The Summer issue of Signs is out now! As fascism accelerates in the US, this issue addresses some of the questions feminist scholarship tackles best: trans rights, abortion, care, socialist histories, feminist businesses & digital activism.

Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society | Vol 51, No 4

This article offers a critical feminist analysis of the perversions of care that appear in moments when care is instrumentalized by neoliberal and fascist states to cover for financial cuts and…

journals.uchicago.edu

“In an era where trans people often figure as phantoms, devoid of their names and personal stories, the authors remind us that this 'debate' begins by stripping trans athletes of their full humanity.” - Elizabeth Sharrow Check out this Short Takes on Fair Game!

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org

To close out #Pride, check out our Ask a Feminist “Trump’s Anti-Trans, Anti-Gender Executive Orders” with Libby Adler and K.J. Rawson, discussing Trump's 2025 “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government" signsjournal.org/trumps-anti-...

Trump’s Anti-Trans, Anti-Gender Executive Orders, A Conversation with Libby Adler and K.J. Rawson

signsjournal.org

To close out #Pride, check out our Ask a Feminist “Trump’s Anti-Trans, Anti-Gender Executive Orders” with Libby Adler and K.J. Rawson, discussing Trump's 2025 “Defending Women from Gender Ideology Extremism and Restoring Biological Truth to the Federal Government" signsjournal.org/trumps-anti-...

Trump’s Anti-Trans, Anti-Gender Executive Orders, A Conversation with Libby Adler and K.J. Rawson

signsjournal.org

#HappyPrideMonth! Check out our multimedia archives “Signs Resources for Trans Rights and Justice” & “Radical Feminism and Trans Rights,” accompanying Breanne Fahs’s essay “The Urgent Need for Radical Feminism Today.” signsjournal.org/catharine-a-...

Catharine A. MacKinnon, “Exploring Transgender Law and Politics”

Digital Archive: To accompany this Feminist Frictions essay, Signs invites you to explore two previously independently prepared resources related to the themes in “Exploring Transgender Law a…

signsjournal.org

“What Do We Learn About Protecting Trans/Queer Youth If We Ask a Lesbian Feminist?” Matt Richardson explores the experiences of Stacy D., a Black trans lesbian femme, emphasizing "life as an ongoing quest for self-discovery & community.” #HappyPrideMonth www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

Check out Julia Golda Harris’ “Womanly Sounds: Women’s Music and Lesbian Transfeminisms and Transphobias in the 1970s,” which offers musical engagement “as a potent tool for claiming lesbian selfhood in the face of transphobic oppression.” #HappyPrideMonth www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

Womanly Sounds: Women’s Music and Lesbian Transfeminisms and Transphobias in the 1970s | Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society: Vol 51, No 1

AbstractWhy did the most significant conflicts over trans inclusion and exclusion in US lesbian feminist spaces in the late twentieth century take place within women’s music settings? Such incidents i...

journals.uchicago.edu

#HappyPrideMonth! Tamara Lea Spira’s “Queering Families: Reproductive Justice in Precarious Times,” draws from queer ancestors to imagine queer reproductive futurity "within abolitionist, anti-imperialist & anti-colonial movements for justice and life.’” www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

Queering Families: Reproductive Justice in Precarious Times. By Tamara Lea Spira. University of California Press, 2025. | Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society: Vol 51, No 3

journals.uchicago.edu

Read Emily K. Hobson’s “Women/Lesbian/Prison/Trans? Categories of Mobilization in the Campaign to Change the Definition of AIDS” to learn about campaigns that proved "generative for queer politics & the politics of prison abolition.” #HappyPride www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

Women/Lesbian/Prison/Trans? Categories of Mobilization in the Campaign to Change the Definition of AIDS | Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society: Vol 51, No 2

AbstractFrom 1989 through 1993, a coalition of activists fought to convince the United States Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to expand its diagnostic criteria for AIDS and through this to compel th...

journals.uchicago.edu

#HappyPride! Learn about Marxist-feminist community in Annelise Heinz & Judith Raiskin’s “’It Was Mythic’: Starflower Natural Foods and Lesbian Collective Space,” examining Starflower’s “radical experiment rooted in and oriented toward wider social change.” www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/signs/20...

Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society | Vol 51, No 2

journals.uchicago.edu

Check out Cati Connell’s “The Lesbian-Identified Lesbian: Lesbian Feminisms for a Post-Binary Future,” urging reconceptualization of gendered and sexual power, toward "a framework for how to live in an increasingly unlivable world.” #Pride www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/10.1086/...

Happy #PrideMonth! Revisit the “Lesbian Studies, Now” special issue, which “affirms that to begin with lesbian is to begin with possibilities for survival, solidarity & radical world making” through feminist engagement within a thriving scholarly field. www.journals.uchicago.edu/toc/signs/20...

Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society | Vol 51, No 1

journals.uchicago.edu

Kara Swanson’s discussion of A Woman’s Work digs into Cleghorn’s sweeping history of “patriarchal motherhood,” where across millennia the same story repeats: control over women’s bodies, dressed up as law, medicine, or morality. Check out the new Signs Short Takes here: buff.ly/Bc4sMzN

What COVID exposed about childcare wasn’t new—it was centuries in the making. Alicia Modestino on A Woman’s Work is a powerful reminder that care has always been essential, and persistently undervalued. Check out her response in our latest Short Takes: buff.ly/Bc4sMzN

From ancient midwives to modern activists, Elinor Cleghorn's A Woman's Work spans 3000+ years of maternal resistance. Join Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara Swanson in conversation, here: buff.ly/Bc4sMzN

“Mothering beyond the biological” is a radical, historical practice. In her comment on A Woman’s Work, Amanda Montei traces how histories of care, coercion, and resistance unsettle both tradwife nostalgia and liberal “choice” feminism. Read our new Short Takes here:

Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work

Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara W. Swanson discuss Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work, with a response from Cleghorn!

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In our new Short Takes, Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara Swanson discuss Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work, which challenges patriarchal constructions of motherhood and documents grassroots movements for bodily autonomy and maternal agency. Read it here! signsjournal.org/elinor-clegh...

Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work

Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara W. Swanson discuss Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work, with a response from Cleghorn!

signsjournal.org

New Short Takes just published! Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara W. Swanson discuss Elinor Cleghorn's new book A Woman's Work: Reclaiming the Radical History of Motherhood. Check it out for free!

Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work

Alicia Modestino, Amanda Montei, and Kara W. Swanson discuss Elinor Cleghorn’s A Woman’s Work, with a response from Cleghorn!

signsjournal.org

"The knowledge that feminist theory has produced has permeated the humanities and interpretive social sciences. The reason we're a target is because there's no going back. The work that we've done is everywhere." — @jennifercnash.bsky.social of @feministstudies.bsky.social

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

“If institutions can fold, they can also unfold.” — Debjani Chakravarty, coeditor of @frontiersjournal.bsky.social Our new Ask a Feminist looks at backlash against gender studies and the stubborn survival of feminist scholarship in the US context and beyond.

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

"As crises get stacked, we are in need of new forms to address them." Patti Duncan, editor of Feminist Formations, discusses the proliferation of genres and methods in response to the current moment. Read or listen at the link!

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

Scholarly journal editors talking about feminist scholarly writing under authoritarianism. Thanks @signsjournal.org for including us!

Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society@signsjournal.org · 3mo ago

What does it mean to mentor feminist grad students when programs are shrinking and jobs are disappearing? Editors describe using the editorial process itself as feminist mentoring and solidarity work. New Ask a Feminist, out now!

What does it mean to mentor feminist grad students when programs are shrinking and jobs are disappearing? Editors describe using the editorial process itself as feminist mentoring and solidarity work. New Ask a Feminist, out now!

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

Programs closing, departments under attack, digital hate campaigns, AI reshaping publishing—how can feminist journals respond? Hear editors from across the field think through crisis, strategy, & care in our new Ask a Feminist w/ @jennifercnash.bsky.social, Debjani Chakravarty, & Patti Duncan.

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

New Ask a Feminist! Editors from @feministstudies.bsky.social, @frontiersjournal.bsky.social, Feminist Formations, and Signs explore how Trump 2.0's attacks on WGS are affecting the production of feminist scholarship. Read or listen for free!

Feminist Scholarly Writing under Authoritarianism, a Conversation with Debjani Chakravarty, Patti Duncan, and Jennifer C. Nash

Editors of the interdisciplinary journals Feminist Studies, Feminist Formations, Frontiers, and Signs discuss the second Trump administration’s attacks on women’s and gender studies.

signsjournal.org

@christinakahrl.bsky.social: "What are sports for? The answer is that they are for all of us, and as [Roscher and Baeth] make clear, our enjoyment of them should not be freighted with expectations about gender or genderized perceptions of performance."

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org

@maggiemertens.bsky.social: "The idea that transgender women are out to ruin women’s sports has become a political sparkplug firing up both right-wing politicians &, sometimes, those w/ outdated ideas about feminism. (i.e., that feminism is about protecting women and not equal opportunity for all)."

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org

“In an era where trans people often figure as phantoms, devoid of their names and personal stories, the authors remind us that this 'debate' begins by stripping trans athletes of their full humanity.” - Elizabeth Sharrow Check out this Short Takes on Fair Game!

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org

Was honored to be asked by @signsjournal.org to review the book Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports by Anna Baeth and Ellie Roscher alongside the brilliant @christinakahrl.bsky.social & @esharrow.bsky.social More conversations like this! signsjournal.org/fair-game-tr...

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org

How does taking seriously the experiences of trans athletes alter the terms of the debate about sports participation? @christinakahrl.bsky.social, @maggiemertens.bsky.social, & Elizabeth Sharrow discuss in their reflections on Ellie Roscher & Anna Baeth's Fair Game. signsjournal.org/fair-game-tr...

Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports

Christina Kahrl, Maggie Mertens, and Elizabeth Sharrow discuss Fair Game: Trans Athletes and the Future of Sports, with a response from authors Ellie Roscher and Anna Baeth.

signsjournal.org