Contesting gender: young women and feminist generations in gender-based violence services

Abstract

Activism and service provision around gender-based violence (GBV) are often young women’s first entry point into feminist movements. Definitions of gender and GBV, however, are increasingly contested within feminist spaces, with often exclusionary consequences for how survivors of violence are supported. Drawing on the findings of online and in-person interviews and ethnographic fieldwork in Serbia and Italy, this article documents young activists’ efforts to broaden the category of gender within feminist organizations and questions whether the frame of feminist generational conflict, prevalent both in the literature and in public discourse, can explain the ensuing tensions. It argues that narratives of generational conflict, despite being frequently deployed by activists themselves, obfuscate a genuine struggle to redefine the subject of feminism and extend feminist solidarity to trans women and other marginalized groups. Different feminist praxes, as seen in the two case studies, can either trigger acts of generational disidentification and disengagement or foster spaces of intergenerational exchange and discussion. Paying attention to the work that intergenerational conflict narratives are doing, and the work they are preventing, can help uncover and explicitly address the tensions currently permeating feminist spaces towards a more inclusive and expansive feminism.