Global-historical and intersectional approaches to the emergence of reproductive rights after 1945

The conference “Whose choice, whose rights? Global-historical and intersectional approaches to the emergence of reproductive rights after 1945” takes place on June 9 and 10 in Glasgow and online.

The conference explores the emergence of notions of reproductive rights, reproductive justice and reproductive choice and autonomy over the course of the second half of the 20^th century. Papers will be focused on the changing status of the reproductive body in public, medical and legal discourse throughout this period, taking post-World War 2 reconstruction as the starting point and the definition of reproductive rights by the United Nations at the International Conference on Population and Development held in Cairo in 1994 as the endpoint. The emergence of notions of reproductive rights will be analysed against the backdrop of changing gender roles, sexual revolutions, processes of medicalisation, changing forms of mass communication, and wider contexts such as decolonisation, the emergence of the UN system and human rights discourse, and the globalisation of demographic debate.

Focusing on topics such as birth control, family planning, abortion, assisted reproductive technologies and sterilisation, the conference will explore political, expert and public discourse as well as intimate practices and norms surrounding bodily autonomy, family, and sexual practice. Presenters are asked to engage with the key historical shifts in this period: the medicalisation of reproductive bodies, the feminisation of reproductive choice and responsibility, the changing notions of human rights, and the hierarchisation of reproductive subjects according to social markers such as race, social class and ability.

Deadline CfP: February 7, 2021.
More information is on H-Net.