Onderstaand bericht bereikte ons via de Facebook-groep van het Gender Studies Teach-in-event. Dit event zal niet plaatsvinden komende vrijdag, maar wel op 22 en 23 mei tijdens het Gender Research Seminar aan de UGent:
On the 8th of March we announced a Gender Studies Teach-in as a way to intervene in an on-going history of missed opportunities with respect to the field of Gender Studies at the KU Leuven:
There have been too many missed opportunities to create a space for a real Gender Studies program at our university, too many unfunded initiatives to promote Gender Studies education that did not get the necessary support, and too few structural policy changes in line with the scholarly standards of this field of study. Gender Studies is an internationally recognized interdisciplinary field of studies and its time to educate the decision makers at the KU Leuven about this fact. We are convinced that our academic community deserves better, and would benefit from being a part of the creative and critical Gender Studies conversations that are constitutive of all great global centers of research and teaching. If the KU Leuven won’t come to Gender Studies, Gender Studies will have to come to the KU Leuven…
This announcement led to many local, national and international conversations about the state of Gender Studies in Belgium in general, and at the KU Leuven in particular. What struck us was that at the KU Leuven there was a significant level of hesitation, general discouragement and also forthright fear of getting involved. This was in sharp contrast to the engagement and proposals from feminist scholars at other universities. This bleak picture led us to believe that, at present, a bid for critical gender studies at the KU Leuven could benefit more from joining forces and strategizing with other gender studies scholars outside of Leuven.
Our first public event will take place in the context of the Gender Research Seminar (organized by UGent, VUB and UA) on 22-23 May 2013 (www.genderseminar.ugent.be). In addition to the already existing program that gathers a number of international and national recognized gender studies scholars, we are currently organizing a panel discussion that addresses the state of Gender Studies in Flanders within the contemporary neoliberal academic context, with special attention to the condition of gender studies in Leuven. Keep an eye on the program, and join us there!
And if you want to get more involved with these on-going conversations about Gender Studies at the KULeuven, get in touch: genderstudieskul@gmail.com
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www.genderseminar.ugent.be
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