#8 'Postmodern feminists' - 06/03/18


**In solidarity with striking members of the UCU at the University of Leeds, we will be running our eighth session off-campus at the Packhorse Pub from 4pm - 5:30pm. Staff, students and members of the public are very welcome.**

In this session, we will be discussing the first chapter of Differences that Matter: Feminist Theory and Postmodernism (2004 [1998]), entitled 'Speaking Back.' A PDF is accessible via Google Drive here.

Secondary reading: bell hooks ‘Postmodern Blackness’ in Yearning: Race, Gender, and Cultural Politics (2015 [1990]). A PDF is accessible here.

In these essays, both Sara Ahmed and bell hooks think critically about the relationship between (intersectional) feminism and postmodernism. For example, Ahmed considers the paradoxical manner in which postmodernism covers a broad spectrum of epistemological disruption and is yet underpinned by processes of exclusion (see Ahmed, 2004, p.4). Via Helen Tiffin, she also draws attention to how postmodernism problematically subsumes postcolonial strategies of rewriting as symptoms, and thus how it participates in a symbolically imperialist project. This finds some counterpart in bell hooks' exploration of postmodernism's exclusion of black women's voices (see hooks, 2015, p.52-53).

In session, we are interested in discussing the usefulness of postmodernism (in all its definitions) for intersectional feminism in theory and practice. Relatedly, we are also interested in charting Ahmed and hooks different responses to postmodernism, as manifest by their respective languages of 'speaking back' and 'yearning.'

All welcome!

Details: Tuesday 6th March, 4pm-5:30pm @ Pack Horse Pub (gig space).

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

#7: Gender is Burning - 06/03/2019

CFP | Quilting Points 2024: Racial Capitalism and Cultural Resistance

Robinson session 2: The Black Radical Tradition