation with maternal fear and monstrosity aligns with the Gothic tradition’s continued engagement in the Othering of the mother (Carpenter 2016: 7), providing a compelling lens for exploring the uncanny and the abject (Arnold 2013; Creed 1993; Oliver 2012). As Kristeva suggests in Powers of Horror, this process of othering reflects a deeper cultural anxiety; she (1982: 73) describes the ‘archaic mother’ as a force of ‘generative power’ that patrilineal structures try hard to suppress. As a consequence, monstrous mothers—whether phallic, castrating, all-consuming, and absent—populate the Gothic imagination, from fiction to movies and video games. Yet, despite their ubiquity, this oppressive maternal figure has often gone unnoticed or deliberately ignored by scholars. Her existence resists traditional interpretations, challenging the widely accepted idea of maternal instinct (Williams, 2025: 1).

Moreover, contemporary Gothic art, by allowing projection into other universes and times, imagining various interpersonal relationships, and questioning the boundaries of biology and gender, inevitably engages with various visions of motherhood – some utopian, while others, dystopian – thus opening the door to the exploration of new possibilities. It is in this fertile terrain that, in addition to the previously mentioned themes, other pressing issues also find space for exploration, such as reproductive biotechnology, ectogenesis, cloning, xenobiology, grafts with living beings or artificial entities, microchimerism, and a long list of others that current fiction seems eager to depict (Marinovich, 1994: 189–205; Anolik, 2003: 25–43).

Therefore, we invite writers, researchers, scholars, and all those who wish to contribute to this special issue of British and American Studies (https://bas.journals.uvt.ro/) dedicated to new visions of the Gothic.





REFERENCES

Allen, Jeffner. 1984. “Motherhood: The Annihilation of Women” in Joyce Trebilcot (ed). Mothering: Essays in Feminist Theory. Lanham: Roman and Allanheld, pp. 315–30.

Anolik, Ruth Bienstock. 2003. “The Missing Mother: The Meanings of Maternal Absence in the Gothic Mode” in Modern Language Studies, 33 (1/2), pp. 25–43. https://doi.org/10.2307/3195306

Arnold, Sarah. 2013. Maternal Horror Film: Melodrama and Motherhood. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

Carpenter, Ginette. 2016. “Mothers and Others” in Avril Horner, Sue Zlosnik, Andrew Smith and William Hughes (eds.). Women and the Gothic: An Edinburgh Companion. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, pp. 44-59.

Creed, Barbara. 1993. The Monstrous-Feminine: Film, Feminism, Psychoanalysis. London: Routledge.

Firestone, Shulamith. 1970. The Dialectics of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution. New York: Morrow.

Harrington, Erin. 2018. Women, Monstrosity and Horror Film: Gynaehorror. London: Routledge.

Kristeva, Julia. 1982. Powers of Horror: An Essay on Abjection. Translated by L.S. Roudiez, New York: Columbia University Press.

Marinovich, Sarolta. 1994. “The discourse of the other: Female gothic in contemporary women's writing” in Neohelicon 21, pp. 189–205. https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02093047

O’Reilly, Andrea. 2016. Matricentric Feminism: Theory, Activism, and Practice. Coe Hill: Demeter Press.

O’Reilly, Andrea. 2021. Maternal Theory: The Essential Readings. Coe Hill: Demeter Press.

Oliver, Kelly. 2012. Knock Me Up, Knock Me Down: Images of Pregnancy in Hollywood Films. New York: Columbia University Press.

Rich, Adrienne. 1976. Of Woman Born: Motherhood as Experience and Institution. New York: W.W. Norton.

Russ, Joanna. 2007. The Country You Have Never Seen: Essays and Reviews. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.

Williams, Sara. 2025. The Maternal Gaze in the Gothic. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.



Contributions on this topic should be submitted to the editors of the special issue (loredana.bercuci@e-uvt.ro, dana.percec@e-uvt.ro, cristina.baniceru@e-uvt.ro) and to bas.journal@gmail.com by 1 October 2025. They should observe the general instructions provided on the BAS site (https://bas.journals.uvt.ro/Instructions to authors)


Last updated July 28, 2025

CFP Monstrous Mother in Literature (Spec Issue Esferas Literarias) (7/15/2024)

Monograph: The monstrous mother in Literature

deadline for submissions:
July 15, 2024

full name / name of organization:
Esferas Literarias

contact email:
almudena.nido@ui1.es

source: https://call-for-papers.sas.upenn.edu/cfp/2024/04/15/monograph-the-monstrous-mother-in-literature

CALL FOR PAPERS: Esferas Literarias nº 7 (2024)

Monograph: The monstrous mother in Literature

The role of the mother is sacred to many cultures since prehistoric times, as it is regarded as the main generative and nurturing power for the origin of life as well as the main agent for childcare. This maternal role is therefore not only defined by biology and birthing, but also by social constructs that focus on the expected role of woman as carer, protector, and nurturer of any child. However, as the first experience the subject has of a distinctive other, the maternal body constitutes the most foreign, unknowable space in human experience. In fact, the womb is considered in itself a threshold that marks a relation of energy and space in the biological processes between two bodies that imply that one is created and/or dependant from the other. Even if endowed by society of these positive features, the maternal body contains the possibility of death, horror, rejection, and disgust. This ambiguity and potential transgression of normative and clear-cut borders recall the figure of the monster in both the symbolic and the physical manifestations. It may also entail how the mother's presence and behaviours are perceived as monstrous by others due to social and ethical conventions of what constitutes to be human and/or to be a mother.

We ask contributors to explore the representations in literature of monstrous mothers and monstrous forms of mothering that do not comply with normative embodiment or social conventions about the idea of mother. Articles may respond to some of the following thematic lines, but these are not restrictive:

• Representations of deviant and abnormal motherhood: This could include representations of mother figures who deviate or subvert in any way the normative physical embodiment or the dominant cultural ideals that expect them to be feminine, compassionate, caring, selfless, self-sacrificing, etc. We are interested in contributions that analyse representations of the monstrous mother as a symbol of generative power/untamed nature, as non-human, animal hybrid, inorganic, uncaring, violent, etc.
• Reproductive horrors and the monstrous body: this includes representations of any biological process that pertains to the maternal body and associates it with the abject. We are interested in contributions which explore narratives that feature menstruation, pregnancy, birth, miscarriage, abortion, death, etc., and relate it to the monstrous body and the experience of mothering.
• The relationship between monstrous mothers and space: We are interested in contributions which explore the possible relationship between the monstrous mother and the spaces where the child-mother dyad takes place or is expected to take place. This could include human habitations like the haunted mansion, or natural spaces like the cave.

Contributions can focus on the figure of the monstrous mother in any literary form, genre or subgenre, produced in any language or cultural context.

The proposed topics can be approached from diverse theoretical perspectives (Cohen’s monster theses; monster theory; psychoanalysis; affect theory; disability studies; race, cultural, postcolonial and decolonial studies; queer studies; women’s and gender studies; ecocriticism, among others).

The articles can be written in English or Spanish.

Articles must follow the guidelines of the journal and must be submitted through the journal’s website: https://journals.uco.es/index.php/Esferas/about/submissions


Last updated April 16, 2024