Protesting like a Girl

Embodiment, Dissent and Feminist Agency

Bibliographic Data

ID4367446
AuthorsWendy Parkin, Wendy Parkins (Murdoch University, corresponding author)
Year2000
Volume1
Issue1
Pages59-78
Publication date2000-04-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueFeminist Theory (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1464-7001 • E-ISSN: 1741-2773
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/14647000022229065
OpenAlexW2106321902
LanguageEN
Citations received43
References cited23

This article examines feminist agency in the light of Merleau-Ponty's phenomenological account of the body subject. Stressing the importance of embodiment to feminist agency (without reifying an essential female body), I argue that bodies inhabit specific social, historical and discursive contexts which shape our corporeal experience and our opportunities for political contestation. Beginning with the assertion that we cannot think of agency without the body, I examine a historical instance of feminist agency in which women's bodies were central to the articulation of political dissent, namely the British suffragette movement. In particular, I focus on the suffragette career of Mary Leigh and argue that it represents a feminist agency derived from corporeal performance. Through daring acts of protest which drew attention to the comportment and capacities of their bodies, suffragettes like Leigh contested the constitution of the political domain and the nature of citizenship

Assertion · Citizenship · Dissent · Feminism · Girl · Political dissent · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · Feminism, Gender, and Sexuality Studies · Gender Studies · Historical Gender and Feminism Studies · Historical Studies on Reproduction, Gender, Health, and Societal Changes · Law · Psychology

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