Sex is a crucial terrain of struggles over power, identity, and freedom in the digital age. New technologies are reshaping sexual practices from AI companions and VR simulated intimacy, to sexual deepfakes and algorithmic moderation of sexual content online. The sex work industry has been altered by the rise of digital platform labour, whilst age-old debates over (de)criminalisation rage strong. Across the globe, religio-conservative interest groups are mobilising to fight against comprehensive sex education, as well as LGBTQIA+ inclusive curricula, at a time when digital access to sexual (health) information is also increasing. Similarly, the fight for reproductive justice has intensified as sexual and reproductive rights have been rolled back in many countries, and reproductive governance remains informed by racialised injustices across the globe. This conference attends to the interlocking and conflicting facets of contemporary sexual politics. We invite contributions from researchers, activists, artists, and other stakeholders who consider sex through feminist, anti-racist, decolonial, and trans-inclusive perspectives. Across five thematic strands, this conference will interrogate the multiple sexual politics of the present.
Strand 1: Constituting Sexual Subjects
How are contemporary sexual subjects constituted? What role does violence play in this context? How is the nation-state produced through its sexual subjects, and vice versa? How are gendered and racialised subjectivities negotiated in sex education, healthcare, and policy among other contexts, including different kinds of sex itself? And how does capitalism shape these processes?
Strand 2: Sex and Resistance
We are interested in exploring the diverse ways in which sex can be a space and practice of resistance to established ideas of pleasure, safety, and consent, gendered expectations, and wider social and cultural norms. We are especially interested in critical reflections on the resurgence of moral panics around sex as part of contemporary conservative backlash against women’s and LGBTQIA+ rights in general and trans rights, communities, and lives in particular.
Strand 3: The Political Economy of Sex
This strand is interested in single-context case studies, as well as transnational perspectives on the political economy of sex. We are interested in different perspectives on sex under contemporary capitalism and in the digital age, including, but not limited to, the commodification of sex, sex work including working conditions and unionisation, and sex tourism.
Strand 4: Sex in Culture
This strand explores the role of sex (and dating) in contemporary culture, as well as its historic roots and future possibilities. We are interested both in how sex is thought and talked about, as well as what an attention to sex may illuminate about contemporary society and culture. In particular, we are curious about reflections on discourses about sex in contemporary art and cultural productions, including pornography.
Strand 5: The Future of Sex
This strand looks into the future of sex, through technological innovation, the imagination and prefiguration of liberatory sexual futures, as well as the anticipation of regressive counter currents. We are looking for contributions that creatively interrogate future technological and social practices around sex, as well as practices that prefigure such futures in the present.
Contributions may include all kinds of intervention, including academic, performative and artistic, among others. As part of the conference, we will also organise a fair for artists, non-profit organisations and activist groups who wish to present or exhibit their work and welcome such proposals. Please submit your proposed contributions in an abstract of no more than 200 words to this form here by Thursday 30th April 2026. We aim to confirm all successful proposals by the 7th May 2026. If you have any questions, you are welcome to contact us at femperspectivesconference26@gmail.com.
Part of our aim is to create new and perhaps unexpected connections between works on diverse aspects of the politics of sex. Please note that on this occasion we will therefore not accept submissions for entire panels.
Thank you for your interest!
Feminist Perspectives