This contest, which honors submissions to Femspec, is conducted every five years. We had two celebrations already, including one party at PCA in San Antonio which was attended by the two SF/F Area Chairs, two award winners, the Editor in Chief, two prospective interns who had just been interviewed and successfully came onboard, participants and audience members of Batya's Tarot panel, a mythologist with a book she had asked us to review, and various attendees walking by or who had noticed us in the program. The second was held at WisCon, a regular Sunday night party from 9 to 2 am with refreshments from Willie's, and readings aloud from prior issues especially most of the creative writing in the award-winning 6.1, of African America Women's Speculative Works. We will have our third event, a wine and cheese, in the book exhibit hall at NWSA in Atlanta, so come by! We will be the ones with balloons and party hats....
Judges: Annis Pratt, Janice Bogstad, Florence Howe, Gloria Orenstein, Laurel Lampella, Philipa Kafka, Rick Collier, and Robert Von Der Osten.
Nominees for fiction:
1: 7.1: Debra Schleef, "From the Archives of Drs. Pacek and Arriola"
2: 8.1/2: Fina Wisker, "New Blood"
3: 8.1/2: K.A. Laity, "Eating the Dream"
4: 9.2: Gina Wisker, "Recruitment"
5: 10.1: Finesia Fideli "The Resurrection of Lazarus"
And the winners are:
First Place: K.A. Laity, "Eating the Dream"
Second Place: Gina Wisker, "Recruitment"
Third Place: Debra Schleef, "From the Archives of Drs. Placek and Arriola"
Fourth Place Tie: Gina Wisker, "New Blood," And Finesia Fideli, "The Resurrection of Lazarus"
Nominees for criticism:
1: 10.2: Ritch Calvin, "'This Shapeless Book': Reception in Joana Russ's The Female Man"
2: 8.1: Eric M. Drown, "Business Girls and Beset Men in Pulp Science Fiction and Science Fiction Fandom"
3: 6.2: C.S'Thembile West, "The Competing Demands of Community Survival and Self-Preservation in Octavia Butler's Kindred"
4 : 9.2: Cristy Dwyer, "Queen Lili'uokalani's Imprisonment Quilt: Indomitable Spirits in Protest Cloth"
5: 10.1: Rebekah Sheldon. "Reproductive Futurism and Feminist Rhetoric: Joanna Russ's We Who Are About To. . . "
6: 6.2: J. Andrew Deman. "Taking Out the Trash: Octavia E. Butler's Wild Seed and the Feminist Voice in American SF"
7: 7.1: R.C. Dorozario, "The Consequences of Disney Anthropomorphism"
8: 7.1: Debra Bonita Shaw, "Sex and the Single Starship Captain: Compulsory Heterosexuality and Star Trek: Voyager"
And the winners are:
First Place: Debra Bonita Shaw, "Sex and the Single Starship Captain: Compulsory Heterosexuality and Star Trek: Voyager"
Second Place: R.C. Dorozario, "The Consequences of Disney Anthropomorphism"
Third Place: C.S'Thembile West, "The Competing Demands of Community Survival and Self-Preservation in Octavia Butler's Kindred"
Fourth Place Tie: Cristy Dwyer, "Queen Lili'uokalani's Imprisonment Quilt: Indomitable Spirits in Protest Cloth"; Rebekah Sheldon. "Reproductive Futurism and Feminist Rhetoric: Joanna Russ's We Who Are About To. . . "; Eric M. Drown, "business Girls and Beset Men in Pulp Science Fiction and Science Fiction Fandom"
Honorable Mention: Ritch Calvin, "'This Shapeless Book': Reception in Joana Russ's The Female Man"
Nominees and winners for memoirs:
1: 8.1/2: Jane Davis, "The Value of Stupidity: Negative Values in Academia"
2: 8.1/2: Batya Weinbaum, "Memoirs of an Academic Career"
3: 8.1/2: Tina Andres, "Growing Thick Skin"
Poetry:
First place: Susan McLean, "Siren," 7.1, 2006.
Second place: Phebe Beiser, "Celebrating Holi," 10.1, 2009.
Third place: Glennis Redmond, "Scripted Hope," 7.1, 2006
Art: Cover Nominations:
1: 10.2: Kartika Affandi, Vinity or Aragon, 2006
2: 9.1: Helen Klebassadel, "Regeneration"
3: 7.1: Menoukha Case, "Ascent: Yes!"
4: 7.2: Jenna Weston, "The Grain Goddess"
5: 6.2: Diane B. Lekovic, "Burning City"
And the winners are:
First place: Helen Klebasadel, Regeneration; created 1999
Second place: Kartika Affandi, Vinity or Aragon, created 2006
Third place: Jenna Weston, The Grain Goddess, created 2001
Best special issue or themed section:
6.1: "Speculative Black Women: Magic, Fantasy and the Supernatural," Ed. Gwendolyn Pough and Yolanda Hood.
Reviews:
First: "Having a Good Cry by Robyn Warhol," Reviewed by Erin Smith, 6.2
Second: "Slayage: The Online International Journal of Buffy Studies, eds. Rhonda Wilcox and David Lavery," Reviewed by Tanya Cochran, 6.2
Third: "The Rat Laughs by Nava Semel," Reviewed by Lank Ravin, 9.1
Other short-listed reviews:
"Demeter and Persephone: Lessons from a Myth by Tamara Agha-Jaffar," Reviewed by Simone Roberts, 6.2
"Women Write Pulp (Dorothy B. Hughes, In a Lonely Place, Faith Baldwin, Skyscraper, Valerie Taylor, The Girls in 3-B, from the Series, Femmes Fatales)," Reviewed by Erin Smith 6.1
"Crafting the Witch: Engendering Magic in Medieval and Early Modern England by Heidi Breuer," Reviewed by Emily Auger, 10.2
"An Introduction to Western Esotericism by Nadya Q. Chishty-Mujahid," Reviewed by Emily Auger, 10.2
"Dearest Anne by Juduth Katzier," Reviewed by Lani Ravin, 9.1
We thank everyone involved. Look forward to a publication of The Best of Femspec: The First Ten Years, a forthcoming anthology of Femspec Books, and to further contests.
Monday, June 20, 2011
Sunday, June 5, 2011
Calls for papers and special issues
We have calls for papers currently operating for Divination as Speculative Literature (previously Tarot in Culture but modified to be more culturally inclusive); Motherhood in SF (formerly Kick Ass Mothers in SF but this got no submissions so we expanded); and Myth, Women and Art.
If you are interested in any of these please scroll through the archives or email us at femspec@aol.com.
Calls for papers when developed with an individual usually continue even if the individual working on the issue or themed section has moved on for some reason or decided not to complete the project. As this happens often due to discovery of the workload, illness, job loss, break-ups, needing to move or to defend a disseration, or a tenure struggle, over the years we have decided to pick up on and continue many special issues so as not to be drained of our resources going into the issues that otherwise would have been advertised by us and fizzled out. We will continue to do this to the best of our abilities, but since special issues notoriously take more time and energy than general queues, we are also not committed to coninuing all special issues if none of the edtors is particularly interested in doing the work.
Having said that, one of our interns who since moved on developed a call for a special issue about Halloween and related holidays which was circulated.So if anyone wants to come forward to pick up on that, since we are currently letting that one go, please let us know.
The two special issues edited by others are now Paula Gunn Allen, in its second stage of review but awaiting complete subscription payment, and Elisabeth Vonarburg in its first stage of reviw and all paid up. At this point, either of these could be issue 11.2 depending on receipt of completely revised manuscripts and funding. Or, as has happened in the past, if the PGA special issue is not completely subscribed and completed to our satisfaction we may pursue the ability to use sections of it as part of a general queue.
We are also interested in doing a Joanna Russ Tribute if anyone wants to coordinate it. Currently interviews with board members and others are planned.
We appeciate your respect for our scarce time and energy and any interest in keeping this fantastic though fragile journal afloat...which miraculously has continued to occur for a number of years.
If you are interested in any of these please scroll through the archives or email us at femspec@aol.com.
Calls for papers when developed with an individual usually continue even if the individual working on the issue or themed section has moved on for some reason or decided not to complete the project. As this happens often due to discovery of the workload, illness, job loss, break-ups, needing to move or to defend a disseration, or a tenure struggle, over the years we have decided to pick up on and continue many special issues so as not to be drained of our resources going into the issues that otherwise would have been advertised by us and fizzled out. We will continue to do this to the best of our abilities, but since special issues notoriously take more time and energy than general queues, we are also not committed to coninuing all special issues if none of the edtors is particularly interested in doing the work.
Having said that, one of our interns who since moved on developed a call for a special issue about Halloween and related holidays which was circulated.So if anyone wants to come forward to pick up on that, since we are currently letting that one go, please let us know.
The two special issues edited by others are now Paula Gunn Allen, in its second stage of review but awaiting complete subscription payment, and Elisabeth Vonarburg in its first stage of reviw and all paid up. At this point, either of these could be issue 11.2 depending on receipt of completely revised manuscripts and funding. Or, as has happened in the past, if the PGA special issue is not completely subscribed and completed to our satisfaction we may pursue the ability to use sections of it as part of a general queue.
We are also interested in doing a Joanna Russ Tribute if anyone wants to coordinate it. Currently interviews with board members and others are planned.
We appeciate your respect for our scarce time and energy and any interest in keeping this fantastic though fragile journal afloat...which miraculously has continued to occur for a number of years.
Anonymous peer review process: read if you are editing for us
http://www.publicationethics.org/
Above is the link that is mandatory for all new editors and special issue or themed sections editors to read.
In the past it has occurred that special issue editors do not understand the importance of anonymous peer review, or the importance of removing themselves from the review procss if there is a conflct of interest in expressed opinion.
Femspec prizes itself on being a peer reviewed journal as this helps with legitimacy for those in academe getting tenured.
Even if you are a specialist in the field editing a special issue for us or with us you must peer review, rather than review yourself knowing the names of the submitters, in order toprotect the standards of the journal.
Thnk you very much.
Above is the link that is mandatory for all new editors and special issue or themed sections editors to read.
In the past it has occurred that special issue editors do not understand the importance of anonymous peer review, or the importance of removing themselves from the review procss if there is a conflct of interest in expressed opinion.
Femspec prizes itself on being a peer reviewed journal as this helps with legitimacy for those in academe getting tenured.
Even if you are a specialist in the field editing a special issue for us or with us you must peer review, rather than review yourself knowing the names of the submitters, in order toprotect the standards of the journal.
Thnk you very much.
WisCon and other recent adventures
Femspec offered its products for sale at a table at WisCon Memorial Day weekend, and made many new connections with future people interested in working on the journal and submitting materials for future issues such as women, myth and art, motherhood in sf, and divination.
We also had our awards party and celebration of the Best of Femspec's Second Five Years, on Sunday night. From 9 pm til 2 am the next morning, we read aloud from previous Femspecs with whomever came in, thus publicizing our winners as well as other authors.
All were amazed at the high quality of work we have been publishing, particular the fiction. Gina Wisker's "Recruitment" was a winner at about 1 am. We also read aloud most of the creative writing in the winning Special Issue, 6.2, African American Women's Speculative Works. By the next day, we had sold out of the entire issue.
Another awards party was also organized at the Popular Culture Association in San Antonio, at which two of the winners were present to behonored.
Look for us in the Exhibit Hall at National Women's Studies in Atlanta, in Nov., where we will have our final and third awards party for the second five years winners.
Good news--although we had decided to publish The Best of Femspec: Creative Writing from the First Ten Years ourselves, and launch it at the next PCA, the editor of Aqueduct Press said she would also like to work on it. So if anyone wants to help get it together, let me know.
I only went to two sessions, besides the one where I read from my novel. One was a Remembering Joanna Russ, at which I recruited contributors to the Joanna Russ Memorial Tribute. Still open...
And another was one on reproductive justice, which left me open to doing a special issue on the topic if anyone is interested.
Happy summer,
Batya
We also had our awards party and celebration of the Best of Femspec's Second Five Years, on Sunday night. From 9 pm til 2 am the next morning, we read aloud from previous Femspecs with whomever came in, thus publicizing our winners as well as other authors.
All were amazed at the high quality of work we have been publishing, particular the fiction. Gina Wisker's "Recruitment" was a winner at about 1 am. We also read aloud most of the creative writing in the winning Special Issue, 6.2, African American Women's Speculative Works. By the next day, we had sold out of the entire issue.
Another awards party was also organized at the Popular Culture Association in San Antonio, at which two of the winners were present to behonored.
Look for us in the Exhibit Hall at National Women's Studies in Atlanta, in Nov., where we will have our final and third awards party for the second five years winners.
Good news--although we had decided to publish The Best of Femspec: Creative Writing from the First Ten Years ourselves, and launch it at the next PCA, the editor of Aqueduct Press said she would also like to work on it. So if anyone wants to help get it together, let me know.
I only went to two sessions, besides the one where I read from my novel. One was a Remembering Joanna Russ, at which I recruited contributors to the Joanna Russ Memorial Tribute. Still open...
And another was one on reproductive justice, which left me open to doing a special issue on the topic if anyone is interested.
Happy summer,
Batya
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)