CONVERSATIONS

INTERVIEW WITH DR. DAVID FANCY

Wednesday June 14, 2017

Associate Professor, Theatre Praxis, Brock University 

BA Hons. (English & Philosophy)Mount Allison University

PhD (Theatre Studies - Samuel Beckett Centre) Trinity College Dublin

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PART TWO

How would adopting a stronger feminist perspective benefit our society, especially considering our current political climate?

Number one, we’re killing our planet, we’re killing our planet, because nature has been constructed as feminine, and therefore a resource for us to consume and harvest. Unapologetic resource consumption. And the Western Euro-American colonial project has equated femininity with nature given that colonial and empirical practices are predicated on a myth of female inferiority, and a societal view that women are lesser, that then permits both the colonial project of subjective colonialism bodies and also subjecting the planet. So, we live in a time when we are in the cusp of environmental collapse, when there is an immense amount of racialization. That’s done lazily without thinking. And a broader adopting of feminist approaches, would allow us to see that divisions don’t actually exist where some of us are allowing them to exist. There doesn’t need to be a clash of civilizations between Muslims and Christians. There doesn’t need to be a war between the genders or the sexes. That these are false constructions. The feminist project draws attention to how gender and sexuality are constructed, both male and female and provides the opportunity for unpacking these myths that generate these false oppositions that we are brought into. And if we are distracted by these false oppositions, we are not able to deal with real problems in the present. So feminism equals environmentalism. Feminism equals racial and ethnic equality. They are all integrated. 

What makes a piece of literature a feminist text?

One that does the work of paying attention to women. 

Do you believe that a male author can produce a feminist text?

If we all wrote about what we knew, we would write about shitting our pants in our diaper. We write about what we come to know. A male writer writing about women, can be a manifestation of a great form of ally-ship. However if we look at the overall political economy of the publishing industry, and if there is a historic and perhaps contemporary tendency to publish male authors over women, there is the risk of appropriation inherent in that because the system is predisposed to publish men, they’re considered to be more authoritative. So if a man is writing about a woman’s experience, and the publishing industry publishes more men, then, is that a collusion perhaps not intentional, but is there e a collusion between the male writer, and the system, the patriarchy, that means that he’s taking up space that a woman’s voice would get. The Joseph Boyden circumstance at the moment around indigeneity is key. Joseph Boyden identifies as having roots in Indigenous Culture, but then that’s been thrown into question recently, but he’s been a voice-piece for indigenous experience. And in a place in time where the political economy of the publishing and in the media industries are that indigenous voices aren’t heard, is his work of writing, about indigenous voices, sympathetic and allied as it might be, taking up the space of an indigenous voice? That is very much part of the question. So, while yes absolutely I think all kinds of men can write feminist text if you look at the broader conditions of production and reception of those texts, we might be able to say that it is necessarily getting incorporated into a vortex of patriarchy, just the way that the whole patriarchy is. It is a complex issue. 

Do you think it is important for society to critique literature from a feminist perspective?

Deeply, and from an intersectional perspective that looks at feminism as a stepping stone to issues of racialization, and minoritization according to age ability and so on. Absolutely, because I think that all of a responsible feminism is one that is responsive to all of those intersecting minoritizations. But rather than taking a text as a piece of art that stands on its own outside of history, and that has sufficient cultural capitol to evade any kind of scrutiny, is incorrect. Now, can a text be reduced solely to what it does to representations of women, are there other things that are happening formally that, even if a text is situating in a space in time and is not particularly feminist, but there are other kind of qualities and attributes to it, that is a much broader conversation. But I think that a materialist feminist perspective would necessarily look at how subjectivity's constituted along gender lines in the circumstance and try to see the cultural work that that text is doing in the world by promulgating those representations. 

Would it benefit our education system to adopt a stronger feminist analysis of literature in the classroom? and why?

A great thing to always do, is when someone says “You can’t do that (ie. teach feminism in the classroom)”, then say, “Well it’s already been going on for a long time”, because there has been an increasing number of women’s voices addressed in the classroom over the last fifty years. “So, why is what I’m doing so radical?”. What a reactionary person will attempt is to construct what you’re doing (ie. teaching feminism in the classroom) as disruptive, dangerous, revolutionary and unprecedented. 

You need to adopt the strategies that you can safely undertake, to engage as much change as you can in the context you are in. There is a risk of you upsetting the apple cart, to the point that it doesn’t become viable for you to perpetuate the conversation further. It might mean that the oppressive system has won, because you are expunged from it. That said, one should not over-estimate the threat of talking about difficult things. What are education systems for? There are all kinds of tools within that conceptually that would make it very clear that materialist feminism is not about attacking men. So I mean, why become so riven by fear, when talking about inequities? Why even be in the education system? Then you are just perpetuating, as Althusser says, an Ideological State Apparatus, which is just making fresh the workers who can keep the means of production going. Yes we always have to find that balance. The key I think, to both protecting yourself but also keep empowering the students, is to present what you are talking to them about, as a series of positions. A series of arguments, a series of tools, a series of definitions. Encourage them to use them, understand them for what they are. But save yourself from the easy accusation of the anxious coworker or colleague, that you are politicizing the classroom by saying that “I’m teaching certain sets of tools and allowing them to use them. And these are the tools that I think are important because of the education that I have had, and they fall in line with the curriculum”. Anything you can do in that moment to allow the people who are anxiously overseeing you or that might be threatening you, is A - you are doing your job, and B - 

you are doing it in such a way in order to empower students to make up their own minds. And ultimately, that is what you want to be doing. Here are these conceptual tools, how does it line up with lived reality, share some experience. Well it seems we have a conflict here, can we mediate this like adults and the way in which we talk about experience and positions without falling into conflict, isn’t it an unfolding and ongoing process that is not complete after today. But we have more tools and concepts to deal with so, yes, pay attention to administrative realities of the world around you, yes, make sure that the historical aggressor doesn’t end up, feeling like it is all their responsibility, its all such a shame and blame, but don’t be afraid to talk about important issues. Especially if you frame it as we are collectively moving through this little circumstance by adopting the best sets of tools  that we can. And it is necessarily and completely let’s all give ourselves a break as we try to work through it together.

If you say, “we’re gonna take a feminist read of this text” and stating that feminism means paying attention to women, and women’s lived experiences, but also exploring gender construction more broadly with regards to queerness, and with regards to male subjectivity.

Instead of allowing an administrator to intimidate you by saying “that’s dangerous terrain” you say “this terrain leads onto every other terrain.” You’re not defending a starting point, you are landing in the middle of it. It is connecting to everything else. So, it is not a self-enclosed, hermetic, fascistic reading, a totalitarian perspective. It is process, it is unfolding. It is recognizing connectivities. And so, the framing is not a hindrance. It is in fact, an opening. 

INTERVIEW WITH DR. DAVID FANCY

Wednesday May 31, 2017

Associate Professor, Theatre Praxis, Brock University 

BA Hons. (English & Philosophy)Mount Allison University

PhD (Theatre Studies - Samuel Beckett Centre) Trinity College Dublin

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PART ONE

What is your definition of feminism?

Well, any definition that anyone would make is going to be situated in some way. Donna Haraway spoke of “situated knowledges”, so it is important that I acknowledge my own perception of my own subject position. Because my subject position is going to inform what I understand the term to mean. And as a hetero-white guy, that could be understood to be a qualifying factor in any definition I provide. I think it is always important to acknowledge where you’re coming from. It works against any assumptions of authoritative or totalizing definitional claims. And with that said it’s also important to realize that people such as myself, in many cases, desire to be the most useful possible type of ally to ongoing conversations and struggles to work away from, patriarchy and other intersecting forms of oppressive dynamics. So those qualifiers are not meant to be slippery - i.e. “I’m going to give you a definition, but…” -  those qualifiers are put in place to recognize my own sort of recognition and the performance of my own recognition that all sorts of knowledge is situated. That said, I would understand feminism to be a very complex, differentiated, broad based, set of theoretical and lived positions and subjectivities that sometimes work together, or occasionally work in opposition to one another, but generally, very much moving in a way to recognize the falsity of the binary assumptions informing patriarchal positions, that women are somehow ‘lesser’ than men. And, because context and history is constantly changing, and because patriarchy, according to feminist writers such Irigary, is a long long term phenomenon, it is important to recognize feminism’s complexity where its situated, what it means to different people how its useful in certain circumstances how it best talks back to patriarchal and forms of gender supremacy. 

Do you identify as a feminist? Why or why not? 

I would cautiously identify as a feminist. There is a risk for a person such as myself who is a white, hetero, man, in adopting the term feminism, could in some circumstances end up being an appropriation of a resistant voice; a voice resisting a set of dynamics that I am necessarily part of because of my own subject position. So sometimes we got to be very careful on out ally-ship. “I’m a feminist!” Does that mean that, by me saying that, I’ve not only taken women’s subjectivities and taken their representations, but now we’re also we’re also claiming ownership of a resistant subject position? There is that risk inherent in there. So I would say that I am definitely feminist sympathetic and if it is possible for men to be feminist, then absolutely. But I understand a theoretical position that would say “dude, no way, you’re a guy, you can be an ally, but don’t take that away from us too.” It is important to realize the potential for re-patriarchalization that can occur as one claims the resistant position. 

There is also a broader recognition. There is a way in which the notion of the feminine, as a binarized construction (feminine/masculine) by adopting the term feminism as the only way in which we think about women is there another term that can be used that can allow women to move beyond the feminine, which has been imposed upon them by a male structure. If the binary - feminine lesser, masculine greater - issues from the patriarchal, manichean project, of separation by saying, “yes, we’re feminist” does that mean that women can’t claim masculine qualifiers as part of their identity? So, that’s a much broader conversation. The lived experience of feminists fighting off sexists, sexual assault, or fighting off, you know, being at a bus stop and hearing a stupid joke. Or even dealing with macro or micro aggressions in relationships, you might not have time or the inclination to have that broader conversation. It might just be, “look, I’m a woman, I am equal to you, f—- off.” And that’s fine, but part of the larger conversation can be about “how do we even construct that term [feminism? Or the term that encapsulated women having identity with masculine qualities]? And are there any limitations inherent in adopting that side of the binary and pushing for it? So many of these conversations depend on also, not just knowledge of the context, but the context in which we “like, is it useful o talk about that now? Or is it just like ‘stop making that sexist joke now.’” Is it more immediate? If we can think in a variety of different registers, theoretical rarification and use them when we need to, the more tools we have the better. 

How would you explain feminism to someone who had never heard of it before? Say, the ‘Spark notes’ of feminism. 

Because the political right has said “feminazi,” and “you’re crazy” and they’ve just use the tropes of feminine hysteria, emotionality back on the position. I would just simply say, “feminism, is about paying attention to women’s lived experience and realities. Because you can go anywhere you want from there. Someone could say, “Well what do you mean? We’re paying attention to women all the time?” Well then we could say “What kind of attention are we paying?” is it the attention of sexualization? Is it the attention of objectification? “Well yeah, that’s part of it, but we’re just guys” Okay, Then I would proceed in a way in which you could call Socratic induction; to keep asking them questions “what do you mean by that, what do you mean by that? And not doing it aggressively, because then they’ll shut down. Because if the strategy is to get people talking, keep extending the project of paying attention to women by asking them more and more questions about what they assume women’s realities to be, and continuing to provide evidence in the form of statistics, stories, lived experiences, encounters. But I would start at ‘paying attention to women’s realities and lived experiences’. And then you can go wherever the situation leads you. 

Do you think the term feminism is misunderstood in today's society? If so, what do you think the biggest misunderstanding is in regards to the term feminism?

I think it is strategically misunderstood. On purpose, by reactionary people, who want to shut down the debate. And they want to blame the victim, and they attribute negative characteristics, generated by patriarchy back onto the people who are trying to speak against it. I think it is very strategic, I think it is organized, I think a lot of people are swayed by those arguments, “‘you’re just being a bitch’, ‘you’re a feminazi’, ‘it must be your time of the month’” All of those accusations and slights and insults that are actually a manifestation of patriarchal project. So it is a re-doubling of binarizing energy back on to those that would attempt to break out of the confines that have been constrained within. Those are the biggest misconceptions, when people think it is just an expression of women’s weakness. 

INTERVIEW WITH LYDIA COLLINS

Wednesday May 3, 2017

L.A. Collins Blog

BA (English), Brock University

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What is your definition of feminism?

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That’s a big question. For me, feminism is a term that is constantly changing. Feminism is something rooted in the destabilization of systems that already exist, and finding ways to look at these systems through an intersectional lens. Feminism aims to ensure that we have equitable work places and spaces for all different kinds of people. It’s about challenging how things are, and ensuring that we can focus on using equity inorder to achieve any kind of gender equality. 

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Do you identify as a feminist? Why or why not?

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I do (but…). I think that identifying as ‘a feminist’ is something that I’ve always struggled with. There has been a lot of not knowing where I fit in [into feminism], just because there are things that can feel exclusive. Many people tend to think that ‘Feminism’ is just ‘super radical feminism’ or ‘white feminism’, and obviously I couldn’t fit into those understandings of the term. I think that when it comes to the very commercialized [and western] idea of feminism, that is not what I identify with. But from my own understanding of feminism and what I’ve claimed it to mean for me, I would say I do. 

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How would you explain feminism to someone who had never heard of it before?

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When it comes to trying to have these conversations about feminism with family or friends who might not necessarily understand what feminism is, or who have a very general idea of what feminism is - particularly with the men in my life, a lot of the cis- hetero- men in my life - we need to try to explain that feminism is FOR MEN too! Men need to be able to work with women, to be allies in order to deconstruct the ways we are treated. Part of feminism is having the men in our lives be supportive, allowing people who already have the most amount of privilege to be able to help women get to where we want to be. We must let people know that feminism is supposed to be inclusive. We need to try to break down that idea of what they think feminism means.

Do you think the term feminism is misunderstood in today's society? If so, what do you think the biggest misunderstanding is in regards to the term feminism?

I think that it is definitely misunderstood in society, because of the way it is portrayed. People have a very narrow version of what feminism is. I think that one of the biggest misconceptions is that ‘feminism’- this commercialized idea of feminism, this first-wave white-washed feminism - is always for ‘all women’. Unfortunately, that’s not always true. But that’s the point of intersectionality and third-wave feminism; identifying the fact that the other kind of feminism is not inclusive, it’s not focusing on all women, it’s focusing on a particular type of woman, a particular race and class of women, women who are straight, women who are hetero. It’s not looking at all different kinds of women. So I think that, especially with third-wave feminism, part of that is challenging other ideas of feminism and looking at historical versions of feminism, and trying to deconstruct those to change the way that people view it.

The fact that we have to say “black feminism” and “intersectional feminism” shows that ‘Feminism’ is not as inclusive as it needs to be. We need to bring feminism to a place where it’s broad enough and inclusive enough that everyone can identify with it, without having to explicitly say that “I am [x] kind of feminism”.

How would adopting a stronger feminist perspective benefit our society, especially considering our current political climate?

When it comes to men, straight men, people who have the most power, when they are able to have these conversations and understand feminism, it provides more opportunities for the people who are marginalized, who are on the fringes of society, who aren’t getting the opportunities that they deserve. If everyone can adopt a feminist mind-set, it’s useful for everyone. Feminism should be meant to ensure that there are equitable ways of living and coexisting together in society, regardless of our different races, genders and ethnicities. You cannot just erase people’s backgrounds. You cannot tell a black person, with their own rich histories and culture that they are just the same as you, and your own cultures and histories. It’s not true. We must understand that we are not all the same, but that is okay. It is okay for us to still come together and be interested in each other’s differences. We should talk about these things. Asking questions is okay. Having these conversations can be huge for people who may have problematic views, and exploring this in a way that all parties feel welcome to participate.

What makes a piece of literature a feminist text?

For me, when I do any kind of reading, I am able to identify it as a feminist text when I am seeing true diversity or inclusivity. Or even if that isn’t necessarily present for certain things like race, but maybe in other ways like gender and even class. If we can see different kinds of intersectionalities with class and privilege, and see an author playing with those ideas, that is really important as well for a feminist text. Feminist texts should break away from certain stereotypes, especially with regards to gender and race. We must allow people and characters to be multi-faceted, like allowing black women to be able to play different roles and not been seen just through one lens.

Do you think it is important for society to critique literature from a feminist perspective?

Yes definitely. Especially as someone who is an English major in a university institution that is predominantly white, and engaging with professors who were all (besides one [that I’ve had]) are white [for English], being forced to take some of the core English courses that are about ‘classic literature’, that are a lot of Shakespeare and other dead white men, courses that are great for some people but don’t tend to interest me. I think that one thing that I’ve learned is that we need to be able to look at things through a different lens, so provide more diversity in classrooms as well. We can’t just be reading about one history or one group of people.

Even if a text is problematic (ie. historical text) people need to be able to have that mind-set where they are constantly thinking critically and critiquing what is problematic, and being able to identify issues, and how can we work through this and even continue to enjoy the text.

Sometimes the biggest part about moving forward is being able to identify when something is wrong. Looking at literature through an intersectional lens, and a more feminist or activist lens allows us to identify what is problematic about a particular text, and how we can possibly subvert, find ways to reshape the text, to look at it in different ways and from different perspectives.

Would it benefit our education system to adopt a stronger feminist analysis of literature in the classroom? And why?

I think that being more critical, and including a feminist lens in classrooms, anywhere from primary up into post-secondary is super important. Especially at the high school age where it’s such a critical point in people’s lives, where they are learning about who they are, learning about what is acceptable and what isn’t, learning about the person that they want to be. It is important that what they are reading and what they are learning about is intersectional and is looked at through a lens that isn’t one sided or forced into the western perspective (very white, idealist views that have been forced upon our society). Just by showing different kinds of literature, introducing intersectionality into the primary level, even by using children’s books that are diverse, with different kinds of characters, that are tackling different issues. There are these ideas that kids are these incompetent little things walking around that don’t know what’s going on, but they’re smart, they absorb everything, they know what’s going on. Even with the new sexual education curriculum, there are people who are upset because they think “Oh, I don’t want my five year old child to learn about anal sex”, but they’re not how to have anal sex, they are learning that there are different kinds of sex, and the importance of consent, and the importance of knowing that your body is your own, and whatever you want to do with it is up to you, and that you don’t have to say yes to people. We constantly think that kids aren’t able to understand certain things, and they’re too young, but I disagree. During those critical times of growing, learning and developing, the education and literature given to students needs to be intersectional, and have more of a feminist analysis so that they can understand ways to not only understand themselves but also to understand others. They need to have a safe space to ask questions, and to unlearn any ignorant assumptions that may have been taught at home or outside of the classroom. Education is an institution that is so dominant and important in people’s lives, and it takes in so many different minds, constantly. School (even just primary and secondary education) will shape you into adulthood, so we really need to change the way we teach children. We need to relearn and reclaim what feminism is and should be, so that it doesn’t have that negative stigma.

INTERVIEW WITH HAYLEY MALOUIN

Wednesday April 19, 2017

Master's student, Brock University

BA (Dramatic Arts -DART), Brock University

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What is your definition of feminism?

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So I read the questions and I’ve been dreading this question. What’s difficult for me with that question, to start, is that my consistent interaction with feminist discourse has been through a look at feminist discourses in an academic setting. So, I feel like perhaps you’ve caught me at a bad time, or a bad year, with that question. I could probably answer it very well coming out of fourth year of my undergrad, saying ‘feminism is this. It means anti-capitalist, etc.’. But now I really feel like I don’t have an answer. One because I feel like I have more information on that subject, which makes me realize how little information I have ... Does that make sense?

I feel saturated with various and potentially conflicting premises of feminism, in feminist discourse. I am finding myself feeling untethered from where I felt I was for so long, like as a teenager and in my undergrad. I have had to continually renegotiate and re-orient myself to my own assumptions, which were tied to un-problematized assumptions surrounding race and class – that weren’t intentional, but were just un-problematized. 

I guess my definition of feminism is “being continually untethered from problematic assumptions and driving towards a temporary or contingent tethering to ideas that work towards emancipation and liberation for more and more people, and to a widening of the category of what people are.” And that is a processual definition. It is contingent on process, which is reflective of where I am right now in my research.

Anne Bogart of SITI Theatre has a quote which I think can apply to a lot of things. She says, “Hold on tightly, let go lightly”, and I like that a lot. One because it sort of removes ego from the process, and removes ego from opinion, which removes opinion from the realm of airy-fairy ethereal “I just think that” kind of discourse. You’re holding on tightly to your feelings because feelings are really important but you’re working in a space where you can let go of presumptions or premises that you might realize along the way are problematic.

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Do you identify as a feminist? Why or why not?

Ya, totally. For me, feminism really is about process, and the processual enacted embodied nature of stuff ... of ‘stuff’, what a great term...

I get very frustrated with the “this is what a feminist looks like” t-shirt slogans because it’s a performative of a discourse without any engagement or practice of a discourse. And so I get frustrated (but not with you obviously) by people who ask “Are you a feminist”  because anybody can say that they are, but what does that actually mean?

When you ask “do I identity as a feminist?” and I say “of course I do”, for me that means continually negotiating my life practice around it and understanding that feminism is a continual project, not a plateau that is ever reached. And of course I make myself sound so fucking enlightened about this, and I’m not. I know that I am entrenched in my own whiteness and my own cis-ness, so there are obviously experiences that I am never going to be able to think my way through with my own little brain. But ya, that’s it.

How would you explain feminism to someone who had never heard of it before?

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My selfish first answer is that I wouldn’t. I would tell them that Google is fucking free.

That being said, I have in the past, and still do sometimes, attempt to engage and explain feminism, however I don’t think that I am willing to step into the educational or educating role in that way or that setting, for a number of reasons. One - I am not the expert, and I am consistently and constantly deferring to people who are experts or who have coined terms, so I would never really try to explain intersectional feminism without referring to the woman who defined it, Kimberlé Williams Crenshaw. Also, there is an implicit hierarchy in that explanatory role, that means that as the “explainer” I’m operating from a place where it seems as though I shouldn’t be questioned, and I don’t want that. However, on the other side, if I do step into that educating role, there is the risk that when you explain that “I am not the expert at this but...” you’ll get jumped on. I am not willing to spend the emotional labour, emotional time and physical real time (on a clock) engaging with that if it is so quickly going to turn into being called a bitch, which I just won’t negotiate with that. Therefore, I guess I would direct the individual to some key sources, and direct them as to how they can conduct their own research. There are a lot of people who have done the work for us to create chronologies across intersections, and have made it very accessible, so I would direct them to that. 

Do you think the term feminism is misunderstood in today's society? If so, what do you think the biggest misunderstanding is in regards to the term feminism?

*laughs* To answer the first question for you is ‘yes’. Feminism is about accountability and responsibility before it’s about correction. And I think that the misconception of feminism is that it is a corrective practice or a corrective behaviour, similar to a prison system. I think that accountability and responsibility can take the form of corrective behaviour by saying, “don’t say that word”. However the end goal of feminism is not a corrective procedure but instead an ongoing dialectic procedure.

What is so interesting and valid and vital about intersectional feminism is that allows us to cross this idea of ‘corrective procedures’ with class issues and class struggles (including the prison system) to see how this idea of ‘corrective procedures’ is not an innate process that we engage in. It is one that stems from industrialization and capitalism, and that our model of maintenance and policing of people is profoundly corrective, so of course feminism in ‘the West’ has fallen into that category.  And that leads me to another misconception about feminism, which is that feminism can be detached at all from race and class struggles, which it can’t be.

How would adopting a stronger feminist perspective benefit our society, especially considering our current political climate?

It could help us end capitalism. That’s sort of it. It’s one of many tools or practices that can work together in an anti-capitalist framework, which class struggle comes out of capitalism. Our capitalist framework relies on inequity, relies on hierarchy, relies on extortion and exploitation of people, and of a firm policing of the borders of ‘what and who people are’. 

What makes a piece of literature a feminist text?

Interesting question. I’m not even sure I have an answer to that. I know for sure that it is not just ‘having more women in it’, however, that is never a bad thing. And I know I’m really hitting you over the head with my anti-capitalist, socialist feminist stuff but I think it comes down to the means of production around texts. It is not just having more women as characters, it’s not just being written by a woman, it’s not just being published by a woman, it’s not just being consumed by women – however it is all of those things as well. In terms of literature specifically, I think that a text that I would enjoy as a feminist text is a text that acknowledges the constructed nature of what realism is and what realistic characters are, and striving to create three- or four-dimensional characters who can also acknowledge their own contingency on realism. I have a serious issue with the strong female character troupe, because her character development is contingent upon realizing something because of a relationship with a man. 

‘What makes a feminist text’ is in the industrial aspects of the literary industry, so who’s publishing it, what publishing house, who is the editor, who’s doing the marketing, and obviously who is the writer. A feminist text is a text that allows for antithesis, an arguable text, a text that takes a position that can be argued, and can be argued against.

Do you think it is important for society to critique literature from a feminist perspective?

Totally. I don’t think a feminist lens is doing anything super radical that isn’t being done by other schools of thought. And there’s a reason why a lot of feminist discourse takes up other voices - for example people can do a feminist reading of Foucault, because it is an extension of what is present in that work. Feminist work is an extension of work that is already being done, so why wouldn’t you want to do the work properly to the fuller or fullest extent? It also restructures and reorients what ‘critique’ looks like, and what a conversation looks like around literature, and invites more people to the table. 

Would it benefit our education system to adopt a stronger feminist analysis of literature in the classroom? and Why?

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As a feminist you are continually work from a place of opposition to a text until you find a common ground with a it because you are working to critique it. It’s investigative work, which means you can’t be alongside a text, you are not defending a text, you are engaging with it. It enables young people particularly, and gives them the tools to read texts across a number of axes. And those are just good skills to have. Furthermore, it allows us to see and critique our current educational model, where one is the bearer of knowledge and the student is the vessel that receives knowledge, as one predicated on classist, sexist, racist, ableist premises. Our conceptualising of the white, middle-class, heterosexual, usually masculine student is a construction and it allows us to understand that our conception of the neutral space of a classroom is never neutral; it is never an apolitical space, and attempting to make it one is a political gesture that supports dominant hegemony. So introducing stronger feminist analysis of literature in classrooms invites more people to sit at the table, it allows for constant renegotiation of the size of the table, the rules of sitting at the table, and what counts as a person sitting at the table. By taking a stronger feminist analysis of literature in classrooms, it constantly allows us to renegotiate criticism that wants to work towards making better literature, and I think that is an important this as well. Feminist analysis allows for more rigorous creative processes that just make texts better, it just makes better art.

THE INTERVIEWS

Our first interview will be posted
Wednesday April 19, 2017

The Interview Questions:
What is your definition of Feminism?
Do you identify as a feminist? Why or why not?
How would you explain feminism to someone who had never heard of it before?
Do you think the term feminism is misunderstood in today's society? If so, what do you think the biggest misunderstanding is in regards to the term feminism?
How would adopting a stronger feminist perspective benefit our society, especially considering our current political climate?
What makes a piece of literature a feminist text?
Do you think it is important for society to critique literature from a feminist perspective?
Would it benefit our education system to adopt a stronger feminist analysis of literature in the classroom? and why?