Feminist summer school: training the new generation of ‘suffragettes’

Published: Sunday, August 14, 2011

Two-day UK Feminista event aims to mobilise activists and school them in art of campaigning and direct action.

After just one day of classes at her summer school of choice, Emily Birkenshaw had already learned a crucial lesson: how to "go floppy" when facing arrest. "You're heavier then, so you can't be carried," she said, with the genuine delight of a new recruit.

The 24-year-old been practising by linking arms with her classmates and singing loudly at a pretend policeman. "It just felt really empowering," she said. "If that happened [in real life] - and I hope it wouldn't - I'd know how to do it without getting hurt."

Birkenshaw, a teaching assistant from York, was one of about 500 who descended on Birmingham at the weekend for the UK Feminista summer school, a two-day event aimed at mobilising feminist activists and training them in the art of campaigning and direct action. With new groups, new campaigns and a set of decades-old beliefs being repackaged for the 21st century, leading figures such as Kat Banyard are claiming a "massive resurgence" in feminism.

Click here to read the full Guardian article.