How to create a feminist future

Published: Tuesday, August 16, 2011

UK Feminista's 'suffragette school' gave budding activists the tools they need to build a fairer world.

School's out for 500 activists as they graduated yesterday from UK Feminista's second summer school. With interest in feminism sparking across the UK, this weekend's "suffragette school" in Birmingham aimed to equip budding activists with a toolbox of techniques for building a feminist future. With attacks on abortion rights, the relentless objectification of women in the media and the assault on women's economic independence through public sector cuts, there's certainly no shortage of obstacles to creating it. Hence "lessons" at summer school included everything from suffragette-era tactics of direct action to the rather more modern approach of mobilising the masses through Facebook and Twitter.

Teachers included Karak Mayik, Women for Women International's country director for South Sudan. Speaking live via Skype from the world's newest nation, Karak described the challenges women's rights activists there face after decades of conflict and how, despite brutal poverty and high HIV-rates, they are still managing to bring about monumental changes in women's daily lives.

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