The Society for Medieval Feminist Scholarship/The Gender and Medieval Studies Group at Leeds 2014

Women, Scholarship and Collective Action: A Roundtable

This proposed roundtable event follows on from this July’s highly successful SMFS/GMS-sponsored roundtable discussion (‘Gender, Posts, Positions, Pay and Promotion’) at the Leeds International Medieval Congress 2013, which concluded by positing a continued need for collective action by women academics as a countermeasure to the type of institutionalised sexism still experienced by many women in the profession. The 2014 roundtable, therefore, will focus on what we mean by ‘collective action’ and the ways in which it can be established and promoted to support women working within the academic environment. As usual, it will focus on both experiential and theoretical approaches, examining the ways in which women’s collaboration and cooperation within academic contexts carry the potential to form a whole much greater than the sum of the parts. It will also debate how collaborative action can effect mutual support as women help each other to succeed, progress and ultimately dismantle the glass-ceiling that the 2013 roundtable identified as still clearly operating within the profession.

Contributions for 5-7 minute papers are sought from academics from all levels of the profession, particularly from those who have experience of collective/collaborative /cooperative actions devised specifically for the promotion of gender equality. Inquiries and/or offers to contribute should be sent to Liz Herbert McAvoy (e.mcavoy@swan.ac.uk) by September 15, 2014.