Voices of Struggle: LGBTQ and Feminist Activism in China and Beyond

We are excited to present Harriet Evans as part of our CeMEAS Conversations.

Our video series “Voices of Struggle: LGBTQ and Feminist Activism in China and Beyond” was filmed on the sidelines of a symposium of the same name held at the University of Göttingen on 17 April 2018. In our conversations with four of the participants (Hongwei Bao, Maizi Li, Popo Fan, Harriet Evans) we explore the complex entanglements between activism and academia in transnational perspective. What does it mean to be an engaged or activist scholar today? How should we think about the connections/separations between the two spheres of activism and academia? And how can activists and academics best combine their strengths to effect change? In what ways are deepening transnational connections re-shaping the practice of activism around the globe? Our two day event brought together leading scholars and activists to discuss these questions in relation to the development of feminism and LGBTQ activism in China and beyond.

Short Bio of Harriet Evans:
Harriet Evans is Professor Emerita at the University of Westminster in London, where she headed the China section for many years. She is known for her highly influential work on women, gender and human rights in China, topics she also advises NGOs on. Her main publications include Women and Sexuality in China: Discourses of Female Sexuality and Gender since 1949 (Polity Press, 1997), and Picturing Power in the People’s Republic of China: Posters of the Cultural Revolution (co-edited with Stephanie Donald, Rowman and Littlefield, 1999) and The Subject of Gender: Daughters and Mothers in Urban China (Rowman and Littlefield, 2007). She was President of the British Association for Chinese Studies (2002-5), has served on the Executive Committee of the Universities’ China Committee in London, and is member of the Executive Committee of The China Quarterly. She was appointed Professor Emerita in March 2017; is Chair of Trustees to the London-based NGO, The Rights Practice, and is Visiting Professor in Anthropology at the LSE.

CeMEAS Conversation Editors: Sarah Eaton & Katja Pessl