In this post, we introduce Emma, who’s covering the project engagement officer position, learn a bit more about the development of the project exhibition and her abiding love of feminist buttons.
Well, I’ve been in post for just over a month now so I guess it’s time I properly introduced myself here on the blog.
Hi, I’m Emma – cat lover, museum nerd, and feminist button enthusiast. I’ll be covering for Ria, the project engagement officer, while she’s on maternity leave. So, some basic information about me: I’m Canadian but have lived in Scotland for almost 10 years. I’ve previously worked for Glasgow Museums and Historic Environment Scotland. I’ve always held feminist principles but didn’t really have that lightbulb moment until university, where my roommate was studying Women, Writing and Gender. She held a course study group in our flat and listening to all those women passionately discussing feminist theory, suddenly, I got it. Feminism was important and something I wanted to actively be involved with. So, when the opportunity came up to get involved with the Speaking Out project I jumped on it.
Even though it’s only been a short time, I already feel like I’ve learned so much about the history of Women’s Aid. That’s probably because my first major task was going through the Scottish Women’s Aid archive at the Glasgow Women’s Library to create a long-list of material our exhibition volunteers can use in selecting items for display at the Museum of Edinburgh. As an aside: our project exhibition opens to the public on Friday, 11 November – save the date! Looking through annual reports, monthly newsletters, training materials and correspondence has given me a wonderful insight into the development of Scottish Women’s Aid. I’ve also been privileged to sit in on a couple of the oral history interviews and have been so appreciative of the generosity of interviewees in sharing their experiences.
I’ve continually been impressed and immeasurably inspired by the determination of the women involved in the Women’s Aid movement – firstly in founding refuges and providing practical support and then working tirelessly to build Women’s Aid into what it is today. All of this was accomplished in the face of often strong opposition and within a society that frequently dismissed concerns over domestic abuse as trivial and unwarranted.
Over the next few weeks I’ll be working with our volunteers in creating the celebratory exhibition mentioned above. Our goal is to showcase the pioneering women and achievements of Women’s Aid in Scotland but to also raise awareness of the continuing prevalence of domestic abuse and highlight the work Women’s Aid groups do to support women, children and young people with experience of domestic abuse.
We’ve picked our exhibition themes and some ‘spotlight’ topics, written the exhibition text, selected our star objects (although we could really use some non-paper items if you’ve got any!) and have started to identify quotations from the oral history recordings to use on the text panels and at the exhibition listening station. We’ve even got a board game lined up! Our next step is to meet with our designer and begin pulling all the different bits together. It’s sure to be an exciting few months!
Apart from the exhibition, I’ll also be working on developing a learning resource for secondary school pupils that uses the oral history material gathered by the project. The resource will use the Women’s Aid movement as a case study to develop students’ understanding of gender inequality, activism and legal developments on the issue of violence against women.
I feel incredibly lucky to be able to contribute to this project and am enjoying every minute of learning about and sharing the history of Women’s Aid. And not only because of all the amazing feminist buttons I get to see!
