HOW TO BE A FEMINIST KILLJOY
Author explains why speaking out and speaking up is more important now than ever
Erin Wunker is a feminist killjoy. She didn’t invent the phrase but she wrote the book on it — literally. Notes from a Feminist Killjoy: Essays on Everyday Life was released this month by BookThug, a Toronto indie publisher. A feminist killjoy, according to Wunker, is a paradoxical figure “who takes pleasure in the work of interrupting the patriarchal norms that pass as joys.” Feminist killjoys are critical of happiness derived from oppression — an off-colour joke, an old boys’ club, outdated expectations of how women should look or act, many of the comments about women, Muslims, black people, Hispanics, disabled people and other groups made by a certain president-elect. “She will not tolerate casual instances of racism or classism. She won’t keep quiet to maintain a smooth dinner conversation,” writes Wunker, who credits U.K. feminist scholar Sara Ahmed with first using the term. Wunker, a literature professor at Acadia University, wrote the book, in part, as a series of essays dedicated to her daughter. Not only did that set the tone and sentiment of the book, but also Wunker’s writing schedule, which led to the snippets and vignettes of thought, theory and criticism mixed in with pop culture references and memoir that make up the book, as she worked in early mornings and evenings while her infant daughter was sleeping. The Star spoke with Wunker from Nova Scotia, where she lives. What does a feminist killjoy do? A feminist killjoy calls out and refuses to be complacent with the so-called joys of patriarchal culture. It can come in the form of an uncomfortable holiday dinner conversation where you have to say, “Well, actually, family member, you just made a racist statement.” It can also come in the form of speaking out among your friends or public places or the media. What are some of those joys that might be problematic? Just thinking about the U.S. election, as a white woman voter, voting for a racist white man is in some way an act of enabling white supremacy. The fact that white women overwhelmingly voted for Trump instead of a woman is a clear indication of the ways in which we learn patriarchy and misogyny. We get born into and learn those systems. We look for somebody with the most power and if it’s a woman, you say, “That can’t be right.” And you look elsewhere. You argue in the book that patriarchal culture is so pervasive as to be invisible. But do you think the presidential campaign made some of that more visible? Yes, absolutely. There are moments in time — and the U.S. election is one of them — where we get a clear snapshot of the depths of racism and misogyny. But I’ve spoken to friends in both Canada and the U.S., and my friends of colour are not as shocked at the results of the election as my white, liberal friends are. I’m white, and we don’t live the same kind of everyday oppression that people of colour do. I was shocked at the degree to which misogyny and racism are thriving in the States and the degree to which dis-ease and disenfranchisement got channelled into people thinking the only way they could act was to vote for Trump. I’m undone by it, really. Shaken, more than surprised. Do you think this attitude will come to Canada? Do you think it’s already here? I think it is here. We’ve seen reports of Jewish students on Canadian university campuses waking up the morning after the election with swastikas on their doors. Anecdotally, colleagues of mine who are queer have noted an acceleration of everyday aggression from strangers . . . A public declaration of the sort we just saw in the U.S. is a licence for people who are feeling threatened by genuine multicultural collaboration and interracial ally-ship. People who feel threatened by this and also disadvantaged by a long neo-liberal austerity are turning to hate as a way of channelling their fear and trying to find some power. There definitely seems to be a solidarity movement, at least online. Can you find anything to be optimistic about in that? I do think social media can be an effective tool for organizing. El Jones, who is the former poet laureate of Halifax, has written extensively about how social media has been a place for people of colour and indigenous people and women to organize themselves around events that are personally egregious. I’m thinking about not only the recent election but about, during the Ghomeshi trial proceedings, the #BeenRapedNeverReported hashtag. People found solace in one another there. Idle No More used social media brilliantly and continues to. But what the indigenous leaders and activists do so brilliantly with this movement is to not only rely on social media. Town hall meetings, teach-ins, community discussion and planning happening in real life, in person. We cannot rely on social media as the only means of action. One characteristic of the feminist killjoy is the desire to make change. So what concretely should people be turning their attention to? We live under capitalism. Donating money to organizations that are threatened. I’m thinking of Planned Parenthood, Black Lives Matter and organizations that work on both the policy-making and community levels for making people’s lives more equitable. We have to move through grief, not to acceptance but to rolling up our sleeves and finding more energy to fight for equity. There’s also a lot of discussion about friendship among women and the significance of portraying those friendships as meaningful and positive. Why is that important? “Shine Theory” is what we need more of. It’s a term that (writer) Ann Friedman coined. Shine Theory is a way of combating toxic narratives of friendship. If you see a woman who is intimidating because she is so awesome, make friends with her. Celebrate and cite her work. Circulate her work. Make friends instead of giving into the visceral reaction of jealousy. You talk in the book about starting the book while pregnant and finishing it after your daughter was born. Why the “notes to my daughter” thing? I ended up writing in the small snippets of time I had. In the process of writing this book . . . I noticed that not only did her arrival in the world structure my writing time differently but my relationship with writing and what I felt responsible for doing differently. If I’m writing a book about feminism and I’ve just given birth to a child that is gendered female, then I’m writing this book toward the world she’s going to grow up in and hoping that it’s going to be different. This interview has been edited and condensed.