Smith, Erica

Smith, Erica

Erica Smith

1 September 2013News

Erica Smith samples the delights of this year's UK Feminista summer school

The artist Rachael House has a project where she encourages participants to draw ‘what a feminist looks like’ on paper plates. At the UK Feminista Summer School this August, there was a delightful variety of over 500 feminists for inspiration.

The conference was held on the Birmingham University campus, and that might have been why the participants were predominantly younger women, and why the tone of the event was gently academic, but older women, women of colour, working-class women…

1 September 2013Review

Microcosm Publishing, 2009, 160pp, £4.99

The first zines I bought were punk publications in the late ’70s, and in the early ’90s I produced my own zine. (Wikipedia definition: ‘A zine [zeen; an abbreviation of fanzine, or magazine] is most commonly a small circulation self-published work of original and/or appropriated texts and images usually reproduced via photocopier.’) I’ve read hundreds of zines over the years, and samizdat publishing holds a huge place in my heart. There is an immediacy and humanity about holding a zine in…