Joy, laughter and 'radical happiness' in the British Women's Liberation Movement

妇女解放运动是一场激动人心的政治运动。女权主义者的平面媒体和活动家的个人证词表达了一种深度的感觉和"情感的漩涡"（沃茨2016：451），这是运动的核心。他们燃烧着正义的愤怒，但也充满了欢乐，充满了爱和笑声。在《激进的幸福》（2017）中，女权主义活动家和学者林恩·西格尔呼吁在集体抗议中重新动员快乐的情绪。她称之为“喜悦的神奇革命力量”（2017：xiv）。但是，有多少快乐和幸福构成了WLM的一部分？它的力量有多大，它的局限性是什么，它对文化和政治抗议意味着什么？该项目将通过对英国档案馆，包括妇女图书馆、黑人文化档案馆、格拉斯哥妇女图书馆和南北女权主义者档案馆进行基于资料来源的分析来探讨这些问题。本研究的主要问题是：1）幸福感、快乐感和笑声在多大程度上以及以何种方式构成了英国人的WLM？2)欢乐和幽默在多大程度上挑战了社会规范，成为一种强有力的政治"工具"？3)在创造一种强大的姐妹情谊、维持政治行动主义和扩散对运动的政治挑战方面，幸福与愤怒一样重要吗？我还将探讨多样性的问题，通过研究对运动内外的人的这种欢乐的反应，以及幸福感和它在WLM中的意义如何随着时间的推移而变化。我将考虑如何在WLM不同群体的妇女，包括从不同的种族，文化和阶级背景和性取向，经历了集体的喜悦的感觉。（沃茨2016年，里斯2010年），重点是愤怒在WLM中的意义和力量;但Bruley的呢？（2013：726）描述的“情绪的巨大爆发”，这是经历了欢乐，也具有参与WLM？这些情绪使英国WLM的简单化叙事复杂化，因为愤怒占主导地位，同时将女权主义者描绘为总是非理性和憎恨男人的厌恶女性主义者。这项关于运动中快乐和幸福的重要性的研究将挑战这种叙述，并为这一时期的分析历史带来一个全新的视角。WLM也经常被认为太白色和太中产阶级，与今天的抗议无关。然而，这是为了掩盖运动中人们的复杂性和多样性（Elllinson 2012）。在访问情感和情感体验，这种分析可以揭示的亲和力和矛盾，形成了WLM，并继续形成今天的抗议运动。我将借鉴社会学家黛博拉·古尔德（Deborah Gould，2010）在20世纪80年代对艾滋病行动主义的研究中的工作和方法。她的分析认为，情感和情感的感觉是提供一个多方面的理解“人的存在”，可能会被掩盖或误解，在分析什么被认为是更理性和认知（2010：17）。除此之外，我还将借鉴女性主义理论家的著作，包括萨拉·艾哈迈德（Sara Ahmed，2004）和克莱尔·海明斯（Clare Hemmings，2011）。他们关注的是力量如何通过感觉和影响循环，以及影响的潜力，以允许进入内脏，情感和具体的维度。他们的方法赋予了情感作为一种知识形式的价值，这种知识"不能与感受和感觉的身体世界分离"（Ahmed 2004：171）。正如Gould（2010年）对ACT UP的分析一样，这些方法可以揭示妇女在WLM中的联系，动机和经验。

The Women's Liberation Movement was an explosion of emotional political activism. The feminist print media and personal testimonies from activists articulate a depth of feeling and "swirl of emotion" (Waters 2016:451) that was central to the movement. They burned with a righteous anger but were also joyous, full of love and laughter. In Radical Happiness (2017), feminist activist and academic Lynne Segal calls for a return to the mobilising of joyous emotions in collective protest. She terms this "the miraculous revolutionary power of joy" (2017:xiv). But how much did joy and happiness form a part of the WLM? How powerful was it, what were its limitations and what did it mean for the cultural and political protest? This project will explore these questions through a source-based analysis in British archives, including the Women's Library, the Black Cultural Archives, Glasgow Women's Library and the Feminist Archives North and South. The main questions this research will ask are: 1) To what extent and in what ways did a sense of happiness, joy and laughter form the British WLM? 2) To what extent did joy and humour challenge societal norms and become a powerful political "tool"? 3) Was happiness as relevant and significant to the movement as anger in the creation of a powerful sense of sisterhood, the sustaining of political activism and the diffusing of political challenges to the movement?I will also explore questions of diversity by examining the reaction to such outpourings of joy from those inside and outside the movement as well as how feelings of happiness and the significance it held in the WLM changed over time. I will consider how different groups of women in the WLM, including from different racial, cultural and class backgrounds and sexual orientations, experienced the collective feelings of joy.Previous work has considered the importance of emotions in the WLM (Waters 2016, Rees 2010) with a focus on the significance and strength of anger in the WLM; but what of Bruley's (2013: 726) description of the "tremendous outburst of emotion" that was experienced as joyous and also characterised involvement in the WLM? These emotions complicate the simplistic narrative of the British WLM as dominated by anger, alongside the misogynist portrayal of feminists as always irrational and man-hating. This research on the importance of joy and happiness in the movement will challenge this narrative and bring a radically new perspective to the analytical history of the period. The WLM is also often considered too white and too middle class and not relevant to protest today. However this is to obscure the complexity and diversity of people in the movement (Thomlinson 2012). In accessing affective and emotional experiences, this analysis can reveal the affinities and contradictions that shaped the WLM and continue to form protest movements today. I will draw on the work and approach of sociologist Deborah Gould (2010) in her study on AIDS activism during the 1980s. Her analysis views emotional and affective sensations as central to providing a multi-faceted understanding of "human beingness" that may be obscured or misunderstood in an analysis of what is considered to be more rational and cognitive (2010:17). Further to this, I will draw on the work of feminist theorists, including Sara Ahmed (2004) and Clare Hemmings (2011). They are concerned with how power circulates through feeling and affect and with the potential of affect to allow access to a visceral, emotional and embodied dimension. Their approaches give value to emotions as a form of knowledge that "cannot be separated from the bodily world of feelings and sensations" (Ahmed 2004:171). As with Gould's (2010) analysis of ACT UP, these approaches can reveal much about the connections, motivations and experiences of women within the WLM.