On behalf of Middle Tennessee State University's Women's and Gender Studies Program, I cordially invite you to join us at our Global Discourses on Women's and Gender Studies conference, March 24 - 26, 2011, on the campus of Middle Tennessee State University in Murfreesboro, TN. (Murfreesboro is about 30 miles southeast of Nashville, TN).

Our keynote speaker is internationally-renowned Cambodian sex slave trade survivor and anti-human trafficking activist Somaly Mam. Mam has dedicated her life to exposing the multi-million dollar global sex trade industry and to campaigning against the trafficking of human beings, particularly the trafficking and sexual exploitation of women and children. Her work in this area, including the founding of the Somaly Mam Foundation http://www.somaly.org, has led to enormous international recognition. For example, she was featured as a CNN Hero in 2006, named one of Time Magazine's "100 Most Influential People of 2009,"; and was the recipient of the first "Roland Berger Human Dignity Award.";

Our conference theme and choice of keynote speaker reflect our interest in promoting feminist perspectives that foreground connections between the local/national and the global in exploring issues and ideas related to women's and/or gendered existence. We are also interested in foregrounding inter- and multi-disciplinary work and therefore encourage presentations from all fields and in a variety of formats. We welcome proposals for individual paper presentations, panel sessions, round table discussions, performances, short films, and posters.

We aim to make this conference a very satisfying experience for all participants; consequently, we have the following:

• Very reasonable conference costs. (Please see registration information.)

• Single panel per session conference format. This format worked extremely well at our 2009 conference as it provided the opportunity for larger audiences at sessions, substantive audience engagement with material presented, and sustained exchange of ideas among presenters and conference participants. This format also promotes interaction among conference participants that can contribute to a positive conference experience.

• Professional development workshop. This workshop is free and open to all registered participants.

• Film Series

We hope you will seriously consider attending the conference. We strive to make our conference a safe and comfortable space for sharing perspectives, ideas, and experiences. For updated conference information, please go to http://www.mtsu.edu/womenstu/conference/ or contact us at 615- 898-5910

Newtona (Tina) Johnson

Director, Women's and Gender Studies Program