Member Opportunities

A Space for Community

The National Women's Studies Association community is comprised of artists, co-conspirators, creatives, dreamers, educators, multi-hyphenates and Feminist Freedom Warriors who remain the source of our Association’s vibrancy as well as strength.

As we grow and shift to meet the needs of our field of study and practice, address the socio-historical dimensions of our political landscape, and make real feminist futures, we strive to leverage the expertise and experience of our members. This may entail serving on committees, task-forces, or as collaborators in Constituency Group-led initiatives.

Read Our Bylaws

So, all of us would do well to stop fighting each other for our space at the bottom, because there ain't no more room.

~ Cheryl Clarke

Join A Constituency Group

Current Members of NWSA can join and participate in Constituency Groups, which are member-driven spaces focused on facilitating networks of support, exploring scholarly and activist topics, professional standards within subsets of the discipline, and fostering community connections based upon shared socio-political locations.

Constituency Groups also invite leadership development for members and support the NWSA vision in strengthening the reach of a WGSS-grounded education. NWSA offers four different avenues of connecting with peers: Caucuses, NWSA Core Committees, Interest Groups, and Task Forces.

Explore our resources to learn more about each of these community spaces! You can also review Article VII of our Bylaws, which names the importance of our Constituency Groups.

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Upcoming Events List

The Writer’s Nest

Mar 12, 01:00 PM - 03:00 PM (ET)
Transnational Feminist Pedagogies: Practical Applications for the GWST Classroom

Mar 19, 06:30 PM - 07:30 PM (ET)

2026 Women of Color Leadership Project Call for Facilitators

The National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA) offers the Women of Color Leadership Project (WoCLP) annually as a pre-conference initiative for Association members. This day-long professional development experience is designed to increase the number of Women and Non-Binary People of Color students, staff, and faculty members whose work is anchored in Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality studies, as well as educators within Women’s, Gender, and Equity Centers (WGECs).

The WoCLP functions cohort-style with an intimate number of accepted applicants and workshop/discussed-based sessions. Our goal is to offer meaningful professional and personal development for historically disenfranchised communities of color through a WGSS-informed lens of community building, resource sharing, care, and leadership development. Therefore, WoCLP strives to have an impact on the levels of participation and leadership of folks of color in the field and NWSA as a whole.

The WoCLP is housed within the Association’s Women of Color Caucus (WoCC) and is developed alongside key stakeholders including, but not limited to, members of the NWSA Board of Directors, current WoCC members, WoCLP alumni, as well as partners at sibling organizations/collectives. Therefore, we are excited to share our 2026 Call for Workshop Proposals for interested NWSA members who hold expertise in women of color feminisms, leadership development, program and administration development, and capacity building.

Have questions? You can connect with our Women of Color Caucus Chair, Dr. Stephanie Andrea Allen at woccc@nwsa.org

Submit your Proposal Here

46th Annual Conference Committees : Call for Volunteers

The NWSA honors the practice of working with members in the hopes of leveraging their expertise, awareness, and creativity through our Annual Conference Committees. As we begin conference planning there are a number of committees available for members to join as volunteers. These working committees collaborate with the National Office, Governing Council, and Conference Co-Chairs throughout conference planning. We're hoping to work alongside members for the following focus areas:

The Local Committee invites members with particular relationships to the conference site to strengthen our commitment to attending place/space in conference planning. Local Committee Members may work and/or live in Atlanta or generally in the Atlanta metropolitan area. We also welcome volunteers who previously worked in or grew up in Atlanta as well.

The Access and Inclusion Committee helps curate how we fortify access and inclusion initiatives at the Annual Conference and develop resources to enact a culture of inclusion beyond reasonable accommodations amongst our presenters and attendees.

Our Proposal Review Committee works alongside our Governing Council in the thoughtful review of conference proposals, the grouping of accepted individual paper submissions, and assists in the intentional design of General Session scheduling.
Our Book Prizes Review Committee support four (4) of our long-standing membership awards. Each year, the Association offers multiple awards in celebration of dynamic, innovative, and exciting scholarship. We are proud to work in coordination with different NWSA Constituency Groups, partners, and publications to make these awards possible. In preparation for our 2025 Book Awards cycle, we are opening our call for reviewers to active and experienced NWSA members. If you are interested in serving on one of our four (4) Book Award Committees, you may find more information on each Book prize by exploring our "Awards & Scholarship" webpage.
- Gloria E. Anzaldúa Book Prize
- Alison Piepmeier Book Prize
- Sara A. Whaley Book Prize
- NWSA/University of Illinois Press First Book Prize

The 2026 Respondent Committee works with President Jessica N. Pabón to seed intergenerational connections between emerging and junior scholars and their more seasoned and established counterparts. We invite senior scholars, cultural workers, and possibility models interested in serving as respondents for conference sessions and programs.

Each committee may have separate and distinct volunteer parameters or service commitments. Please explore each Committee Interest Form to learn more and submit your details!