Mutuality without alliance: the roles of community in becoming a college student feminist

ABSTRACT

Feminism has made a resurgence in the last several years, especially on college campuses [Davies. 2011. “Feminism is back, and we want to finish the revolution, say activists.” The Guardian, August 5. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/aug/05/feminism-resurgent-activists]. Actions to address sexual violence and other forms of ‘lad culture’ are growing in visibility, as young feminists come together to challenge patriarchal norms on campuses. Little is known about how feminist community functions to solidify individuals’ commitment to liberatory action. The meaning-making process of college-age feminists in the US/UK is relevant to the ongoing question of how social change movements function and flourish. This study chronicled 33 college feminists in the US and UK, describing how feminist communities on campus served to foster stronger commitment to feminism and greater confidence in advocating for feminist values and viewpoints. Community forged through consciousness of one’s differential power and privilege and productive engagement with identity difference was notably absent in these narratives, signaling incomplete encounters with cross-coalitional alliance [Rowe. 2008. Power Lines. On the Subject of Feminist Alliances. Durham: Duke University Press].

KEYWORDS:

• Higher education
• qualitative interviews
• identities
• social theory

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes of contributors

Susan Marine, Ph.D. is Associate Professor and Program Director of the Higher Education Graduate Program at Merrimack College. Her research focuses on feminist transformation of the academy, including prevention of and response to campus sexual violence and the advancement of LGBTQ agency and visibility.

Dr Ruth Lewis is Senior Lecturer and Programme Leader (Sociology) at Northumbria University, UK. Her research focuses on gender-based violence – particularly online abuse, GBV in universities, intimate partner violence, and lethal violence, as well as legal remedies – and feminist activism in response to these and other forms of misogyny.

Notes

1 UK University feminist societies are generally established by groups of students, are open to other students and operate as relatively independent bodies. Some are affiliated to the university’s Student Union, although some of our respondents reported their SU was resistant to the establishment of a feminist society. It is believed that student feminist societies have multiplied (see, for example, Pearce 2014) in recent years although we know of no reliable empirical evidence that supports that claim.

2 Names have been changed to protect the anonymity of our respondents.