Inheritance

Historically and culturally, various social groups such as women and people of color have been excluded from inheritance. More recently, advances in reproductive technology have also complicated notions of inheritance and genealogy. In this issue, scholars and writers reveal the multiplicity and power relations underlying inheritance while considering the broader role of feminist and reconstructionist efforts in redefining lineages of literary and intellectual inheritance.

Maria Rice Bellamy is an Associate Professor of English at the College of Staten Island, City University of New York. Author of Bridges to Memory: Postmemory in Contemporary Ethnic American Women’s Fiction, Bellamy focuses on the generational effects of traumatic memory, postmemory, gender, and cultural identity in contemporary Ethnic and African American literature. She has been the recipient of numerous awards and fellowships including the PSC-CUNY Research Awards and the American Association of University Women’s American Fellowship.

Karen Weingarten is an Associate Professor and Acting Chair of English at Queens College, City University of New York. In her first book, Abortion in the American Imagination: Before Life and Choice, 1880-1940, she presents a genealogy of the liberal rhetoric surrounding abortion discourse. Her next research project examines the intersections and tensions between feminist theory, women’s reproductive lives, and disability studies.