Call for Papers: StageStruck! 6: Women and the American Musical
Convenor: Dominic Broomfield-McHugh and the Library of Congress Music Division
Committee: Mark Eden Horowitz, Caitlin Miller, Colleen Montgomery, Stacy Wolf
Location: Library of Congress, Washington D.C.
14-16 May 2025
The centrality of women as artists to the American musical on stage and screen has long been acknowledged by scholarship (e.g. Coleman and Sebesta, 2008). The organization Maestra has helped to make the contribution of women and nonbinary creatives to American musical theatre more visible (maestramusic.org); the representation of women within musicals has been analysed (e.g. Wolf, 2002 and 2011; Garcia, 2019); and academic studies of important women who are theatre and film makers (e.g. Greenspan on Dorothy Fields, 2010; Peck on Rida Johnson Young, 2020) have appeared.
Yet there is much more to be done. This special edition of StageStruck! at the Library of Congress will focus on the latest scholarship related to women in and around the American musical in all formats and media, and will showcase the Library’s rich collections related to the subject.
The committee interprets the conference theme broadly; possible topics for presentations may include:
- Women as book writers, lyricists, composers, and screenwriters
- The representation of women in musicals
- Performers and performance
- Women as producers, directors, lighting designers, set designers, arrangers, orchestrators, musical directors, and other creative figures
- The experience of women working in and around musicals
- Intersectionality and feminist theory
- Women as audience members
- Women involved in promoting and advertising musicals
- Women performing songs from musicals outside of context (e.g. Ella Fitzgerald’s songbook albums)
Proposals for individual papers (20 minutes + 10 minutes of discussion) or for a 90-minute pre-constituted panel (three papers + discussion) should be submitted to d.mchugh@sheffield.ac.uk by 19 August 2024. Engagement with the Library of Congress’s collections in proposals is very welcome but not required. Proposals should be 250 words for a standard presentation or 500 words for a panel.
The Library of Congress is home to one of the world’s preeminent music collections. With over 25 million items in its custody, the Music Division preserves and provides access to general music collections comprising musical scores, instructional books, and music literature, as well as special collections that include the personal papers of notable creative artists, the business papers of publishers and artistic foundations, and more. Special collections related to women and musicals include Pearl Bailey, Peggy Clark, Barbara Cook, Katherine Dunham, Sylvia Fine, Dolores Gray, Harriet Hoctor, Yuriko and Susan Kikuchi, Florence Klotz, Ethel Merman, Mary Rodgers, Jeanine Tesori, Gwen Verdon, and many more.
The StageStruck! conference has previously been held at the University of Sheffield (2014, 2016), at the Great American Songbook Foundation (2018, 2024) and online (2021).