"A MOST ADMIRABLE SLUT"

Photo by Linda Rosier, 1992

After Rush Limbaugh's maddening comments about Sandra Fluke, I was pleased to write a piece for the NY Daily News at their Pageviews blog on the history of the word "slut."

More than 500 years before Rush Limbaugh called Georgetown law student Sandra Fluke a “slut,” Geoffrey Chaucer used a form of the word to describe an “untidy man” in "The Canterbury Tales." “Why is thy lord so sluttish, I thee pray, And is of power better clothes to bey,” he wrote in the 14th century poem.

But in the ensuing centuries, the would come to take on different meanings – and much more provocative ones, as Limbaugh’s crude use of the word reminds.

According to what linguist Lisa Sutherland told the BBC, the noun “slut” was first used in 1402 by Thomas Hoccleve, in much the same way Chaucer used the related adjective. In his “The Letter of Cupid,” Hoccleve refers to “the foulest slutte in al a town.”

Read the full article here. I didn't mention Kathleen Hanna (pictured above) or riot grrrls, though you know I had them in mind all the while.

WOMEN, THE ARTS, AND ACTIVISM: SUPPORTING THE SCENE

I’ve been involved with the Sarah Lawrence Women’s History Month Conference since 2009, planning 2010’s The Message is in the Music. This year (in its 14th year) will be my first time presenting my own work at the conference, and I am excited to be doing so with my cohorts in For the Birds. Here are the details for our panel THIS SATURDAY. I'll be presenting a slightly edited version of the paper I read at last year's Women Who Rock conference in Seattle.

SARAH LAWRENCE WOMEN’S HISTORY MONTH CONFERENCE

Saturday, March 3rd, 2012
4:30pm-6:00pm
Slonim Living Room

SUPPORTING THE SCENE: CREATING AND CURATING A FEMINIST SAFER SPACE

Feminist collective For the Birds will discuss the ways that gender informs their curatorial and activist practice, and their understanding of “safer spaces,” as well as how their scholarly journeys have been reflected in their own community-building experience.

Kate Wadkins, Sarah Lawrence College
Lauren Denitzio, Parsons the New School for Design
Sarah Hanks, CUNY Graduate Center
Roz Hunter, Sarah Lawrence College

For the full details, conference description, & schedule, click through the jump.

PAST PRESENT & FUTURE

rare book exhibit at The Berks Conference of Women's Historians

Breaking Boundaries & A Night of Spoken Word

via RE/VISIONIST

This weekend the Sarah Lawrence community will be celebrating Women's History Month with our 13th Annual Women's History Month Conference, Breaking Boundaries: Body Politics & the Dynamics of Difference.  Friday, the conference opens with a plenary featuring Marilyn Wann (author of Fat! So?) then a Night of Spoken Word featuring Maria James-Thiaw and Lara Frater, plus other artists: Ms. MaDonna Awotwi a.k.a. Sankofa the Poet, Jennifer Bartlett, Andrea Baker, Sheila Black, Shaashawn Dial, & David Wolach.

flier by Kate Wadkins | illustration by Cristy Road

A full conference schedule can be found here.

I'll be helping with the conference this weekend (along with fellow R/V staffer Thea Michailides) so I really hope to see you there! Excited about it all.

Queering Categories, Bringing Wreck

My review of (personal fave) Mimi Nguyen's panel, "Aesthetics, Access, Intimacy" or "Race, Riot Grrrl, Bad Feelings" at the Sarah Lawrence 12th Annual Women's History Conference is up at the Sarah Lawrence website now, included in our annual WH newsletter!

Nguyen’s comment about “quitting punk” illustrated the way many marginalized people feel within white dominated movements. Women, people of color, and queer folks alike have written extensively about how punk rock can be completely isolating to them. On the other hand, with its do-it-yourself ethos, punk rock offers the tools for positive things like grassroots organizing and creative self-expression. The potential for social change within punk and riot grrrl creates a tension: the simultaneous acceptance of marginalized folks within the subculture versus its constant re-creation of social hierarchies.

Read the full review here.

For more on how much I loved Mimi's panel, click here.

LADY ZINE PARTY

or "Thoughts on riot grrrl, feminisms, & race at the Lady Zine Party"

My friends Sheela and Julie hosted a "LADY ZINE PARTY" on the rainiest Saturday in recent memory. We met at Julie's apartment, and after homemade pizza and alcoholic Shirley Temples, we did a go-around and introduced ourselves.

One of the highlights was that a lot of people at the zine party weren't necessarily influenced by riot grrrl or had never done a zine. At least one person wasn't from the U.S., and everyone else seemed to grow up all over the country. There was a reality TV contest winner, folks who work at various nonprofits for the advancement of women, lots of grad school students, and some of my best friends. In the go-around, there were some tense discussions about why some young girls are so averse to the term "feminist". We talked about how the term "feminist" can sometimes be a misnomer and generally not conducive for communities of color and/or working class women. We also talked about how for youth, the "F" word can be a scary thing.

WOMEN'S HISTORY MONTH NEWS

Crossposted with katewadkins.com

Myself and four other women from the Sarah Lawrence Women's History Graduate Studies Program have been working on an online publication since last semester. We are officially launching tomorrow, in concurrence with Women's History Month and in time for the 12th Annual Women's History Conference at Sarah Lawrence this weekend. My title is officially "Web Editor". That means a lot of different things, some important ones being that I designed the website and the header too.

The publication is called RE/VISIONIST. Here's a little bit about us:

RE/VISIONIST is an online publication created by students of the Sarah Lawrence College Women’s History Graduate Program. In the interest of fostering dialogue, RE/VISIONIST aims to promote a critical analysis of history and contemporary issues through the lens of multiple feminisms. We focus on the intersections of lived realities and histories, such as the experiences related to race, class, gender, sexuality, age, and ability. We strive to keep the question, “who gets to write history?” on the table.

I will also take this moment to gently remind you that the Women's History conference, The Music is in the Message: Hip-Hop Feminism, Riot Grrrl, Latina Music & More, starts on Friday. The panel I am moderating on Riot Grrrl is on Saturday, March 6th, at 1:00PM.

RIOT GRRRL PANEL @ SLC WOMEN'S HISTORY CONFERENCE

HELLO FOLKS, IT'S ALL HAPPENING!

You may already know that I will be moderating the Riot Grrrl panel at Sarah Lawrence College's 12th Annual Women's History Conference: "The Music is in the Message".

What you don't know:

1. The panel is on Saturday, March 6, 2010 at 1:00PM

2. I am honored to say that the panel features author of Girl Power: The Nineties Revolution in Music, Marisa Meltzer; contributor to Riot Grrrl: Revolution Girl Style Now!, Julia Downes; and my friend and comrade in the Girl Gang Underground, blogger Jamielynn Varriale.

3. My dear friend Cristy Road did the illustration for the cover of the program.

As to be expected, I am so humbled and excited to be part of this! I'm geeking out on the conference and hope you all can make it. I am posting the info that pertains to me here, but the entire program is seriously phenomenal, and best of all: it's FREE (so no sorry excuses). My classmates in the Women's History program will be facilitating the other panels, so you'll get to see their fabulous faces too.

RIOT GRRRL HISTORY

EXCITING NEWS  >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>


I will be moderating the riot grrrl panel at Sarah Lawrence College's Twelfth Annual Women's History Month Conference.

The Message is in the Music:
Hip Hop Feminism, Riot Grrrl, Latina Music, and More

Twelfth Annual Women’s History Month Conference
at Sarah Lawrence College
Bronxville, New York

Friday & Saturday, March 5 & 6, 2010

Keynote speaker: Carmen Ashhurst, former president of Def Jam Recordings and Rush Communications, and author of the forthcoming book, Selling My Brothers: The Movement, The Media and Me

Music has long served social movements as a sound track, as a means of communication, and as its own arena for activism. While multiple generations of feminists have used music in these ways, it has played especially vital roles for those born since the 1970s. This conference will explore the ways in which young feminists have defined and expressed politics through music and musical cultures and communities. Among the questions we will ponder are: How does music reflect sites of agreement and conflict among different groups of feminists? How have movements like Riot Grrrl and Hip Hop feminism attracted young women to feminist activism? How do young feminists’ uses of music compare with those of earlier generations?

[Call for Proposals from Sarah Lawrence College]

REVIEW: Gender & the Sectional Conflict

And now for something... not so totally different! I began pursuing my Master's degree in Women's History at Sarah Lawrence College in September. I've been writing weekly papers, but recently, I was assigned a book review for my Visions & Revisions in U.S. Women's History class.

Gender & the Sectional Conflict
Nina Silber
The University of North Carolina Press
http://uncpress.unc.edu

I've Got A Proposition, Goes Something Like This: A Brief Herstory of The Big She-Bang

Beth and I have been working on this for weeks now. I think this is the final copy which will be going in the Big She-Bang zine. [Poster by No Guts No Glory]

I've Got a Proposition, Goes Something Like This:
A Brief Herstory of The Big She-Bang

by Beth Puma and Kate Wadkins

In late 2003 there had been many rumblings of the girls and women in the Long Island DIY punk and activist community wanting to organize on their own. Modern Times Collective had been around for years, ideas for Freespace were quickly developing, and the Freewheel Bike Collective had really taken off. A lot of folks were engaged in a variety of projects at this time, ranging from animal rights to various social justice groups. The younger women involved in the community wanted to organize in a more direct way, to deal not only with all of the social justice issues they were fighting for, but for their own space in this creative and active community.

A small group of girls decided that they wanted to focus on self-taught, skill-share workshops as a stepping stone to self-empowerment. They began with a series of skill-shares on knitting/crocheting, playing guitar and bass, silkscreening, and bike maintenance, among others. They met in each other's houses and in Argyle Park, Babylon. As with many other feminist collectives, their shared experience with their immediate community brought about common frustrations. Similar to consciousness-raising groups of the 70's and riot grrrl meetings of the 90's, they started to work from their own experience, and identify the sexism they experienced on an every day level in their surrounding community. These women named their group the Long Island Womyn’s Collective (LIWC).