Lady Business

When you first drafted this post I said it made me realise our feminist education had a lot in common even though our educational experience was sort of different. Maybe it would be useful if I explained the similarities, so that this book doesn't leave you feeling like you're barred from entry to feminism? There are probably a lot of us out there who came up with a less than formal feminist education and who are still rapidly trying to patch holes in our knowledge, as we go about the business of living and sometimes it's nice to know you're not alone.

I find it really difficult to remember how I became a self-identifying feminist, because I've been one for so long, but also because it seems kind of bizare to me that it happened. Sure, I had a mother who had both a fulfilling career and a family, I went to decent, regular schools and I spent a bit of time on female heavy message boards, but I don't think any of those things directly contributed to making me a feminist. Like, I never had a big 'women are awesome' chat with my mum, or with any kind of feminist mentor. My schools weren't conservative, but neither were they feminist havens. Sometimes I look around and I wonder why I'm as liberal as I am/how feminism became such a part of me. And by the time I got to message boards at 16/17, I already identified as a feminist, despite the fact that I really had very little idea about feminist history. I can only assume that a patchwork of small moments (that one citizenship lesson that was designed to challenge gender assumptions) and seeing women I admired acting strongly and working in good positions (my mum, my teachers, my cousin)led me to self-identify as feminist, before I even really got that feminism was a huge movement with a huge, complicated history.

As for learning feminist stuff in higher education, well I went to a university that specialised in medieval history, so I took a lot of courses in medieval history. There probably were nineteenth century courses I could have taken that would have intersected with ninteenth century feminism, but I don't remember them and imagine I would have shunned them unless they were all about feminism, as the nineteenth century isn't my favourite period. I was really lucky, because I went through school at a time when it was pretty compulsory to make every course explore female history (at least for one lesson). So, in nearly every course, there would always be one lesson on women and there would always be one paper option that encouraged you to learn more about women. I took a gender in history course in my last year, which again focused on early history. I think I picked up a lot of useful stuff about women's earlier lives, but, yes I do still feel adrift when confronted with other's wealth of knowledge about the biggest time of feminist progress. And my lack of knowledge does sometimes make me feel insecure when I want to discuss feminism with people who have a more formal education.

So that's me. Like I said, our experiences aren't the same, but they have similarities that I thought it might be useful for you to know. I don't really have any solutions for you, but then you don't really need any, because this post is about expressing feelings and feelings don't need solving.