CFP: Contemporary Action Women Panel (SCMS Conference)

From: Lisa Funnell [[email protected]]

CFP: Contemporary Action Women Panel

SCMS Conference

Chicago, IL, USA

March 6-10, 2013

The recent success of the Hollywood blockbusters *The Hunger Games *(2012)
and *The Avengers *(2012) has prompted critical discussions about the
commercial viability of action women in the global film market. The
heroines featured in these ensemble casts have been credited with
attracting female filmgoers to the theatre and boosting the box-office
performance of their films—*The Hunger Games *earned $700 million worldwide
while *The Avengers *has made over $1 billion at the box-office. The
popular appeal of these films and the heroines featured within them has
(re)opened the question as to whether these exists a (global) market for
female-driven action films; in other words, can female-centered action
narratives inspire comparable box-office returns to these ensemble cast
action films?



This panel will take up this line of discussion and explore how
contemporary action women negotiate heroic space in a genre that centers on
male stars and masculine performance. Attentive to the history of the
action genre and various cinematic traditions of action women, this panel
encourages new approaches to the study of contemporary action women working
in a range of national and transnational contexts. In particular, this
panel is calling for papers that examine contemporary heroines in relation
to the history of action women (in a particular tradition) and/or papers
that utilize the recent wave of heroines as a springboard for the
reconsideration of the significance/performance of previous action women.



Some possible topics include, but are not limited to:

·         a comparative analysis of different (waves of) action women

·         a consideration of female stars working in a range of industrial
contexts

·         the mobility and influence of stars and star images in the global
film market

·         the impact of production modes (e.g. co-productions) on the
representation of heroines

·         the influence of various media (e.g. videogames, fantasy novels)
on cinematic heroines



Interested panelists should send a 300-word abstract and a brief author bio
by August 1, 2012 to Dr. Lisa Funnell <[email protected]>.
Submitters will be notified by August 15th if their papers have been
accepted.


--
Lisa Funnell, Ph.D.
Women's and Gender Studies Program
University of Oklahoma


*Transnational Asian Identities in Pan-Pacific Cinemas: The Reel Asian
Exchange*

<www.routledge.com/9780415893541>