Workshops and Panels

This page provides information about the workshops and panels held at Feminism in London 2009.

Racism and sexism: what are the issues for black and minority ethnic women?

This question time panel looked at how sexism and racism multiply and compound each other and took inspiration from the many black and minority ethnic women who are organising and resisting. The panel explored these issues through their own personal experiences of recovery and resistance in the UK and internationally.

Panel members:

• Femi Otitoju (chair)
• Akima Thomas (Clinical Director of Women and Girls Network)
• Yasmin Rehman
• Ego Ahaiwe
• Shahida Choudhry

“It’s easy out here for a pimp” anti-porn slideshow

This workshop was based on a hard-hitting feminist anti-pornography slide show written and produced by Dr Rebecca Whisnant of the University of Dayton for Stop Porn Culture. The slide show provides a feminist analysis of the nature, impact and harms of the contemporary pornography industry and the pornification of the wider corporate media culture. It shows how, by selling a set of toxic and distorted messages about gender, power and sexuality, this culture is hurting all of us, but especially children and young people. It ends with suggestions for activism and ways to resist porn culture.

This workshop was presented by Anna Fisher.

What are the issues for pro-feminist men?

This workshop was led by the London Profeminist Men’s Group, which consists of about half a dozen men meeting in London every 2 weeks. The aims of our meetings are: 1) To support each other in our personal struggles as men, including our efforts to rid ourselves of sexist behaviour. 2) To discuss issues around gender politics generally. 3) To plan what kind of action we can take as pro-feminists.

This workshop discussed the role of men in gender politics and activism, and asked “How do men’s life issues relate to the struggle for feminism?” They split into gender specific groups at some point to talk more about our personal experiences and ideas.

Read their blog about the workshop >>

Feminist self-defence and assertiveness training

This active workshop was a practical session led by Claudia da Silva, Annie Rossi and Andrew Blackwood from the London Centre for Personal Safety. The workshop invited women to share their concerns about personal safety and aimed to address these concerns. It looked at the concept of women’s self defence and why it is important. During the course of the workshop participants were shown a short video addressing issues around personal safety and were taught basic self defence moves. Participants also had the opportunity to start developing their own personal safety plan.

What’s wrong with prostitution?

This question time panel aimed to inform and educate about the realities of prostitution and the modern globalised “sex industry”.

Panel members:

• Rebecca Mott (survivor)
• Anna Travers (survivor)
• Denise Marshall (chief executive of Eaves, which runs the Poppy Project which assists women exiting prostitution)
• Finn Mackay (chair)

Commanding the camera and setting the agenda: media training with camera

Part one developed confidence within the medium and examined camera technique and body language. It also explored different sorts of television styles and interviewers and, through feedback, discussed and developed successful ways of handling both interviews and the medium as a whole.

Part two took the skills developed in the first half of the afternoon and built on these. It looked at how the interviewee can set the agenda and tone of an interview and how they can insure that their message is the predominate one to the audience.

This active workshop was led by Rebecca Morden.

No recourse to public funds

“No recourse to public funds” (NRPF) refers to people from abroad who are subject to immigration control and have no entitlement to welfare benefits, Home Office support for asylum seekers or public housing. This can be a catastrophe for women who come to this country perfectly legitimately and subsequently find themselves in violent or abusive relationships. Because they have no access to the financial support that would allow them to escape, they can be trapped in an intolerable and dangerous situation.

The workshop covered:

• An overview of policy and legislation around NRPF, including the 2 year rule and the domestic violence concession.
• The particular impact this has on Black, Asian, Minority Ethnic and Refugee (BAMER) women and children experiencing violence.
• Strategies for supporting women and children.

This workshop was led by Marai Larasi, director of Imkaan.

Raising children in the age of porn

This workshop was for all those who interact with children (whether as a parent, an aunt or uncle, a teacher or a play leader). Have you wondered what to do on discovering your 11-year old son watching hard core porn on the Internet? Or how to respond to your 7-year old neice who asks for a Playboy t-shirt for her birthday? Or how to help your own teenager or the young people you work with have a more critical analysis of the porn culture that engulfs them? In this workshop, a collective session, we will be looking for answers to such questions.

This workshop led on from the anti-pornography slide show and was facilitated by Laura Colclough, Youth Outreach Worker with Rape Crisis (Wycombe, Chiltern and South Bucks). Minimum age: 13.

Poverty and motherhood: how society undervalues women’s work

40 years since the equal pay legislation, the pay gap is alive and kicking. Many mothers would love to have more time at home when their children are little, but the lack of flexible childcare and unreceptive employers make it difficult. Mothers often feel damned whatever they do. If mothers do choose to stay at home, they are likely to suffer financially in the future – they lose seniority when they do return to work, if they are in a relationship and dependent on a partner, they are more vulnerable to poverty if the relationship breaks down and in old age they are vulnerable because of the lack of savings and pension contributions. Changes in the benefit system threaten to push single parents off benefit and into work. The pay gap is largest for women who work part-time, who are overwhelmingly mothers. This question-time panel looked at these issues and showed that the underlying theme is how society undervalues women’s work.

Panel members:

• Sue Cohen (director of the Single Parent’s Action Network)
• Ali Edney
• Abi Moore (Pink Stinks)
• Lisa-Marie Taylor (chair)

Rape and sexual violence

The focus of this workshop was the extent and impact of rape and sexual violence on women and girls. It explored:

• How women’s lives are affected by the fear of rape;
• The consequences of rape for women and girls who have experienced it;
• The support that survivors of rape and sexual violence might need;
• The cultural stigma of being a victim of sexual violence;
• The limitations of victim and survivor as identities for women who have experienced sexual violence;
• Activism to challenge the myths and stereotypes about sexual violence.

This workshop was facilitated by Hilary McCollum.

This workshop was for women (including trans women) only.

Power in bed

Top, bottom, in bed or out. What does empowering sex look like? How do power and privilege play out in the sex we have and the sex we want to have? Join this fun facilitated discussion to examine how the social forces and power dynamics we challenge publicly also shape our most intimate interactions.

This workshop was led by Alice Kentridge.

Activism training: how to run a successful campaign

It is an exciting and important time to be a feminist activist. As inequality remains massive, misogyny and violence against women remains rife and the backlash against the struggle for equality intensifies – with women being objectified and sexualised by the mainstreaming of the sex and porn industries – women and men across the country are increasingly standing up to object.

This spirit of resistance has been mobilised by campaigns like the OBJECT/Fawcett campaign against the mainstreaming and proliferation of lap dancing clubs, the student union-led campaign against sexist beauty pageants being reintroduced into universities, OBJECT Feminist Fridays taking place around the country to object to lads’ mags, and the Demand Change! OBJECT-Eaves coalition using activism to challenge the glamorisation of prostitution and the idea that it is acceptable for a woman’s body to be bought and sold like a commodity.

This workshop was facilitated by Anna van Heeswijk, grassroots coordinator at OBJECT.