Editors: Anita Thaler & Anna Szlavi
In 2008, feminist STS researchers in Graz, Austria, began to discuss queer-feminist literature in a ‘reading circle’. This initial reading group gradually developed into a working group – growing in persons and spreading geographically – whose critique of heteronormative and binary gender concepts (i.e. a queer perspective in the original sense) was just as important as questioning the power mechanisms of scientific organizations. Against the backdrop of the economization of science, questions of social justice and intersectionality became relevant both as research content, but also from the perspective of those affected from discrimination. In 2011, the working group officially named itself ‘AG Queer STS’ (AG as in “Arbeitsgruppe”, German for working group) and has been working together loosely but continuously ever since. Since 2016, the working group publishes the “Queer-Feminist Science and Technology Studies Forum” on their website https://queersts.com, a freely accessible, transdisciplinary, multimedia online journal. The journal is dedicated to one topic each year and used by the queer feminist community in- and outside academia. Queer-feminist STS can offer theories and methods to not only criticize heteronormative and binary gender concepts but moreover questioning the power mechanisms of scientific knowledge production and technological and innovation research. Queer-feminist knowledge theory can broaden the heteronormative epistemology of science (Armstrong & Danielsson 2023). Thus, journal topics ranged from “Queering the Class in Academia”, “Interfaces of Queer Technologies and Sexualities” to “Academic Kindness” and the latest issue on “Queer-Feminist Solidarities in Times of Social and Political Turbulences”.
This is our tenth issue, and we are celebrating this milestone by looking back and forward, to discuss past and current issues of queer-feminist STS.
We are once again seeking to explore queer-feminist interventions into STS like we stated in our manifesto from 10 years ago (https://queersts.com/work-group/manifest/), whether they 1.) criticize empirical science from a queer-feminist point of view (cf. Schmitz & Höppner, 2014), 2.) conduct research from a queer standpoint of the person(s) doing the research (cf. Heckert, 2010), 3.) observe the queerness of the subject of their research (Leibetseder, 2012), 4.) use a methodology which can be defined as ‘queer’ or 5.) do queer-feminist interventions e.g. in transdisciplinary research or art projects (cf. Hofstätter et al. 2021). These different methods of applying queer-feminism can also flow seamlessly into one another (cf. Boellstorff, 2010).
However, to not get to stuck in our past, we invited a guest editor, Anna Szlavi, to publish this milestone Forum with us.
We are interested in contributions from research papers to creative formats using audios, videos, images, texts – to illuminate and share queer-feminist discourses and experiences for a multi-media open access publication opportunity in our Queer-Feminist Science and Technology Studies Forum #10/2025.
Please send abstracts describing your idea in 1000 to 2500 signs (blanks included) until April 21st to .
Additionally, to we invite former contributors and friends, to share their ‘Queer STS story’ with us, tell us about how we met, how your contribution was received and what happened since then. We would love to collect some voices and snapshots from our community.
Time schedule for issue #10 in 2025:
- Call for contributions: April 1-21st 2025
- Deadline for submitting abstracts: April 21st
- Feedback on your abstracts: April 28th
- Submission of first full version of contributions: June 16th
- Review feedback: August 31st
- Submission final version of contribution: October 1st
- Planned date of publication: November-December 2025
References
Armstrong, Eleanor S. & Danielsson, Anna T. (2023). Science Butch Blues. In: Schlager, Jenny & Thaler, Anita (eds.). Queer-Feminist Science and Technology Studies Forum “Queer-Feminist Inclusion and Visibility”. Open Access Online-Journal, Vol. 8, Download: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/376686552_Queer-Feminist_Science_and_Technology_Studies_Forum_8_Queer-Feminist_Inclusion_and_Visibility_-_Overcoming_Stories_of_Exclusion_and_Invisibility_in_Science_Education_and_Technology
Boellstorf, Tom 2010. (2010). Queer Techne: Two Theses on Methodology and Queer Studies In: Browne, K. and Nash, C., (eds.). Queering Methods and Methodologies: Queer Theory and Social Science Methods. Ashgate, London, p. 215-230.
Heckert, Jamie (2010). Intimacy with Strangers/Intimicay with Self: Queer Experiences of Social Research In: Browne, K. and Nash, C., eds. Queering Methods and Methodologies: Queer Theory and Social Science Methods. Ashgate, London, p. 215-230.
Hofstätter, Birgit; Scheer, Lisa & Thaler, Anita (eds., 2021). Queer-Feminist Science and Technology Studies Forum “Queer Interventions”. Open Access Online-Journal, Vol. 6, Download: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/357747791_Queer-Feminist_Science_and_Technology_Studies_Forum_6_Queer_Interventions#fullTextFileContent
Leibetseder, Doris (2012). Queer Tracks. Subversive Strategies in Rock and Pop Music. Farnham/Burlington, Ashgate.
Schiebinger, L., Klinge, I., Sánchez de Madariaga, I., Paik, H. Y., Schraudner, M., & Stefanick, M. (2011). Gendered innovations in science, health & medicine, engineering, and environment. Available at https://genderedinnovations.stanford.edu
Schmitz, Sigrid & Höppner, Grit (eds. 2014). Gendered Neurocultures. Feminist and Queer Perspectives on Current Brain Discourses. In:“challenge GENDER. Aktuelle Herausforderungen der Geschlechterforschung”. Zaglossus: Vienna.