A one-day conference organized by London Women and Planning Forum, Rooms of our Own and Women’s Studies without Walls.   

This one-day conference will explore the role of women’s spaces in feminist politics, focusing on women’s centres and other women’s spaces in the past, present and future. During the 1970s there were autonomous women’s centres in most London boroughs and throughout the UK. They provided an exciting, safe and liberating environment for women to share thoughts and experiences and to campaign for change.

Many of these centres were funded by local authority grants but as the grant-giving environment diminished most were forced to close. Some have survived by tendering for out-sourced council services such as domestic violence and rape counselling. Many have struggled against the conflation of feminist demands into a generalised equality agenda. During the past decade a new  generation of feminists has started to campaign against the objectification of women in the media, the expansion of pornography, sexism in the workplace and on the street, the lack of representation of women in public life and the sexualisation of young children. This new generation of feminists is largely organized via social media rather than in physical spaces.

Registration deadline: 6th May 2014

For more information and to book, please see the Queen Mary University of London website.