Resistance to War Update

1. Women’s Organisations and Female activists: Aftermaths of War network project.

There is a school of thought that suggests that women are innately peace-loving and fundamentally opposed to war because of their role as nurturers and care-givers.  We might therefore expect women as a group to resist war and protest against the outbreak and continuation of a global conflict such as the First World War that caused so many people to be killed or injured.  However, in most of the combatant nations in 1914 women’s support for the war effort was a marked feature of mobilisation and this included the organised women’s groups who had been campaigning for women’s advancement – for example suffrage and access to higher education – internationally and in their own countries.  After the war, too, women’s groups did not all work for reconciliation (what John Horne has called ‘cultural demobilisation’) but in some cases kept the memory of the war alive through resentment at the terms of the peace, continued bitterness at the actions of the enemies during the conflict or simply by evoking their wartime activities in order to achieve some of their long-standing aims.

The complexity of organised women’s response to war and its aftermath is being explored by an international network of scholars at a series of conferences held over the last two years.  We met in Budapest in May this year to discuss the theme Women’s Organisations and Female Activists in the Aftermath of the First World War: Central and Eastern Europe in National, Transnational, International and Global Context.

Budapest is an ideal location for a conference focusing on movements and activists operating in or communicating with Central and Eastern Europe, areas until recently considered peripheral to the European war story. The event was organised by Dr Judit Acsady and Ms Ingrid Sharp (Leeds, UK), supported by a team of postgraduates, and enjoyed the generous support of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Arts and Humanities Research Council, UK.  Legacies of War were represented by Professor Alison Fell (Leeds, UK) and a number of other affiliated colleagues. You can read more about the conference on the project website http://arts.leeds.ac.uk/aftermaths/

Background

This conference is the fourth in a series. The first, The Gentler Sex: Responses of the Women’s Movement to the First World War, 1914-1919, London (UK), was held in 2005 and  followed in 2008 by Aftermaths of War: Women’s Movements and Female Activists 1918-1923, Leeds (UK), and in May 2012 by Women’s Organisations and Activists: Moving Across Borders, Hamline (US). Publications arising from the earlier conferences include special issues of Minerva: Journal of Women and War and two edited volumes: Fell, A.S. and Sharp, I.E. (eds) (2007) The Women’s Movement in Wartime. International Perspectives 1914-1919. Palgrave Macmillan and Sharp, I.E and Stibbe, M (eds) (2011) Aftermaths of War: Women’s Movements and Female Activists, 1918-1923 (Brill).

Emerging from the project were a number of themes and questions around commemoration and suffrage as well as resistance to war, revolution, nationalism, internationalism and the national contexts of defeat and victory.  We identified the post-war period (ca 1918-1923) as a key area for further research as it is a distinctive period in its own right during which important negotiations were taking place that would affect the post-war order. It is characterised by the often troubled transition from a wartime to a peacetime society and the cultural anxieties that surrounded this. Within this context, the role of organised women’s movements and female activists in the post-war period takes on a new importance.

As in Hamline in 2012, the Budapest conference was characterised by a spirit of intellectual generosity, with lively discussions following each panel and paper and the experience was enhanced by the stunning venue, the warmth of both the Budapest weather and Budapest hospitality.

The network will be meeting again in Leeds in November 2013 to discuss publications arising from the project and ideas for further collaboration – this will bring colleagues from Austria, Hungary, Bulgaria, Russia, The US and Canada together with local scholars from Leeds and Sheffield.

2. Plans for a ‘Resistance to War’ conference at Leeds, Easter 2016

Plans are underway for a conference at Leeds in 2016 looking at all aspects of resistance to war in the UK and other nations.  Strands being considered are Conscientious Objection; gendered resistance; cultural representations of resistance and culture as resistance; Classics and the resistance to war; internationalist aspects of war resistance and a panel on continuities that focuses on the legacy of resistance and its relevance for present day peace-building and conflict resolution.  We would like this to be an event that involves partners outside the University and are looking to organise a programme of talks, exhibitions and performances as part of the event. If anyone has ideas or suggestions or would like to be involved, please get in touch!  My e-mail is i.e.sharp@leeds.ac.uk and please don’t be put off by the ‘out of office’ message you may receive – I am on study leave this year and will be concentrating on research, including planning this conference, rather than teaching and administration.