Episode 1 – An introduction to rural and peasant feminisms

WEGO-ITN mentor Stefania Barca and PhD’s Ilenia Iengo and Anna Katharina Voss together with Miriam Corongiu and Katya Madio present the rural feminism collective they are part of and the project of the radio episodes. These aim at divulging, sharing and amplifying voices, knowledges and resistances engaging with issues concerning feminism and rurality, women and agriculture, ecofeminisms from the south of Italy and beyond.

In order to dismantle the patriarchal system that dominates our society, and that also affects agriculture, it is fundamental for both women and agriculture to free themselves from violence, from invisibility, from devaluation. Patriarchy seems an abstract concept but it is real and concrete: it is, above all, a way of producing that appropriates, for free or below cost, women’s work, taking it for granted, making it invisible and devaluing it. In agriculture, patriarchy has produced the overwhelming degradation of work, land, and other living species, making it unsustainable for people, for the environment, and for the generations to come.

Against this system we propose a peasant and or rural feminism. And that is, first of all, our right to say no to patriarchy, to recognize and sustain our work, our knowledges, our practices, our way of seeing agriculture. For our collective Tutte giù per terra, peasant feminism means giving priority to care: care for the earth, people and the whole more-than-human world. Our priorities are an alternative model of agriculture that peasants from all over the world are carrying out under the name of agroecology. This is the perspective that has brought us together and that pushes us to work in order to be the protagonist of change.

For this reason, Tutte Giù Per Terra intends to voice our experiences as women. We will therefore talk to you about stories, projects, practices and struggles carried out above all by peasant women and their allies all over the world, yesterday, today and even more so tomorrow. We are convinced that starting to listen to ourselves and engage with agroecology is an important step to see things in a new way and begin to rewrite our personal and collective history, and that of agriculture.

Watch – and listen to – the full episodes here:

Episode 1 – An introduction to rural and peasant feminisms

Episode 2 – A dialogue on feminism and care for the territory with Comunità rurale diffusa

Episode 3 – A dialogue on patriarchal violence in agriculture with Simona Lanzoni and Stefania Prandi

Episode 4 – A dialogue on the restanza movement in Irpinia with Maria Laura Amendola

Episode 5 – A dialogue on farmers protests in India with Irene Leonardelli and Arianna Tozzi

Episode 6 – A dialogue on the 8M feminist strike and territorial resistances

Radio Iafue has granted permission to publish the videos on WEGO’s website.