The Feminism of Fools: When Real Feminists Do Fascism

04/04/25 • 30 min

The UCL Gender and Feminism Research Network (GFRN) and qUCL present a conversation with ex-academic writer Sophie Lewis and Victoria Mangan, PhD student in the English Department at UCL.

On 7 March 2025, Sophie Lewis gave the annual qUCL/GFRN lecture on 'The Feminism of Fools: When Real Feminists Do Fascism', which explored the imperial, racist, and otherwise exclusionary legacies of various kinds of feminism – varieties of feminism that have not just been taken up by the regressive right, but have participated enthusiastically and feministly in these movements.

In advance of her talk, Victoria Mangan met with Sophie to ask her a few questions about her new book, 'Enemy Feminisms,' and especially to ask her: why this book, and why now? They went on to discuss the relationship between Sophie's current work and her previous books on family abolition, why it is that we are so attached to feminism as a unilateral 'good' despite evidence to the contrary, and the particular Englishness of certain feminist activism in the 21st century.

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Sophie Lewis, an ex-academic writer, lives in Philadelphia and is the author of 'Full Surrogacy Now, Abolish the Family,' and 'Enemy Feminisms.' Her essays appear everywhere from n+1 to the LRB. She is working on an essay collection, 'Femmephilia,' and a book, 'The Liberation of Children' (forthcoming from Penguin, 2027).

Victoria Mangan is a PhD student researching transgender literatures and theories. Her thesis enquires into how we read and interpret trans literature and what this growing body of work might offer literary criticism as a discipline. She is a Wolfson scholar in the humanities and has taught across several departments at UCL.

Lewis and Mangan are introduced by Alex Hyde, Associate Professor in Gender Studies and Co-Director of the Gender and Feminism Research Network at UCL.

The episode was produced by Marthe Lisson, Editor of Think Pieces.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

The UCL Gender and Feminism Research Network (GFRN) and qUCL present a conversation with ex-academic writer Sophie Lewis and Victoria Mangan, PhD student in the English Department at UCL.

***

Lewis and Mangan are introduced by Alex Hyde, Associate Professor in Gender Studies and Co-Director of the Gender and Feminism Research Network at UCL.

The episode was produced by Marthe Lisson, Editor of Think Pieces.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Previous Episode

The Lives of Statues: Adored, Ignored, Abhorred?

The UCL Gender and Feminism Research Network (GFRN) and qUCL present a conversation with Rahul Rao, Reader in International Political Thought at the University of St Andrews, and inclusive heritage specialist Sean Curran.

On 14 May 2024, Rao gave the GFRN and qUCL joint annual lecture titled 'The Libidinal Lives of Statues'. In this episode, Rao and Curran expand on the central question of the lecture: what is it about statues that has spooked people in the past enough to arouse in them the impulse to destroy.

Standing in front of the Gandhi statue in Tavistock Square, Bloomsbury, London they reflect on why statues have become the ground on which struggles around caste and race are played out and why Gandhi statues in particular have become objects of contestation despite the common association of Gandhi as an anti-colonial figure. They move on to talk about statues as gifts from one country to another and whether it is violence to damage, deface or removing a statue. Above the whole conversation lingers the question: what is the future of statues - have they become obsolete?

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Rahul Rao is Reader in International Political Thought in the School of International Relations at the University of St Andrews and the author of Out of Time: The Queer Politics of Postcoloniality (2020) and Third World Protest: Between Home and the World (2010). He is currently writing a book about statues.

Sean Curran is an inclusive heritage specialist with 17 years of experience working in historic houses, libraries, archives and museums. Their PhD at UCL Institute of Education was about LGBTQ+ heritage, and they curated the first ever LGBT History Month exhibition at a National Trust property.

Rao and Curran are introduced by Alex Hyde, Associate Professor in Gender Studies and Co-Director of the Gender and Feminism Research Network at UCL.

The episode was produced by Marthe Lisson, Editor of Think Pieces.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.