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The article calls for papers for the 18th Annual Conference of the Women's History Network at St. Hilda's College in Oxford, England from September 11-13, 2009. Papers are encouraged to focus on gender and institutional politics, women's movements and identity politics, and community and neighbourhood empowerment.

Over the last decade, there has been growing awareness about issues of sexual consent. This has resulted in a global shift towards prioritising education and campaigns which address consent and sexual violence. Yet much discourse about consent continues to reinforce legalistic and binary notions of consent/rape which do not map onto young people's experiences of navigating sex and relationships. This paper draws on findings from an innovative 2-year participatory action research project about sexual consent with young people that involved a series of educational and action-based projects at seven sites in Southern England. By drawing on important feminist work about continuums, this paper considers the generative potential of theorising and teaching about consent using the device of a continuum. It offers insight into how young people construct consent and develops an expanded model of consent using 'continuum thinking'. Findings suggest the need to encourage and embrace a wider variety of terminology regarding consent and sexual violence in order to invite more people into the consent conversation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern Foreign Language (MFL) education has long been described as being 'in crisis' by virtue of a long decline in the numbers of students being entered for exams at age 16 and 18. Whilst this decline is generally attributed to policy, harsh grading and the rise of global English, this paper challenges this view by positioning the decline at the intersection of the feminising of the subject and an othering of the speakers of the languages taught. Using a loosely Foucauldian form of discourse analysis, academic literature, published reports on language needs and language teaching, and original qualitative data from two studies are drawn together. A feminising discourse around the subject of MFL is identified, juxtaposed with a masculinising discourse around education more generally, leading to the devaluing of the subject. Edward Said's orientalism is explored as a framework for the discussion of the media and public 'othering' of the speakers of the languages commonly taught and the 'fetishisation' of less commonly taught languages. It is argued that overcoming the decline in uptake of modern foreign languages will require reconceptualising of the problem at policy level and a change in the media and public discourses surrounding the subject. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores how nursing education both exemplifies the contradictions of neoliberalism alongside its seemingly all-encompassing influence. We conduct a feminist critical policy analysis to trace the histories of nursing as a feminised vocation located outside the academy, and how this is reflected in recent policy. We then critically explore widening participation and social mobility in relation to nursing education, and demonstrate how a discourse of fairness is used to justify market solutions. The 'special case' of nursing is considered through an analysis of how 'the nurse' as subject is constituted in education policy discourse. Our discussion focuses on the effects of these reforms and demonstrates how historical discourses that centre on women as carers are assimilated into the 'neoliberal social imaginary'. The paper's scope is both local – the gendered history of nursing education in England – and global – the force of neoliberal globalisation in education policy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides a reflection on the use of visual art workshops in an interdisciplinary feminist project with female survivors of domestic violence living in refuges in England and Portugal. The paper discusses the fieldwork in each location with attention to the interaction between participants, between participants and the researcher/s, and the cultural and institutional structures influencing the research and the images produced. Despite some key differences in the context, the analysis highlights key resonances and commonalities amongst the objects that survivors of domestic abuse depicted in each location. We use the feminist notion of 'giving voice' as an analytical tool throughout the paper. The paper argues that 'giving voice' was not unproblematically accomplished by using visual methods and suggests that our understanding remained partial and often reliant on verbal narratives accompanying the visual images produced. We also highlight issues of power emerging when exhibiting art generated through the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on a series of seminars held in the year 1987 in Cambridge, England on feminism and psychoanalysis. Seminars were nominally international, with speakers from Great Britain, Holland, France, India and the U.S. The papers on these seminars are now published in volumes. One assumes that papers were followed by discussions, or at least questions, and it is regrettable that no indication on audience reaction is given. The purpose of these seminars was to explore debates that have arisen between feminism and psychoanalysis, especially psychoanalysis of the Lacanian persuasion. Few concessions are made to the uninitiated, and most of the authors assume a familiarity with a wide range of difficult material. Both the Cambridge papers rely upon and reproduce a number of dubious propositions, not least the pervasive belief that there is a dominant Cartesian rationalism which can be held responsible for the constitution of the thinking subject.

In this short paper, I start with a case study – about how elementary school children in the early twentieth century in England understood their responsibilities vis-à-vis family (and school). This example provides a window into a past which deeply contrasts with present-day children's and adults' understandings and lives. I go on to consider (very briefly, for the field is vast) how ideas about childhood changed in the interwar years and how, since then, children have become locked into educational establishments – as well as into families. It seems to me that in these circumstances we are not used to thinking of children as thoughtful and active members of society. So it is no surprise to me that adults do not look to inter-relations with children as key variables towards understanding the social order. I note that my emphasis is on the UK, since I know most about that! [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper centres on a nursery teacher who finds herself confounded by an aspect of boys' play, particularly their attraction to 'gun play'. However, by engaging with poststructuralist theories the teacher is able to recognise how her inability to deal satisfactorily with the boys and their play can be attributed to her own immersion in two discourses: child centred pedagogy and feminism. The paper charts her efforts at shifting certain mechanistic practices. In this cleared space, she is then able to offer the boys ways of extending their play. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A sample of women ( n = 5) participated in a qualitative service evaluation concerning an open-ended, therapeutic group for women only. Data analysis followed suggestions by Halcomb and Davidson (2006). Main themes derived from the evaluation included: 'Groups are different from individual work', 'Belonging/ not being alone', 'Performance in the group', 'The group as a safety net', 'Life improvements and hope for the future' and 'The extent of emotional despair felt'. In this paper, several sub-themes within the main themes and relevant theories and implications for theory and service provision are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper evaluates the Stern Review of rape in the context of public responses to rape, in England and Wales. The piece is based on an anti-rape feminist approach and so weighs a woman-centred approach to rape responses against the mainstream justice model. Overall, the argument made is that nothing much is really changing in public responses to rape. The work outlines problems with the Stern contention that the conviction rates for rape need to be calculated differently, and takes issue with the claim that the “policies are right”. Stern's call for greater support for women who have been raped is welcomed, but the effectiveness of the review process itself is questioned. These discussions illustrate the process of attrition as it is variously understood by feminists and by Baroness Stern. It is suggested that reviews themselves may be little more than a dampener, brought in when claims for change create a need to be seen to be doing something. A preferred alternative might be some form of ongoing body, reviewing and challenging practice and policy; however, it is recognised that this could be difficult to achieve amid the current spending cuts. The paper then turns to evaluate trends in support for survivors and notes that the more “professional” models of the Sexual Assault Referral Centre and the Independent Sexual Violence Advisers have held sway for some time. However, under the new coalition, government funding is also being directed towards women-only Rape Crisis centres, and this move is warmly welcomed here. The work concludes that much does indeed remain the same, despite positive signs in terms of respect for this survivor-centred model. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The feminisation of migration is absent in policy and programmatic discourses on adult education in the USA and England. This paper uses an intersectional framework and feminist transnational methodology to probe this concept and its implications for women migrants and their education and advancement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Highlights the 2000 BISA Gender and International Relations Working Group Workshop in London, England on October 7, 2001. Emphasis on methodologies in feminist research; Consideration of the intersubjective identities of researcher and the research subject; Names of several presenters.

Drawing on two recently completed ethnographic studies of young women in the West Midlands, this paper explores a series of issues about the application of feminist principles and practice to such research. One study analysed young women's friendships, mainly through participant observation in school, supplemented by participation at a youth club. The other explored the likely success of the former Conservative Government's 'Health of the Nation's' targets for aspects of young women's health, through extended attendance at two youth clubs, supplemented by ‘shadowing’ informants at school. Both studies also used interviews, diaries and other data sources. Driven by the researchers' desire to ‘give a voice’ to their informants, this paper reviews power relationships in the production of knowledge; issues about self-presentation; securing access to and winning the trust of the young women; and their resolution of some of the ethical dilemmas which confronted the researchers in the course of their fieldwork. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The abuse of disabled women is an issue that has not historically been given a great deal of attention. More recently, efforts to raise awareness of this particular set of needs have been ongoing but largely limited to the specialised spheres of domestic violence and disability activism. This paper explores the types of discourse being put forward in these efforts, using Fraser's categorisation of needs talk within the process of politicisation. It finds evidence of oppositional, expert and reprivatisation discourses and suggests that these have emerged in a way that reflects the distinctive histories of disabled people as well as feminist explanations of domestic violence and abuse. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In early 1920 women in England and Wales sat as Justices of the Peace (JPs) for the first time, becoming the first women to have any formal role in the country's law courts. Less than thirty years later nearly a quarter of JPs were women, a proportion unparalleled in any other activity of civic and public life other than voting. Yet the legislation that admitted women to the magisterial bench - the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act - is usually pronounced a failure by historians. This article argues that the appointment of so many women to the magisterial bench in a relatively short period of time was a success for the women's movement and that it was due very largely to the agency of some of the early women magistrates themselves and the efforts of the organisations to which they belonged, albeit working with the grain of reform in the criminal justice system. The article also maps the campaigners' use of the twin concepts of 'rights' and 'duties' within their overall project for the advancement of equal citizenship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The summer of 2017 heralded an interesting layering of English elite women's sports events as major competitions were held in cricket, football, rugby and hockey. Uniquely this was the first occasion when these competitions were held during the same summer period and England was the only team to participate in all four events. This presents an opportunity to examine British print media coverage of elite English women, across a range of sports tournaments during a confined season. A qualitative analysis of British print media was undertaken for each of the four tournaments. Eighty nine articles from four national newspapers were analysed and results demonstrate emergent themes of International success, Performance and Role Models. These themes are discussed in the context of an accumulation of successful coverage, third wave feminism and the framing of the achievements resulted in the portrayal of the sports women as authentic athletes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article details the conference on contemporary feminism entitled "Transformations: Thinking Through Feminism" held in Lancaster, England on July 17-19, 1997. Participants, speakers and issues discussed in conference; Focus on feminist ethics; Concepts related to transformation.

Following our contribution to a study of mentoring in seven European countries, we explored epistemological and ontological inconsistencies within mainstream mentoring systems and their regulated practice in England. We considered how feminist mentoring praxis can unsettle conceptualisations of mentoring relationships and challenge inequity in the early education systems and the practice of teaching young children. Predominantly female, early childhood educators suffer from low status in England, and their working lives may be controlled and policed through inequitable systems. On entering the workforce, trainees encounter a reductionist policy milieu where mentoring structures and normative assessment arrangements contribute to inequity. Mentors play pivotal roles in inducting trainees into their worlds of work with young children. Mentoring relationships can determine whether trainees accept the status quo. Principles derived from feminist praxis enable mentors to practise an ‘engaged pedagogy’, co-constructing knowledge, subverting hierarchies and contesting taken-for-granted aspects of policy and practice. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Numerous critical analyses have already established the profoundly gendered nature of normative body ‘ideals’ and weight-management practices in Western cultures. Such studies have, amongst other things, elucidated how body dissatisfaction, ‘dieting’ and other weight-loss practices are discursively constituted as both feminised and feminising. Critiquing the over-determined normativity of thinness as a key index of femininity, these analyses have also highlighted how fatness, as abjected flesh, is equated with the feminine and how, in the context of an alleged ‘obesity crisis’, ‘fat’ men, as well as women and children, risk stigmatisation. An emergent research literature now explores men’s engagement with body ‘ideals’, weight management and ‘body projects’ more generally. This article builds on that work, exploring the negotiation of embodied masculinities in the weight-related talk of men who risked being labelled ‘overweight’ or ‘obese’. Drawing on interviews (N = 37), the study illustrates how ‘big’ men attempted to shield their threatened masculine identities by contrasting their own bodily bigness, corporeal concerns and embodied practices with those of women and girls. Also attentive to sexualities, ethnicity and class, this article illustrates the context-specific, intersectional and contested nature of embodied masculinities and body projects in these ‘epidemic’ times. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

This article explores feminist interventions in urban school politics. First, it argues that the female contribution was an essential component to politics and policy making in the 120-year period that London had a single education authority. Second, it suggests that these women politicians were advocates of a cultural praxis that involved reforming institutions to change the trajectory of political consciousness in twentieth century Britain. Particular emphasis is given to a generational analysis of what was achieved by a long line of women struggling politically and the relevance of much of their political and educational agenda for politics today. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 1859 Jessie Boucherett, the daughter of a Lincolnshire landowner possessed of an independent income, was inspired by press discussions of the need to find alternative occupations for women to make contact with the women who were already spreading this message through the English Woman’s Journal. With their rather grudging support she founded a society, which still exists, to further this aim, the Society for Promoting the Employment of Women (now the Society for Promoting the Training of Women). Using the records of this Society, now housed at Girton College, Cambridge, this article looks at the way commitment to this cause allowed a woman from a wealthy, high Tory, landed background to turn herself in six years into the feminist who put up the initial money for the women’s suffrage campaign, and went on to be a leading figure in campaigns to reform the married women’s property laws and against legislation restricting women’s work. It examines in particular the use she made of her personal wealth to direct the strategies of the activist groups to which she belonged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Focuses on the conference held by Women for Socialism on October 7, 1989 which brought together socialist-feminists to begin the process of building the vision of an education system which would challenge the oppressions of class, gender and race. Background of Women for Socialism; Background of the Dayschool; The women and education Dayschool; Socialist-feminism in context.