Setting up book club / discussion group re. Radical Feminism

[LoveCompost]

Hi, our local library appears to have been ‘captured’ by Stonewall allies . Drag Queen Story Time , Pride flags flying for weeks , LGBTIQ reading group .. I’m wondering if a good way to balance this out is to start a book group focussing on feminist issues ? The proper kind ! I’d be grateful for any advice here as I haven’t a clue and I’m a new feminist too so am unsure as to whether I’d have the confidence to actually be the lead but I don’t mind being the name .

Thanks, Imnobody and Aston. All very reassuring.

I don't know. If you told the library that you wanted to have a "Women's book group" or "Feminist book group" then they might just agree without comment, or they might tell you "Well, you can call it whatever you like, but we can't let you exclude anyone". And I don't think that moving to Costa Coffee would necessarily help. The management probably wouldn't like having to be referees when a group wanted to keep one or two individuals from joining (even if they bought coffee). They'd probably prefer it if everyone went somewhere else.

I very much doubt a womens group would be cause for a management intervention.
No referees are needed.

What a waste of this thread when a simple post pointing out that some libraries might have an issue with single sex groups, and who to contact and or which part of the EA might apply would have been much more useful, supportive and dare I say sisterly?!

There is a problem with the word feminism because it sort of implies it is just about women wanting to be equal to men, so for instance the Fawcett Society has men who are members.

I think that a women only group would be a Women's Liberation reading group. The basis of women's liberation is the common oppression women face from birth because of their sex (ie discrimination and worse from the male sex class).

And absolutely is you were reading texts from something like the Women's Room that absolutely last thing you would want is anyone who was born male and grown up in a patriarchal society. (Many novels have been far more galvinising of women to organise that theoretical texts).

The London Feminist Network has a book club. You could maybe contact them about how they go about organising.

Have found these links:
www.meetup.com/Reading-Women-London-Feminist-Book-Group/
londonfeministnetwork.org.uk/groups/feminist-book-group

I thought they were on facebook but cant find them

Where is this book club going to be?

You could put an advert up to gain interest and then take it from there?

These are excerpts from Glasgow Women's Library. It is a charity rather than a public library but I suspect public libraries may well take the same line.

Glasgow Women’s Library’s (GWL) book club is one of the longest running groups in the city. Like the library, the club reads exclusively women writers and its members are women and non-binary people

The one below is for a woman of colour reading group.

This reading group is for women of colour and is free to attend. All women-only events are inclusive of trans and intersex women, as well as non-binary and gender fluid people who identify in a significant way as woman or female

General statement

All women-only events are inclusive of Trans, Intersex women, non-binary and gender fluid people

In general when you have a public group, the benefit and difficulty is that there are limits on the control you have. Even if it is a woman only group, whomever shows up may have their own ideas which may be different to or opposed to your own. And you can't really take a hard line, people simply won't keep coming to a group like that.

A possible approach to test the waters as it were might be to do a single book study of a likely book, advertise it as such, and see how it goes. If it really goes well you can carry on with more books, but there is also a natural end if it doesn't seem to quite work.

Why don’t you go in and speak to a librarian?

You’d need to have a plan, ie an outline of reading material and discussion topics, a timeline, and a projected size of group and duration.

You could think about tackling:
The first wave of feminism - Vindication of the Rights of Women, etc.
2nd wave feminist texts - the classics
Texts discussing women & work - not just paid work, but domestic work
Texts discussing pornography - the way it represents women, and the effect on us
Texts discussing women’s sexuality.
The role of ‘beauty’ & ‘fashion’ in maintaining patriarchal systems.
The ideal woman - what are the promoted feminine characteristics?
Domestic violence & violence against women - how it is normalised.
Feminist dystopias- are there any which have particular relevance to us now?
Access to abortion & contraception & how these have affected women’s lives.
A quick canter through The Invisible Woman because people like it.

This is all very western focused. I don’t know enough to suggest topics for non western women’s experiences & texts, but think you should definitely try to cover that.

I think you could probably spend several weeks just on domestic work!

Amazing how virtually as soon as this query went up, someone was contemptuously trying to shut it down (“super-sekret wimmins group”- just dripping with bile and hatred at the thought of women talking to each other.) Anyone who is in any doubt about how women are being shut down, just look at this thread, and the venom shown. Why don’t people want women to talk to each other, I wonder? Is it because we might discover similarities of experience which demonstrate the reality of our biology, and how crucially it has affected our lives?

I don't really see why it needs to be in a public library. If I were holding this I'd probably select something like an All Bar One type venue- bit bland but women friendly and spacious. The one nearest to me is deserted Sunday to Wednesday evenings. You wouldn't need to book anything with the bar- you're just a group of customers. You'd have to get the books yourselves but I don't think that's a problem really.

Glasgow Women's Library is, like many women's groups in Scotland including rape crisis and women's aid, trans inclusive.

So their's is a public statement of their political beliefs. ie they are running a "Women's" Library but dont believe in the biological reality of sex!

... "bye-laws"...?

Well that didn’t take long. Went from “you need to be careful you’re not breaking any rules” to “TWAW and you’re a bunch of bigots”, in a shorter time than usual.

Indeed. I doubt this is a first time poster on FWR.

its members are women and non-binary people

Why? Even if you have to include MTF trans why do you have to include "non binary people" whenever there is something for women (and I've never seen this for a men's event)? Make your mind up, you don't think you are either sex!

I think some groups have included them in women's events because some of the non-binary people are in fact women, and so they want them to be included. But it's really talking around the fact of the matter.