Thursday 11 February, 2021, 19.00-21.00
Rescheduled from April 2020 due to Covid-19, this session, planned to take place at the South London Gallery, will now be held as an online Zoom session. It will include an introduction to the article within its cultural and political context, and small out-loud readings.
This instalment of the Feminist Duration Reading Group, led by Flora Dunster, looks to debates around censorship, past and present, to consider how, why, and to what effect a feminist argument can be made for limiting free expression.
Focusing on the differing feminist perspectives around practices like pornography and S/M during the 1970s and 80s, the session will consider arguments made for and against censorship, the impact they had on organising and activism, and what we can draw from them in our present.
Sue O’Sullivan
The meeting will be introduced by Sue O'Sullivan, a member of the London Women's Liberation Workshop; Feminists Against Censorship; Spare Rib collective; Feminist Review collective; Red Rag; and Sheba Press.
Reading
We will read together from O'Sullivan's co-authored article (with Susan Ardill) "Upsetting an Applecart: Difference, Desire, and Lesbian Sadomasochism" (1986), with additional texts TBD.
Link to Reading: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1xfe_1PJ5lMlXOMlZbQZTTRNdEyUA44bl/view?usp=sharing
No advance reading is required as we will read together, out loud, on the evening.
Reserve a Place
Contact us by 9th February 17.00 to reserve your place: feministduration@gmail.com
The event is likely to book up so please let us know if you are unable to attend closer to the time.
Feminist Duration
This event is part of the Feminist Duration series which explores under-known texts, ideas, and movements associated with earlier periods of feminist activity in the UK. Part of a year-long residency at the South London Gallery, it juxtaposes earlier moments of feminist with current urgencies and struggles.
By restoring material texture to overlooked political and cultural movements, it seeks to resist versions of the past that reduce feminist struggle to one-dimensional stereotypes. Looking to the past to activate its nascent potential, the programme aims to identify tools that can inspire and enrich further collective action, promoting the intergenerational exchange of knowledge and experience. While honouring earlier feminisms, the series also highlights how collaboration, difference, and dissent have characterised previous feminist movements, and how feminists have both negotiated, and failed to significantly attend to, differences between themselves.
Future sessions will focus on intersectional feminist life writing and feminist generations and genealogies in the UK.
If you would like to be part of the process of developing or contributing to these meetings please email feministduration@gmail.com
Further information can be found at feministduration.com
Feminist Duration is generously supported by the CHASE Doctoral Training Partnership.