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This article explores the revival and representation of Edith Garrud, the art of suffrajitsu and the jujitsuffragettes in Lissa Evans’s novel Old Baggage (2018) and Harry Bradbeer’s Enola Holmes films (2020, 2022). These works revisit the figure of this jujitsu instructor and her fellow suffragette trainees to respond to certain misrepresentations of these women in both historical and contemporary narratives and depictions of the suffragette movement. By resorting to the figure of Garrud and her self-defence lessons for suffragettes, the novel and films vindicate the contributions of these women to feminism. The works not only shed light on jujitsu’s usefulness and relevance for women’s own protection, but also on the potential of this martial art to empower women and subvert gender stereotypes. Old Baggage and Enola Holmes offer more accurate and faithful versions of the jujitsuffragettes and their trainer than those offered by detractors of women’s suffrage during the period, thus restoring and commemorating the contribution of these women to first-wave feminism. Este artículo explora el resurgimiento y la representación de Edith Garrud, el arte del suffrajitsu y las jujitsuffragettes en la novela Old baggage (2018), de Lissa Evans y las películas de Enola Holmes, de Harry Bradbeer (2020, 2022). Estos productos rescatan la figura de esta instructora de jiu-jitsu y sus compañeras y aprendices suffragettes para responder a ciertas tergiversaciones sobre estas mujeres presentes en narrativas y representaciones del movimiento sufragista tanto históricas como contemporáneas. Al recurrir a la figura de Garrud y sus lecciones de autodefensa a las suffragettes, la novela y las películas reivindican las contribuciones de estas mujeres al feminismo. Estas obras no sólo iluminan la utilidad y relevancia del jiu-jitsu para la propia protección de las mujeres, sino también el potencial de este arte marcial para empoderar a las mujeres y subvertir los estereotipos de género. Old Baggage y Enola Holmes ofrecen versiones más precisas y fieles de las jujitsuffragettes y su entrenadora que las ofrecidas por los detractores del sufragio femenino durante ese período restaurando y conmemorando así la contribución de estas mujeres a la primera ola del feminismo.  

Collective action and oppositional political activism are firmly established features of any society and pose a challenge to inequality, exclusion and injustice rooted in the oppression of people. Oppressive practices and exclusionary policies are often the catalyst for participation in collective action to generate a conscious move towards social, cultural and political change. Over 100 years ago the suffragette movement in the UK and the nationalist movement in India employed peaceful tactics (Viewed as law breaking) with spectacular outcomes and impact which could not have been foreseen. To acknowledge the history of movements globally is crucial in the understanding of new social movements which is the focus of this special issue.

This article explores the revival and representation of Edith Garrud, the art of suffrajitsu and the jujitsuffragettes in Lissa Evans's novel Old Baggage (2018) and Harry Bradbeer's Enola Holmes films (2020, 2022). These works revisit the figure of this jujitsu instructor and her fellow suffragette trainees to respond to certain misrepresentations of these women in both historical and contemporary narratives and depictions of the suffragette movement. By resorting to the figure of Garrud and her self-defence lessons for suffragettes, the novel and films vindicate the contributions of these women to feminism. The works not only shed light on jujitsu's usefulness and relevance for women's own protection, but also on the potential of this martial art to empower women and subvert gender stereotypes. Old Baggage and Enola Holmes offer more accurate and faithful versions of the jujitsuffragettes and their trainer than those offered by detractors of women's suffrage during the period, thus restoring and commemorating the contribution of these women to first-wave feminism.

This paper will be concerned with the development of feminism throughout the 19th century of the English literature, discussing the social and cultural perception on this topic. The 19th century was one of the most significant periods of the British history, nevertheless it was a century of changes for women. Throughout the 19th and 20th centuries, literature has developed as well as the society and the position of women with respect to men. This perpetual fight for equality between men and women had a starting point and this was the suffragette movement. There has been a gradual development of the feminist movement throughout the centuries. Therefore, the word “feminism” can evoke negative or positive meanings for those who try to discover its roots.

This article explores the importance of the written word of the Holloway Jingles in the fight for female suffrage through the analysis of the Foreword, “There’s a Strange Sort of College” and “L’Envoi.” Firstly, it will focus on the importance of writing as a venting tool for the suffragettes and it will demonstrate the idealization of imprisonment in the collection by comparing it to realistic and autobiographical accounts of life in Holloway Gaol, as well as the relevance of such an idealization in order to strengthen the bonds between the suffragettes both inside and outside of prison. Secondly, it will explore the impact of the collection within the feminist movement relating it to Virginia Woolf’s and Mary Wollstonecraft’s ideas, thus focusing on a wider notion of justice and freedom that was essential for their emancipatory fight.

An actress turned playwright and political militant, Elizabeth Robins was aware of the political uses of laughter. Her novel The Convert, in which laughter is explicitly linked to performance and action, is stimulating material for an investigation of the part played by humour in women’s empowerment. The New Woman was often criticized for her lack of humour, and gravity was the expected context of feminist novels with a purpose. Elizabeth Robins wanted her political drama Votes for Women to “deal with the Suffrage question for the first time in a serious fashion”. Yet, when the play was transformed into a novel, The Convert, comedy became a central element in the representation of female suffrage. Indeed, since the New Woman was commonly a target for caricature, the suffragette a laughing stock, and feminist demonstrations were considered as enjoyable as “good Sunday afternoon street entertainment”, The Convert turned this tendency to its advantage and used humour as a sweetener for the serious pill it contains, in accordance with the received idea that women are born entertainers. In the witty drawing-room conversations and in the sarcastic call and response exchanges during the demonstration scenes, Elizabeth Robins also builds up a reflection on the gender politics of humour. Her didactic novel indicates that not all laughter is “good to hear” and that feminist literature must bring some laughs to a halt. More crucially, it suggests that while men laugh, women may learn. The loudness of the laughing response is proportionate to the gravity and magnitude of the woman question. In the course of her conversion into a suffragette, Vida gets a sense of her political significance, builds up her armour and turns her sense of repartee into a political weapon.

Hunger striking is a form of protest that escapes conventional forms of political participation. I argue that as a spectacular performance of death, the hunger strike not only draws attention to a particular cause or exert moral pressure on an opponent but can galvanize and strengthen a nascent political identity. Drawing on the example of the hunger strike of suffragette Marion Wallace-Dunlop, which I argue performatively constructed the identity of the disciplined “true suffragette,” I explain the hunger strike as a political becoming. Undertaken behind bars, by those denied citizenship rights, this protest should be understood not necessarily as the free expression of an already existing member of the demos but instead as a way of becoming a political subject while contesting and reconfiguring political boundaries.

This book departs from familiar accounts of high-profile woman suffrage activists whose main concern was a federal constitutional amendment. It tells the story of woman suffrage as one involving the diverse politics of women across the country as well as the incentives of the men with the primary political authority to grant new voting rights - those in state legislatures. Through a mix of qualitative and quantitative evidence, the book explains the success and failures of efforts for woman suffrage provisions in five states and in the US Congress as the result of successful and failed coalitional politics between the suffrage movement and important constituencies of existing male voters, including farmers' organizations, labor unions, and the Populist and Progressive parties.

Punch magazine was instrumental in shaping the figure of the New Woman in the popular imagination. Critical studies of the representation of the New Woman in Punch tend to focus on its misogynistic depictions of a ‘nagging New Woman [who] can never be quiet’ (26 May 1894, 252), but alongside these satires on the New Woman were pieces by female authors, some of whom could be described as New Women themselves. This article will focus on two pieces, published in Punch just over a decade apart, by women who were committed to the cause of women’s rights: Rosaline Masson’s poem ‘The Reason Why’ (1898) and Evelyn Sharp’s short story ‘The Wreck of “The Ark”’ (1909). The authors of both of these pieces poke fun at the stereotypes surrounding the New Woman without overtly criticising Punch for its frequent ridicule of this figure. Through my discussion of these pieces I will explore these authors’ motivations for publishing in Punch, rather than a publication with a more sympathetic attitude towards women’s rights, and I will examine the trade-off that required them to mute their feminism in return for a wider audience. The article will also explore how these authors, who were both intelligent, independent women who earned money through writing, made use of humour while publishing in a periodical in which such women were generally the targets of humour rather than the originators of it. This article will highlight the role of female writers in contributing to the portrayal of women in an influential periodical and will expand the view of Punch’s representation of the New Woman beyond the familiar satires and caricatures.

Hundreds will travel to Bournemouth, England for the Unite-CPHVA Annual Professional Conference on October 17-18, 2018. Attending the conference is a great opportunity to celebrate the achievements of the NHS, the suffragette movement and contributions from the Windrush generation. Here, details on the 2018 program are presented.