Living Radical, Living Female

A 10-week course with Lisa Maya Knauer
Mondays, 5:30 to 7:30 pm
THIS CLASS WILL BE DELAYED FOR ONE WEEK AS LISA KNAUER CAN NOT GET OUT OF GUATEMALA ON TIME DUE TO EAST COAST SNOWSTORM—NEW STARTING DATE IS FEBRUARY 1
Women have played an important role in nearly every radical and revolutionary movement in modern times — as activists, theorists and visionaries. However, they have often had to struggle against not only societal expectation of women but also the machismo of their male comrades in struggle. This class will explore how radical women have narrated their lives and imagined different futures through a consideration of fictional and autobiographical works by and about women radicals, ranging from Alexandra Kollontai to Black Panther women.

We will begin by reading Olive Schreiner’s The Story of An African Farm, http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1441/1441-h/1441-h.htm, Alexandra Kollontai’s Love of Worker Bees, Emma Goldman’s Living My Life (excerpts: entire 993-page book is available at http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/emma-goldman-living-my-life), Meridel LeSueur’s The Girl, and continue with works by Tillie Olsen, Josephine Herbst, Alice Walker, along with selections from the autobiographies of Angela Davis and Elaine Brown.

Lisa Maya Knauer has been collaborating with anti-extractivist groups in Guatemala for the last several years. She is currently researching a book on indigenous resistance, autonomy and alternative citizenships and the neoliberal extractivist state.

(no class on March 14)