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#MeToo: Thinking Ahead is the topic of the RIKK – Institute for Gender, Equality and Difference and Gender Equality Studies and Training (GEST) Programme conversation series in spring 2021. The series focuses on #MeToo, its gains as well as the challenges that remain in the fight against harassment, discrimination and violence. The series builds upon two recent books published on the movement, firstly an Icelandic issue of Fléttur, RIKK’s book series, and secondly The Routledge Handbook of the Politics of the #MeToo Movement, edited by Irma Erlingsdóttir, Director of RIKK and GEST, and Giti Chandra, Research Specialist at GEST.
The event takes place on Thursday 18 March at 14:00-15:00 GMT. The sessions are held on Zoom (https://eu01web.zoom.us/j/69712898240) and will be live-streamed on Facebook. Recordings of the sessions will be made available on RIKK’s website and the Youtube-Channel of the School of Humanities.
The third session in the series brings together Karen Boyle and Audrey Roofeh. Karen Boyle is a Professor of Feminist Media Studies at the University of Strathclyde, UK, where she runs the Applied Gender Studies programme. Audrey Roofeh is an employment attorney and the CEO of Mariana Strategies LLC, a work-place culture consulting firm. Their conversation will focus on accountability and leadership.
Audrey Roofeh will talk about the tension between a focus on liability and a focus on culture in the workplace, and how a focus on culture is what’s needed to start creating safe workplaces. Thinking ahead, she asks where we can go from here, and what real inclusion looks like at work. Roofeh explains how ‘add diversity and stir’ does not create equitable and inclusive workplaces, but rooting out discrimination, centering the experience of those who have been marginalized, and holding people accountable does. Karen Boyle will discuss the challenges of accountability in a leaderless movement and, relatedly, the importance of situating #MeToo in broader feminist histories within specific locales.