Tidskrift för genusvetenskap

Medverkande

Tidskrift för genusvetenskap — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

Äldreomsorg som medborgerlig rättighet: ett resonerande stridsrop

Fanny Ambjörnsson, Helene Brodin — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

Att skriva kroppen. Ett samtal om feministisk fenomenologi, situerad kunskap och citering som motståndspraktik

Maria Törnqvist, Lisa Folkmarson Käll — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

ÄG – Ämnesföreningen för genusvetenskap i Sverige

Helena Wahlström Henriksson, Linn Sandberg, Maria Carbin, Ulf Mellström — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

Underkastelse och motstånd. Litterära bröstcancerberättelser och Rosa bandet-kulturen i 2010-talets Sverige

Christian Lenemark — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

The article examines how literary breast cancer narratives published in Sweden in the 2010s performatively do breast cancer in relation to the so-called pink ribbon culture. The focus is on Karin Björkegren Jones Jag vill fan leva. Kampen mot bröstcancer (I Want the Hell to Live. The Fight Against Breast Cancer) from 2014, and Annelie Babitz Inte bara ett bröst. En bröstcancerpatients dagbok (Not Just a Breast. A Breast Cancer Patient’s Diary) from 2018. With theoretical insights from Judith Butler, Lisa Diedrich and Eve Kosovsky Sedgewick, among others, the article analyzes how these breast cancer narratives both reproduce and resist the gendered norms and ideas considered to be characteristic of the pink ribbon culture. The analysis shows how Jag vill fan leva largely submits to the ideology of this culture, distinguished as it is by positive thinking and a strong individualistic view of breast cancer as the individual woman’s project. On the other hand, Babitz in Inte bara ett bröst challenges the discursive norms that surround the traditional breast cancer narrative by taking what Emilia Nielsen calls the role of “the cancer killjoy”. At the same time, it would be too simplistic to see these narratives as polar opposites. Even if Jag vill fan leva predominantly does breast cancer in line with the pink ribbon ideology, it also problematizes it. Conversely, Inte bara ett bröst reveals how difficult it is for a woman with breast cancer to escape the normative ideals that characterize the pink ribbon culture. Thus, the article concludes with underscoring the need for more research taking into consideration how gendered norms and ideals connected to the pink ribbon culture performatively are both reproduced and challenged in 2010s Swedish breast cancer literature.

Att göra livet (över)levbart: Transpersoners ontiska, relationella och reflekterande arbete för att skapa minoritetsro och hantera utsatthet i vardagen

Tove Lundberg, Matilda Wurm, Anna Malmquist — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

Transgender people report significantly poorer mental health than cisgender people. In psychological research, these health disparities are explained by theories of minority stress and microaggressions, while other disciplines use theories on normativity, livability, affective work, world making and utopias. Such theories are seldom picked up by psychologists even though they could serve to help psychological research and practice improve mental health in transgender people.
The aim of this interview study was twofold. Empirically, it was to explore how 29 transgender people in Sweden (aged 17-63 years), experience and cope with vulnerability to make life survivable/livable. Analytically, psychological theories of minority stress, microaggressions and coping were put in conversation with theories of livability and emotional labor. Queer phenomenology was used to orient our analysis of the empirical material, as well as orient us theoretically, to find new ways of understanding transgender people’s vulnerability psychologically.
While participants’ negative experiences are interpreted as covered by theories on minority stress and microaggressions, these theories do not explain all nuances of the exposure. In addition, theories on coping do not fully capture the constantly ongoing work participants need to do to manage everyday situations. The analysis resulted in three themes. One theme describes the ontic work that participants do in response to existential challenges of not being recognized as a subject. Another theme visualizes the relational work that participants do to deal with subtle exposure in their everyday life, trying to relate to oneself and others simultaneously. The final theme shows that participants utilize reactive and agentic reflexivity to try to achieve minority peace and a livable life. We hope that this dialogue between psychology and gender studies can continue in a Swedish context to better serve transgender people’s livability.

Poetiska homeplaces: Reflektioner och samtal om muslimsk subjektivitet inom spoken word och poesi

Mehek Muftee — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

The last decade saw a renaissance of the artform called spoken word poetry through several spoken word projects in the suburbs of Swedish cities. A group of women who have been prominent in using these platforms as a way to highlight their voices and stories are young Muslim women from primarily from socioeconomically disadvantaged suburbs. This article focuses on a few of these voices. Based on a multimodal methodology including interviews with poets and readings of their work, this article sets out to understand how the young women use their poetry to formulate their subjectivity and issues that that matter to them. The poets and spoken word artists can be seen as knotworkers who use various platforms and tools in order to share their stories and reflections. The study shows how spoken word platforms have played an important role in creating a space where young poets find creative homeplaces and craft their own positions as poets and the kind of poetry they want to engage in. Through personal experiences and stories, the poets bind together several societal issues such as antiblack racism, antimuslim racism, classism, and patriarchy. Muslim subjectivity is articulated through the use of language and certain religious definitions such as references to prayers. Poetry is also used as a way to create feminist archives of missing stories. This study also highlights how double consciousness is at work where the poets reflect on certain difficult topics and how they chose to engage with them through their writing.

#konstnärligfrihet: reifikation som förtryckshandling och motstrategi

Karin Hansson, Malin Sveningsson, Hillevi Ganetz — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

In the autumn of 2017, more than 2,000 female and non-binary artists and designers in Sweden joined forces in the group #konstnärligfrihet [artistic freedom] to share experiences of sexism, sexual harassment, and sexual violence, and to write a joint petition. Using a media timeline and semi-structured interviews, this article aims to situate #metoo in a larger narrative and investigate how sexual harassment within the Swedish art industry is explained and understood by 13 activists and representatives of art institutions.
Our results show that there is a strong connection between oppression and economic exploitation. The art industry is characterized by precarious economic and social relations, but also by the idea of the genius and elitist ambitions of standing outside the social order and embodying an unexploitable particularity. This combination is crucial to understanding sexual harassment in the industry. A central theme in the interviews was the feeling of grief and frustration of not being allowed to work freely as an artist but forced to constantly navigate invisible but tangible structures. These structures are maintained performatively through various acts of oppression that are part of a reification process, which systematically limits the livability of the exposed identities. During #metoo, this reification process was counteracted and turned against the oppressors themselves through an objectification of “men” as oppressors. Another finding relates to the interviewees’ understanding of sexual harassment as based upon power. Here, the positions of powerful and powerless were not univocal. As power intertwines with desire and vulnerability, oppressive acts can be multifaceted and ambivalent, and take place as part of a dynamic negotiation of positions in the informal economic system.

Utopier, hopp och hopplöshet. Hur feministiska framtidsbilder och känslor av hopp påverkas av den nyliberala diskursen

Hanna Agri — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

If those who formulate visions of the future are prevented from thinking freely because of a reduced capacity to imagine a different world, then there is a risk that they only advocate limited changes. Some feminist researchers in political theory and philosophy, such as Wendy Brown (2003, 2008, 2015) and Johanna Oksala (2011, 2013), claim that this has affected feminist movements. They believe that hope for a different future has been weakened among today’s feminists and that this development can be explained by the spread of the neoliberal discourse.

In this article, I discuss theories on how the neoliberal discourse has affected feminist movements and relate such theories to the lived experiences of contemporary feminist engagement. The latter is based on an interview study with seven Swedish feminists engaged in different feminist organizations. The analysis indicates that the neoliberal discourse could have affected how utopias are used and what inspires hope among contemporary feminists. The result of the study also indicates that feelings of hopelessness can be useful in feminist work.

Levbarhet, motstånd och hopp

Maja Sager, Irina Schmitt — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100

Feministiska rum i en ny tid

Evelina Johansson Wilén, Linnéa Bruno — Wed, 11 Jan 2023 00:00:00 +0100