The Daughters of Themis is a network for all scholars who identify as women business scholars, in all areas of scholarship pertaining to business, including but not limited to law, economics, management and administration, political science, sociology, and natural sciences.
The workshop theme
The 2023 Workshop Theme on intersectionality and business recognises the paramount importance of a diversity of voices and unique experiences in the multi-layered aspects of business and its ancillaries. Kimberle Crenshaw is credited with coining the term intersectionality in 1989, although claims about the interconnectedness of race, class, gender, sexuality, and other social identities were part of the everyday life experiences of many marginalised social groups activities and of other academic writings before that as well. It was added to the Oxford Dictionary in 2015 and defined as ‘the interconnected nature of social categorisations such as race, class, and gender, regarded as creating overlapping and interdependent systems of discrimination or disadvantage’. It is a powerful analytical framework and tool for academic scholarship, and a compelling driver for societal, policy, and legislative movement, change and development.
As scholars, practitioners, and citizens in our different communities, we can see intersectionality as a call to go beyond conversations about equal opportunities, equal progression, and equal experiences. The realities of living in the 21st century mean that equality is often misconstrued with equity; that discrimination and disadvantages take many shapes in the Maslow-like hierarchy of discrimination and disadvantages. New awareness and understandings of systemic problems in societies, relevant for business and more broadly for our societies, economies and for the individual form the backdrop for this call. The workshop wishes to explore intersectionality and business in ways that will make us rethink how oppressive power structures are placed, how structural and systemic inequalities can permeate many aspects of just ‘being’ and ‘existing’, and how we might be able to use this knowledge to reorient and centre voices and experiences of marginalised communities. Hence, the theme of this workshop encourages participants to use the lens and narratives of intersectionality, in theoretical or practically oriented analyses concerning business.
Fig. 1 Examples of some social markers of difference that can be analysed through the Intersectionality framework (Source: Womankind Worldwide website)
We invite proposals from all disciplines and across disciplines that engage with the overarching theme of intersectionality and business, regardless of the author’s background or position, since we are all situated and contextualised social actors in the production of research.
- Equitable approaches to equality, diversity, and inclusion in business
- Disabilities and the workplace: The changing landscape(s) of discrimination laws
- Equitable and conscious businesses
- Gender, race, nationality, and business policies
- Anti-racist policies for business
- Methodological approaches to measure and/or engage with intersectionality theory and praxis
- The multidimensionality of discrimination experiences and the challenges to an intersectional approach of law and institutions
- Global structures of inequality and the decolonial feminism lens
- The spectrum of diversity and the key elements for inclusion in business
- Intersectionality, business, and sustainability
Submission of abstracts and working papers
The title of your paper and an abstract of no more than 500 words should be submitted via this online form by 6 January 2023. Successful participants will be notified by 6 February 2023. The selection of participants will be competitive, based on the quality and thematic fit of the submitted abstract with the workshop theme.
Timely submission of working papers is a pre-condition for participation in the workshop. Short working papers of a maximum of 2,500 words, including footnotes, will be due by 8 May 2023.
A peer-reviewed joint publication of selected workshop papers is envisaged. We will therefore only accept original research, which is not submitted for publication elsewhere, and we request that the workshop participants commit to this publication process within a reasonable timeline, to be agreed upon at the workshop and/or further related communications.
About the workshop
The Daughters of Themis Annual Workshops are deliberately designed to be small, welcoming, and in-depth. Our Annual Workshops are a warm and supportive space in which constructive, critical, and inspiring dialogues can take place between participants, whilst nourishing the mind and body in a peaceful and idyllic natural setting.
Workshop spaces are limited to 12 participants, so that each participant can benefit from extended discussion of their work. The workshop sessions are shaped to ensure interactive discussion with two commentators assigned to each paper.
The workshop will be held from Tuesday 30 May 2023 to Friday 2 June 2023 at the Cavo Perlevos Guesthouse on the Greek island of Kea. We offer an optional pre-workshop social day on Kea on Monday 29 May 2023 for participants and an optional post-workshop social day on Saturday, 3 June 2023.
Further details about travel and accommodation will be given to the selected participants. A reasonable self-cost workshop fee will be payable by the selected participants. The workshop fee will cover accommodation at Cavo Perlevos as well as lunches and dinners from Monday, 30 May 2023 to Saturday, 2 June 2023. The workshop fee and other travel and accommodations costs are to be funded by the scholar herself.
Funding
The network, unfortunately, has no general funding available for participants. However, we have managed to secure funds to contribute to costs for one or two participants. We wish to include female business scholars from lower-income countries in our network, and especially encourage submissions from existing or potential new members in such countries, while the possibility to apply for financial assistance is open to all members. Please provide a short justification in the financial hardship section of the online form and let us know whether funding is a prerequisite for your attendance.
Contact Information
For further information, please email either Dr. Pin Lean Lau (PinLean.Lau@brunel.ac.uk) or Dr. Yue S. Ang (dr.yue.ang@gmail.com).
Organising Committee for the 2023 Workshop
Sanja Mihalić, PhD candidate, Attorney-at-Law and Partner, Mihalić & Pikija LLC, Zagreb, Croatia
Dr. Yue S. Ang, Associate Professor, School of Law and Social Sciences, London South Bank University, England
Dr. Pin Lean Lau, Assistant Professor, Brunel Law School, Brunel University London, England
Lívia Gil Guimarães, PhD Candidate, Faculty of Law, University of São Paulo, Brazil
Logistics on the ground in Greece: Professor Beate Sjåfjell, University of Oslo