Call for Papers for Special Issue - Women, Gender & Research
The theme of the special issue is: After the tipping point - New perspectives on Danish and Nordic trans studies. Deadline 7th of January.
Since 2014, when the international context reached what was coined “the transgender tipping point,” a new awareness and public conversation about trans existence and representation has emerged (Johnson, 2022; Straube, 2020). The trans perspective has become a more recogni-zed player on the minority political scene, just as trans people and trans lives are increasingly represented in art and culture – not just as objects, but as subjects of cultural and political production. However, more recently, we are witnessing a strong backlash, where transness increasingly serves as a symbolic focal point for conservative anti-gender agendas, which have already culminated in heightened violence (Johnson, 2022), and a series of international anti-trans policies, which is also mirrored in Danish/Nordic policies (Ekström, 2025).
This raises fundamental questions about how trans bodies and experiences are positioned within the shared cultural space – between visibility and precarity, representation and instrumentalization. What does it mean that trans visibility simultaneously appears as a sign of social and cultural progress, while also serving as a driving force behind anti-trans policies and violence? This so-called visibility paradox (Tourmaline et al., 2017) points to the dual position that the trans subject occupies in contemporary culture: both as a center of attention and as a figure of increased surveillance, regulation, and violence – a visibility that seems to promise recognition, but is often accompanied by renewed forms of control (DeLire, 2023).
In this publication of Kvinder, Køn & Forskning (Women, Gender & Science) we revisit the growing field of trans studies in a Danish and Nordic context. When Kvinder, Køn & Forskning published its first special issue on trans* in 2011, trans research was a diminutive Danish/Nordic research field, within which only a minority of researchers identified as belonging to a trans category themselves. Today, we have seen a shift where trans and nonbinary researchers are themselves leading the way in sociological, humanistic, and political science (though to a lesser extent in medical research). In this special issue, we therefore particularly invite contributions that include reflections on the significance of the situatedness and standpoint of the research. We also wish to highlight the latest trans research conducted in and/or about a specifically Nordic context.
Important deadlines:
- Abstract: January 7, 2026
- Reply from editors: February 1, 2026
- Final article (first draft): July 15, 2026
- Peer-reviews returned to authors: Sept 20, 2026
- Edited articles to be submitted from authors: Nov 1, 2026
Abstracts must be submitted through the website: https://tidsskrift.dk/KKF/information/authors