At 12.30 pm on 6th January a banner was unfurled outside the Cineworld Cinema in Chesterfield. The banner read ‘The Real Iron Ladies’ Women’s Action Group Miners Strike 1984/85. This was in protest at the Hollywood re-writing of history in a film about Margaret Thatcher called ‘The Iron Lady’, starring Meryl Streep, which premiered in London in the first week in January. Continue reading “The Real Iron Ladies”
Boffins and geeks: geek or chic?
The labels swot, ear ’ole, boffin, keeno, geek and nerd resonate meaningfully across generations of school-goers and echo through the terrains of popular culture. Our Gender and Education viewpoint started life as a conversation about our own research into how such identities are imagined and lived. We wondered: Has ‘the rise of the nerd’ meant that being a ‘boffin’ at school has lost its stigma? Continue reading “Boffins and geeks: geek or chic?”
Does Hit Girl Kick Ass?
Written by Jane Goldman and starring Aaron Johnson (a British actor known best for playing John Lennon in ‘Nowhere Boy’), Chole Moretz (last seen in the remake of the ‘Amityville Horror’) and Nicholas Cage, this movie was hailed simultaneously as
being ‘cynical, premeditated and mindbogglingly irresponsible’ (The Daily Mail) and, ‘a thoroughly outrageous, jaw-droppingly violent and very funny riff on the quasi-porn world of comic books’ (The Guardian). Wherever it went Kick Ass stirred emotions, fired debate and ultimately made a lot of money. The cause of the controversy? Hit Girl, an 11 year-old wise cracking, knife wielding, karate kicking female superhero-in-training. But is Hit Girl a Feminist icon for the 21st Century? Continue reading “Does Hit Girl Kick Ass?”
Made in Dagenham: Made for Feminist Discussion in Schools?
This month has seen the release of the hotly debated film Made in Dagenham. This is a film which recalls the events surrounding the 1968 strike by the women sewing machinists at the Ford plant in Dagenham, London. The film was produced by Stephen Wooley and Elizabeth Karlsen in conjunction with BBC films and was directed by Nigel Cole (also known for his direction of the popular film ‘Calendar Girls’). At a recent London Feminist Network screening of the film, the film’s producers Wooley and Karlsen claim that the original idea for the film was first developed over four years ago. However, they explain that the film was unsuccessful in gaining funding at this time because there appeared to be very little interest in feminism or on issues relating to equal pay. Continue reading “Made in Dagenham: Made for Feminist Discussion in Schools?”