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Moving Boundaries in Feminist Theory: Postcoloniality and Posthumanity
Programme
The NOISE Summer School is an advanced training course, which offers a diversified, but coherent programme
of study from an interdisciplinary perspective. It is meant for advanced MA students and
PhD students and provides special and separate tuition seminars to these two groups.
Download the final programme here.
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FORMULA
- Two lectures in the morning
- Separate MA- and PhD-specific seminars in the afternoon
- Social programme
- All participants are expected to fully participate in the entire programme during the two weeks
- Students prepare before the summer school by reading and collecting material for assignments (approx. 70 hrs of work).
After fulfilment of all requirements (preparation of assignments and reading, active participation and final essay
of 10 - 15 pages), participants receive the NOISE Certificate for 240 hours of work, equalling 9 ECTS
CLUSTER ONE
Feminist Perspectives on Postcolonial Europe
Coordinated by Ass. Prof. Sandra Ponzanesi (Utrecht University, the Netherlands) and Dr. Marsha Henry (London School of Economics, UK)
Postcolonial critique aims to account for structures of domination and resistance, which are present in our globalized world.
In this cluster we engage with the field of postcolonial critique by mapping out some of its major contentions and paradoxes.
For example, we will expand the field to minor and removed colonial legacies (i.e. Dutch, French, Italian, Nordic, Soviet, or Austro-Hungarian)
and address the problems of postcolonialism as an all-encompassing buzzword, which has also turned into a fashionable commodity.
The scope of this cluster is therefore to apply the tools of postcolonial feminist critique to specific historical and geo-political formations in Europe,
which has remained a blind spot in postcolonial critique.
We will discuss what makes Europe postcolonial and why the notion of Europe is more contested than ever, both internally
(through the proliferations of ethnic, religious, regional differences) and externally (Europe expanding its boundaries but closing its borders).
We will do so by exploring major debates in contemporary Europe on citizenship, migration, secularism and multiculturalism both at the level of
representation and of socio-cultural formations through the analysis of different media, genres and strategies.
Confirmed teachers for this cluster are:
Ass. Prof. Sandra Ponzanesi, Utrecht University, the Netherlands
Dr. Marsha Henry, London School of Economics, United Kingdom
Prof. Dr. Frances Gouda, University of Amsterdam, the Netherlands
Prof. Dr. Marguerite Waller, University of California-Riverside, USA
Dr. Kristín Loftsdóttir, University of Iceland, Iceland
Dr. Ruba Salih, Gender and Middle East Studies, University of Exeter, United Kingdom
CLUSTER TWO
Posthuman Tropes in Feminist Theory
Coordinated by Dr. Jami Weinstein (Utrecht University, the Netherlands) and, provisionally, Prof. Dr. Maureen McNeil (Lancaster University)
This cluster will interrogate the effects posthuman theories have been having on feminist theories in recent years.
Posthuman theories aim to overturn the Enlightenment construction of the human as autonomous, self-identical, rational, static, and distinct from animals, artifacts, and nature.
Since these notions of the human are essential to what it means to be human under the humanist paradigm,
if we repudiate them, the resulting “human” would be unrecognizable to us as such, hence the term “posthuman”.
Posthuman theories thus seek to re-imagine the human beyond humanism and they do so in a variety of (inter-)disciplines:
technoscience studies, media studies, animal studies, and queer theory, among others.
In light of posthuman theoretical insights, we are compelled to revisit and call into question many key issues in feminist theory,
for example: questions of sexual difference, the sex-gender distinction, notions of embodiment, and understandings of sexuality, subjectivity, and identity.
We will use posthuman interpretative techniques as analytical tools to reconceptualize feminist strategies and theories.
We will thus explore what it means to be a sexed/raced/gendered/sexual body in light of the shifting, leaky, fluid, moving boundaries advocated by posthuman theories.
Confirmed teachers for this cluster are:
Dr. Jami Weinstein, Utrecht University, the Netherlands
Prof. Dr. Maureen McNeil, Lancaster University, United Kingdom (provisionally)
Prof.dr. Lynda Birke, University of Chester, United Kingdom
Dr. Amade M’Charek, University of Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Dr. Kerstin Sandell, Lund University, Sweden
Dr. Jenny Sundén, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), Sweden
Doro Wiese, MA, Utrecht University, The Netherlands
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