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redchidgey's blog

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Call for participants: feminist research

Hello everyone!

My name is David Byrne and I am an undergraduate student of Psychology and Sociology at Dublin City University. I am conducting my thesis research on group dynamics in advocacy groups. I am looking for participants who identify as feminist and are a member of a feminist advocacy group to complete a short survey. The survey is called the Feminist Perspectives Scale. It consists of a series of statements relevant to feminism which you will be required to rate as to how you view them. The purpose of this study is to identify and examine potential changes in the perspectives of members of feminist advocacy groups in response to different types of information. It is my intention that this study be the first in a line of research which I would hope to carry through to an eventual Master’s degree. I would greatly appreciate your participation! If you chose to participate, please follow the link below:

https://www.surveymonkey.com/r/762T9GR

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New essay on Eva & Co, feminist mag from Austria

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Eva and Co magazine, launched in 1982, was a successful femininist magazine from Austria which combined theory, strategy, and creativity to promote the work of contemporary women artists and activists.

When the magazine disbanded in 1992, the magazine team wrote a manifesto of continued promise: “We will infiltrate everything! We will go underground and to the sky. And be warned: in the future we will camouflage ourselves.”

Read Eva Ursprung's first person history of the magazine and its exploits.

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Rdece Zore Fest: Zine Expo

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hey! so here's some pictures from the zine expo i helped set up at Rdece Zore this year.

Based in Ljubljana, this queer fem fest celebrates cutting edge performers, artists, theorists, writers, and provocateurs. Raised for the eleventh time, Rdece Zore excels in offering creative political engagement in an atmosphere of diy / professionalism / avant garde / intergenerationalism. Every audience member has the chance to participate in some way and the friendliness of the space and organising team is legendary.

catch Mirjam Baumert's interviews with myself and Gabefrom cunterview.net over at the festival blog.

personal highlights? These have to include the Queen of Eggs exhibiton replete with swinging ball bags for visitors made from water ballons and tights, the I Ass Jazz dance performance and the opportunity to hug a girl on stage whilst she recited Beyonce lyrics as poetry, a session on remembering Uckermark concentration camp for "unsociable" girls, and hanging out with some very cool ladies indeed.

props to all the organisers for another amazing fest, and for Metelkova for being such a sprawling, action hub of connection.

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Kathleen Hanna interviewed on GRITtv

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Following from our blog post about Kathleen donating her papers to an archive in New York, the nice folk at GRITtv just got in touch about an interview they recorded with the riot grrrl stalwart.

Check out the awesome clip out here

http://www.blip.tv/file/3228125

and also just found out about the Bikini Kill archive blog. Go contribute your memories!
http://bikinikillarchive.wordpress.com/

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Riot Grrrl History: Kathleen Hanna donates personal papers to an archive

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Much beloved figure within punk rock feminism, Kathleen Hanna is an icon for our generation. Standing on stage sreaming about girl's rights ("rights. rights. you do have them"), writing about sexual abuse in a way that opens your guts on to the page, and constantly encouraging other feminists to find their voices and own ways of resisting, Hanna has been an incredidly influential figure in the rise of riot grrrl and third wave feminisms. She's been the soundtrack and mentor for many young feminists learning how to make zines, make noise, change their scenes, and start a "grrrl style revolution, right now!".

So it's pretty exciting to hear that Kathleen has donated a whole stack of personal papers from the years 1989 to 1996 to the NYU's Fales Library in the States, which has a brand new Riot Grrrl Collection. The histories of queer/grrrl/Lady actions are still to be told, especially in our own words. When more materials are available for the historical record it helps us move beyond all the fourth-hand news that often gets reported, and distorted, in popular press and academic accounts. Knowing our histories not only gives us the courage to stand up and speak out, it also passes on valuable information about tactics and strategies. We need a mountain of these histories to keep us strong and to keep us moving.

Hanna and her co-conspirators over the years have contributed massively to an underground challenge to male dominance in women's everyday lives. Riot Grrrl was not just a North American thing but has been picked up across Europe, Down Under, in Latin America, South Africa, Malaysia and the Phillipines. Whilst its power as a subculture fuelled by sounds and fanzines have diminished over the years- as is only right for a healthy, self-generating feminist counter culture- its legacies are still incrediby powerful and shape many punk rock feminist dreams still.

Kathleen Hanna, we salute you!

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Do you ever read / watch / listen to feminist-made media? Ever been to a Ladyfest? Come fill out our online questionnaires...

As part of our research projects "Feminist Media in Europe" and "Young Women as Creators of New Cultural Spaces" we have created two online questionnaires.

The first one is to find out how and why people consumer and/or produce feminist media. This survey is specifically targeted to people living in Europe. Fill out the survey here

The second one is to find out about people's experiences at Ladyfest festivals. Fill out the survey here

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What is the role of innovation in activist media cultures?: Civil Media Conference 2009

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At the beginning of November, Camp GF was busy at the Civil Media Conference in Salzburg, Austria. As an event which brings together media activists, community workers, policy makers, and scholars this annual conference is always a good opportunity to think about the role of technologies and strategies in media activist cultures and beyond. This year's topic was "innovation" and it got me thinking about feminist media communities. We had the opportunity to discuss these ideas in two panels, "Participatory Culture and Technology in on- and offline networks" (with Tea Hvala, Rosa Reitsamer and Sonja Prlic) and "Feminist Media Production in Europe" (with Trouble X, Sarah Diehl, Cristiane Tasinato and Nicole Niedermüller)- more info on these below. We also had the obligatory zine exhibition on show.

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Grassroots feminism web 2.0: An interview with Red Chidgey

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Grassroots feminism 2.0?

Want to make connections with grassroots feminist activists across borders and languages? Melanie Maddison talks to Red Chidgey about an online project that aims to help us do just that.

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When the seeds have been sown: Some publications from the GF project

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Hi everybody, just a heads up on some publications that have emerged from researching feminist media production in Europe through this platform and conducting interviews.

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"but you can't eat rights": Mamma Cash's guide to economic justice

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Mamma Cash is an international organization giving grants to women and transgender led projects. Here's an article by Gisela Dütting and Esther Vonk on why economic justice issues must be central to our feminist work. It covers what is meant by economic justice, why is it so urgent, and what the most important issues are. For them economic justice includes:

* equal rights, equal opportunity, equal wages
* fair working conditions
* economic independence and economic security
* economic participation
* mobility
* access to fairly paid work
* control over money and resources
* universal access to basic services
* sustainable and just economy
* an end to inequitable international economic relationships

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