Introduction to “Chronotopes of Gender”

Abstract The authors in this special issue explore the ways in which chronotopes are often gendered and gender performance is chronotopic. Articles examine a diverse range of discourses—tradwives, Chinese beauty influencers, paleofantasy health trends, Kiowa War Mothers, and Swahili-language Islamic marital advice—and unpack the ways that notions of gender rely on particular constructions of the “here-and-now” in contrast to various “theres-and-thens.” As this special issue demonstrates, one is not just a gendered subject; one is a particular type of gendered subject, and those types are embedded in imagined times and places.