A morning for doctoral students and interested parties with Gaea Schoeters
Over the last 15 years, Gaea Schoetershas focused on the gender gap in various ways. In the short opera Rosalind, she investigates the intellectual theft of Rosalind Franklin’s DNA-research. She’s also a member of the FixditAuthors’ Collective, a group of female writers trying to map and fix sexism in literature, and she curates the Dead Ladies Show, a café chantant celebrating women who achieved great things during their lives but were nonetheless ‘forgotten’. In her latest novel, Trophy, she examines (toxic) masculinity as a driving force for hunting great game–a way to regain virility in a digital world where physical power has lost its value.
Traditional role patterns are making a huge comeback. Recent elections worldwide reveal a growing gender divide in voting behaviour. Is the political sway to the right / more authoritarian regimes a backlash against emancipatory movements like #MeToo? Is there a connection between nostalgia to classical gender roles and political extremism? Why are so many young men obsessed with their bodies? And (how) do extremists of all sides exploit this search for a lost masculinity? Could it be that incels, neo-Nazis, and jihadists have more in common than it seems? What draws teenagers to Andrew Tate? What makes young men parade T-shirts with the slogan ”Your Body My Choice”? And what does this mean for women*?
If what we are facing is a war of the sexes, what could be done to close the gap from an academic and artistic perspective? Can research or literature/art help us develop strategies to engage in dialogue with people with whom we seemingly share no common ground? Should we even try?
Mandatoryreading:
Schoeters, Gaea 2024. Trophy. TranslatedbyA. Fawcett. Manuscript. Pages: 6-9;
12-18; 22-27; 46-48; 116-118; 130-131 (tobecirculated).*
Further reading/viewingsuggestions:
Opera ROSALIND 2024: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MSvF1LmghCo
FixditGruppe Manifest 2022: «Optimistische Wut –Behebt den Sexismus in der Literatur», De Geus (tobecirculated).
* German publication: Schoeters, Gaea 2024. Trophäe. Zsolnay, Wien.
