Women Writing Architecture: Can Writing be Activism?

As part of Parity Talks : Get Your Act Together! Studio Adam Caruso X Women Writing Architecture hosted workshop on 8 March 2023 at the ONA DiD Lab at ETH Zurich.

WWA Workshop asks the crucial question: “Can writing be activism?” Our starting point is that no, it cannot, unless it is activated within a social situation. After a short reflection on what the mechanisms for activation might be – from placards and body painting in demonstrations to the ideologies perpetuated through singing hymns in a church or performing poems at a slam, and, indeed, publishing, the workshop unfolds through two consecutive activities. These activities, or mechanisms of socialisation, are inspired by the studio’s weekly reading.

Our friends Geraldine Tedder (gta exhibitions), Tine Milz (Theater Neumarkt) and Alicia Yerebakan (aka Madame ETH), along with Studio Caruso and Women Writing Architecture, formed three different groups of students.

The discussion of the second group in the session two, organised by Helen Thomas and Alicia Yerebakan, is below. Students read the first text Eight Theses on the Feminist Revolution in their pair group and the second text The Carrier Bag Theory of Fiction by Ursula K. Le Guin together.