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Eastern European lessons on women’s right to vote and women’s right to choose, celebrating International Women’s Day on 8 March.

During Communism, 8 March was celebrated as International Women’s Day, taking its origins from the history of the socialist movement. At the time, it was compulsory to celebrate full equality between the sexes, which had allegedly been reached: marches, school galas, and bosses’ speeches in the workplace commemorated the achievement. After the fall of Communism, the day was re-appropriated by the Polish feminist movement, which has organised yearly countrywide manifestations called Manifas, expressing concerns about women’s life and equality which appeared to be lacking after all.

Similar to many countries across Europe, Poland granted women political rights on 28 November 1918. The eve of 8 March 2018 provides a special opportunity to mark the centenary of women’s suffrage in Central and Eastern Europe, including Austria, Germany, Hungary, Poland and Russia, as well as the Representations of the People Act in the UK. Joining symbolically the tradition of Manifa demonstrations, this one-day seminar is devoted to discussions covering a range of issues that women face a hundred years on: the life-changing impact of political rights, legal and symbolic representation in the face of economic and social change, and women’s place (or the lack thereof) in fora and frameworks of power in the European tradition. This seminar adopts a comparative areal perspective on these themes, focusing mainly, but not exclusively, on Poland and Hungary.

Programme:

10.00-10.15:Ìý Welcome

Tom Lorman, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ SSEES: The Importance of Political Emancipation
Urszula Chowaniec and Eszter Tarsoly, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ SSEES : Against Vulnerability: Women’s Rights to Vote/ Women’s Rights to Choose

Session I. 10.15-13.00 Against Political Vulnerability: Emancipation and its Impact on the Contemporary Position of Women in Society

10.15 -11.25      Early twentieth-century developments in Central and Eastern Europe

10.15 -10.45      Małgorzata Radkiewicz, Jagiellonian University: Polish Modernists and Emancipators: Women on Film.

10.45-11.10ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Anna FrÄ…tczak, AFM Kraków University: Jewish Women as Radicals at the beginning of the 20^th-century Europe: The case of BUND

11.10-11.25       Discussion

11.25-11.45       Coffee break

11.45-13.00       Post-1945 and contemporary developments in Poland and Hungary

11.45-12.15ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Agnieszka Mrozik, University of Warsaw: Forgotten Revolution: Female Communist Intellectuals and the Making of Women's Emancipation in Postwar Poland

12.15-12.45ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Veronika Munk, ELTE Eötvös Lo°ùá²Ô»å University and Index News, Budapest: Speaking for Oneself: Prostitution as an Emancipatory Movement?

12.45-13.00       Chair: Eszter Tarsoly

Lunch 13.00-14.00

Session II. 14.00-16.00 Silent Others? Loud Others? Women as Metaphors and Symbolic Vulnerability

14.00-14.30ÌýÌýÌýÌýÌýÌý Eszter Tarsoly, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ SSEES: Women’s Talk? Discourses of Fertility, Childbearing, and Women in Public

14.30-15.00       Urszula Chowaniec, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ SSEES: Women and LGBTQ Issues Today. 20^th-century Perspectives from Eastern Europe

15.00-15.30)     Jelena Ćalić, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ SSEES: Language Teachers. A Job for… Men? The Political and Emancipatory Implications of a Profession

15.30-16.00       Discussion Chair: MaÅ‚gorzata Dawidek, Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ Slade School of Art 

16.00-17.30    Reception

Contact details:

Project leaders:

• Dr Urszula Chowaniec: u.chowaniec@ucl.ac.uk, +44 (0)7904 104311
• Dr Eszter Tarsoly: e.tarsoly@ucl.ac.uk, +44 (0)7792 251763

Co-operation:

• Main funder: Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøվ 
• Co-funders: Centre for Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ of Central Europe SSEES; Â鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾ European Institute ; qÂ鶹´«Ã½ÊÓƵÍøÕ¾; Gender and Feminist Network

Publication:

The papers of the seminar are invited to be submitted for a special issue of the journal Central Europe (published by Taylor and Francis, Autumn 2018).