Assistant Professor Leah Allen, On the Surprising Relationship Between Feminism and Health

Leah Claire Allen is Assistant Professor in Gender, Women’s, and Sexuality Studies (GWSS) and English at Grinnell College. At Grinnell, Professor Allen teaches Introduction to GWSS, Theory and Methods in GWSS, Masculinity in American Literature, the capstone Senior Seminar in GWSS, and Queer and Trans Literatures. She received her PhD in Literature from Duke University, MA in Gender, Sexuality, and Women’s Studies at Simon Fraser University, and BA in English at the University of Winnipeg.Her current book project In Praise of Bad Critics revisits feminist critics from the 1960s and 1970s who have been labeled “bad critics” or “bad feminists” both within and outside of feminist circles. Her Autumn 2016 article in Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society argues that Andrea Dworkin, a quintessential “bad” critic and feminist, is an unexpected ancestor of queer theory. This article won the 2017 MLA Women's Caucus Florence Howe award for outstanding feminist scholarship. Professor Allen's research seeks to assess the methodologies and pedagogies that founded academic feminism with the aim of tracing the surprising history of contemporary queer and transgender theory in the forgotten and dismissed figures of the feminist past.In this episode, Dr. Allendefines feminismhow gender, inequality, and social status affects womens' healthdescribes her research on how the effects of division amongst feminists can lead to isolation, resulting in detrimental health consequencesYou can find her at https://www.grinnell.edu/user/allenleahRefer to these links to learn more about the feminists mentioned in this episode -Sara Ahmed (1969-- ). The book Dr. Allen would most recommend of everything she mentioned, is “Living a Feminist Life” https://www.dukeupress.edu/living-a-feminist-life This book is absolutely incredible and helps us think about how we might minimize the “wear and tear of living a feminist life” (163).Audre Lorde (1934-1992). Her book, “The Cancer Journals” https://www.auntlute.com/the-cancer-journalsValerie Solanas (1936-1988). Breanne Fahs’ biography of Solanas, a very complicated person, is an excellent read and is useful for thinking about defiance of social expectations https://www.feministpress.org/books-n-z/valerBarbara Christian (1943-2000). This obituary describes her enormous contributions to African American and feminist literary study: http://texts.cdlib.org/view?docId=hb987008v1&doc.view=frames&chunk.id=div00011&toc.depth=1&toc.id=Andrea Dworkin (1946-2005). Here’s a New York Times article on the recent resurgence of interest in Dworkin: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/22/opinion/sunday/trump-feminism-andrea-dworkin.htmlHere is a link to an article Dr. Allen wrote about Dworkin: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/686977?af=R&mobileUi=0&