Qhen, in the early 2000s, in the newspaper where I was working at the time, I began to deal with issues related to emancipation, I had many doubts. The word “feminism” had been completely abandoned. I was still a “director” and I wondered if the theme, which for many women of my generation had been so relevant, was still relevant to the new generations.
Would the girls have followed us, they who seemed indifferent to the subject, distant, as everything had already been resolved by their mothers? THEMeanwhile, some English journalists, aware of how important words are, had commissioned to a large communications agency the task of evaluating a new, more “cool” word. They called the project “Rebranding feminism,” but not even the marketing wizards had found an alternative term. The French colleagues, always the most aggressive in claiming rights, had begun to get passionate about the subject and in 2010 they had launched, at the Faculty of Sciences Po in Paris, “The States General of Women”, just as they had done in the same place in full of the battles of ’68.
Something was moving, again, in the world of women. We started talking about it again. One of the first signs came from a reader, happily aboard, but accusing me of inconsistency. We cannot talk about feminism and continue to use the masculine to define ourselves. Touché. I immediately switched to the feminine, “director”. Then the e-mails from the girls arrived: we quickly discovered that they were with us, but different. Lucid, determined, even angry. On their communication channels, in online communities, then on social networks, the theme was very present. The new word we had been looking for so much was also born: empowerment.
Difficult to translate into a single term because it is full of meanings: “empowerment, understood as recognition of the potential of women and the actions necessary to support them”, or “the set of actions that give women the means to take control of their lives and become stronger and more independent “. From that reborn sensitivity soon came the pink quotas, the #MeToo, the Body shaming, the paternity leavethe language respectful of the genre: in short, a new sensitivity and a different attention.
Today, we proudly announce that the first gender equality training campus is also born of the Corriere della Sera with iO Donna, the 27esimaOra and the civic media Le Contemporanee (detailed information on page 26). It will be held at La Sapienza University on 10-12 March with the title “Objective 5”, because this is how one of the most ambitious goals is numbered in the UN 2030 agenda for sustainable development: achieving gender equality and emancipation of all women and girls. We are waiting for you (registration required): is there a better way to celebrate March 8?
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