CEED Feminisms 4: SKAM, or the Albanian Lesson
Radical Sense
20.03.2024
Wednesday 20 March 2024
6.30–8.30pm
Online
Join us online for the fourth CEED (Central Eastern European and Diasporic) Feminisms meeting led by Radical Sense, a reading group based in Tirana. The session focuses on a micro-reader compiled by Radical Sense that explores the activity of translating SCUM Manifesto, radical feminist Valerie Solanas’s 1967 polemical argument for the wholesale extermination of men, featuring Doruntina Vinca’s oral essay ‘SKAM, or the Albanian Lesson,’ 2021.
The exchange with Radical Sense introduces contemporary Albanian feminism as a live dialogue between thinkers, writers and artists based in the Balkans and internationally, responsive to political backdrops shaping experiences of womxn in Albania and beyond, and global feminist histories. The discussion will touch on Radical Sense's work translating readers of feminist writing into Albanian, in the context of the 'challenge' as diagnosed by the group—that there's very little feminist writing or theory happening in the Albanian-speaking region.
There is no expectation to read the texts in advance. We will read out loud, together, during the session, before discussing the texts.
Access to digital copies of texts will be granted upon RSVP. A Zoom link will be sent to you 24 hours in advance of the event.
Please contact Jessie Krish for any access needs: jessie [at] cellprojects [dot] org.
Further events in the CEED Feminisms series will be announced soon. Find out more about the programme delivered in partnership with Feminist Duration Reading Group here.
Curator Jessie Krish, with Sabrina Fuller and Helena Reckitt (Feminist Duration Reading Group)
Further References
- Stefania Arcara, Deborah Ardilli, and Michela Baldo, 'Valerie Solanas’s Trilogia SCUM: A Feminist Translation Project of Care,' Gender/Sexuality/Italy 6 (2019): http://www.gendersexualityitaly.com/?p=4193
- Ayşe Düzkan, 'Written on the Heart, in Broken English,' The Routledge Handbook of Translation and Activism, ed. Rebecca Ruth Gould and Kayvan Tahmadebian (London: Routledge, 2020), 217–21
- Breanne Fahs, Valerie Solanas, The Defiant Life of the Women Who Wrote SCUM (and Shot Andy Warhol) (New York: Feminist Press, 2014)
- Chavisa Woods, 'On Hating Valerie Solanas (and Loving Violent Men),' Full Stop, May 21, 2019, https://www.full-stop.net/2019/05/21/features/chavisa-woods/solanas/
Radical Sense is a weekly radical feminist reading group based in Tirana, Albania. Founded in 2018 by Silvi Naçi, Doruntina Vinca, and Leah Whitman-Salkin, Radical Sense is a space for reading, listening, and thinking together.
Feminist Duration Reading Group (FDRG) established in 2015, is a gathering focused on feminisms outside the dominant Anglo-American canon. It juxtaposes earlier moments of radical feminist thought, art, and collective practice with current urgencies. The group has developed a practice of reading out loud, together, one paragraph at a time, with the aim of creating a sense of connection and intimacy during meetings.
CEED Feminisms is a Research Group of the British Art Network (BAN). BAN is a Subject Specialist Network supported by Tate and the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art, with additional public funding provided by the National Lottery through Arts Council England. CEED Feminisms is additionally supported by Cockayne Foundation.
