About

The Feminist Duration Reading Group (FDRG) focuses on under-represented feminist texts, movements and struggles from outside the Anglo-American canon. The group has developed a practice of reading out loud, together, one paragraph at a time, with the aim of creating a sense of connection and intimacy during meetings.

The group was established in March 2015 by Helena Reckitt, at Goldsmiths, University of London, to explore texts from the Italian feminist movement of the 1970s and 1980s. Later in 2015 it relocated to SPACE in Hackney, East London where it was hosted by Persilia Caton until April 2019. From June 2019 to February 2020 the group was in residence at the South London Gallery, where it focused on intersectional feminisms in the UK context (a planned year-long programme that was moved online due to COVID-19).

In 2023 we were one of several groups selected for the eighteen month Residents programme at Goldsmiths CCA, London.

From 2023-2024 FDRG partnered with Cell Project Space developing CEED (Central East European and Diaspora) Feminisms, funded by the British Art Network, with Cell Project Space.

FDRG sessions have been organised in London with the Advocacy Academy, Artangel, Barbican Art Gallery, Cell Project Space, Chelsea Space, Chisenhale Gallery, the Drawing Room, Feminist Library, Flat Time House, Goethe Institute, Goldsmiths CCA, Mimosa House, Mosaic Rooms, The Showroom, Sine Screen, South Kiosk, Studio Voltaire, Tate Modern, in collaboration with AntiUniversity, the Department of Feminist Conversations, and FIELDNOTES, and as part of The Table at the Swiss Church.

Elsewhere in the UK the FDRG has been hosted by Grand Union and Eastside Projects, Birmingham, esea, Manchester, De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea, and Hypatia Trust, Penzance.  A sister group, NW FDRG, was set up in Liverpool by Kezia Davies in 2019.        

Internationally we have partnered with Emilia-Amalia at Art Metropole in Toronto, Canada; Kunstverein Harburger Bahnhof and HFBK Hamburg, Germany; and with ‘Hope is a Dscipline’ curators as part of the 2024 October Salon in Belgrade, Serbia. In 2025 the group contributed to Mundos Habitables (Liveable Worlds), an online resource devised by Peruvian-based curator Susan Quinilan.

Online international meetings have been held with groups including Radical Sense in Tirana, Albania, Mai Ling in Vienna, Austria, and the Gender Studies journal in Kharkiv, Ukraine.

In 2015, at the end of the FDRG’s first year, seven members - Angelica Bolletinari, Giulia Casalini, Diana Georgiou, Laura Guy, Helena Reckitt, Irene Revell, and Amy Tobin - organised the two-week long events programme, ‘Now Can Go,’ focused on legacies of Italian feminism, across the ICA, The Showroom, SPACE, and Raven Row in London.  

The group usually meets once a month, in art spaces and community venues as well as non-institutional venues such as private homes or gardens. From 2025 - 2027 we are Residents at Goldsmiths CCA, London.

The FDRG aims to create an inclusive trans-positive space. We welcome feminists of all genders and generations to explore the legacy and resonance of art, thinking and collective practice from earlier periods of feminism, in dialogue with contemporary practices and movements.

Working Group

FDRG sessions are initiated by a Working Group. Current members are Beth Bramich, Lina Džuverović, Sabrina Fuller, Taey Iohe, Mariana Lemos, Katrin Lock, Helena Reckitt, and Dot Zhihan Jia.

Former Working Group Former members are Giulia Antonioli, Angelica Bollettinari, Lily Evans-Hill, Félicie Kertudo, Ceren Özpinar, Sara Paiola, Justin Seng, Ehryn Torrell, and Fiona Townend.

Working with the FDRG: A Note for Institutions

The FDRG is run by members of the voluntary Working and Support Groups. We regularly partner with community and arts organizations to offer free events to the public.

The reading group is our collective practice that we enjoy and like sharing with others. Facilitating sessions does of course involve considerable time and effort. We also have running costs for web hosting and communication, invited speaker fees etc.

We understand financial constraints within the cultural sector, but appreciate any contributions that support our efforts.

The FDRG operates an ‘Honesty Box,’ and asks funded organisations to pay what they can.

For organisations who can access funding, we suggest a fee of £300 - £600 per session, depending on the scope of work entailed.  This roughly follows the a-n artist payment guidelines for 1-1.5 days for an artist with seven years professional experience (the FDRG was set up in 2015).

Collaborators and Partners

FDRG sessions have been led by Adomas Narkevicius, Ximena Alarcón-Díaz, Giulia Antonioli, Diana Baker Smith, Anna Barham, Fari Bradley, Beth Bramich, Giulia Casalini, Laura Castagnini, Catherine Cho, Leah Clements, Morgane Conti, Lauren Craig, Cinzia Cremona, Galit Criden, Giulia Damiani, Oana Damir, Kezia Davies, Department of Feminist Conversations, Flora Dunster, Lina Džuverović, Lily Evans-Hall, Lucia Farinati, Berit Fischer, Lynne Friedli, Sabrina Fuller, Diana Georgiou, Rose Gibbs, Marija Iva Gocic, Valeria Graziano, Laura Guy, Haley Ha, Lily Hall, Nora Heidorn, Minna Henriksson, Jacqueline Hoàng Nguyễn, Yurika Imaseki, Taey Iohe, Félicie Kertudo, Hristina Cvetlincann Knezevic, Alexandra Kokoli, Jessie Krish, Mariana Lemos, Mai Ling, Barbara Mahlknecht, Alex Martinis Roe, Jessa Mockridge, Jet Moon, Gabby Moser, Roisin O’Sullivan, Ceren Özpinar, Frances Painter Fleming, Grace Eunhye Park, Sara Paiola, Natalia Paunic, Raju Rage, Helena Reckitt, Irene Revell, Lidia Salvatori, Elif Sarican, E Scourti, Justin Seng, Sarah Shin, Zorana Simic, Something Other, Cecilia Sosa, Amy Tobin, Ehryn Torrell, Emma Yifan Wang, Ana Simona Zellenovic, and Dot Zhihan Jia.

Artists, Writers & Collectives

Sessions have been dedicated to texts and artworks including those by Clay AD, Naadje Al-Aali, Joan Anim-Addo, Floya Anthias and Nira Yuval-Davis, Gloria Anzaldua, Jenn Ashworth, Margot Badran, Sita Balani, Anna Barham, Khairani Barokka, Marquis Bey, Chiai Bonfiglioli, Anne Boyer, Brixton Black Women’s Group, adrienne maree brown, Wilmette Brown, Octavia E Butler, Sakine Cansiz, Hazel V Carby, Adriana Cavarero, Teresa Hak Kyung Cha, Anne Anlin Cheng, Catherine Cho, Barbara Christian, Lia Cigarini, Eli Clare, Leah Clements, Diane di Prima, Lauren Craig, Galit Criden, Mariarosa Dalla Costa and Selma James, Abri De Swardt, Maria Puig De La Bellacasa, Leah Clements, Claudia Durastanti, JJJJJ Ellis, Silvia Federici, Ray Filar, Leopoldina Fortunati, Leta Hong Fincher, Shulamith Firestone, Lauren Fournier, Takana Fuego, Ruth Frankenberg, Olivia Guaraldo, Katie Hare, Johanna Hedva, bell hooks, Kim Hyesoon, Onyeka Igwe, Sanja Iveković, Juliet Jacques, N K Jemison, Kathy Jetnil-Kijiner and Aka Niviana, Marie Elizabeth Johnson, Jane Jin Kaisen, Banu Kapil, Jasleen Kaur, AE Kings, Larissa Lai, Andrea Lawlor, Naja Lee Langvad, Teresa de Lauretis, Clarice Lispector, Carla Lonzi, Fereil Ben Mahoud, Alex Martinis Roe, Lea Melandri, Fatema Mernissi, Milan Women’s Bookshop Collective, Trinh T Minh-ha, Adriana Monti, Jet Moon, D Mortimer, Antonella Nappi, Astrida Neimanis, Jacqueline Hoàng Nguyen, Abdullah Ocalan, Naomi Okabe, Pauline Oliveros, Lola Olufemi, Sue O’Sullivan, Tanja Ostojić, Cecilia Palmeiro, Queer Beograd, Elizabeth Price, Darija Radaković, Raju Rage, Claudia Rankine, Tabita Rezaire, Rivolta Femminile, Lucia Egana Rojas, Sasha Roseneil, Gail Rubin, Lou Lou Sainsbury + Kari Rosenfeld, Sofia Samatar, Suzanne Santoro, E Scourti, Selma Selman, Christina Sharpe, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, Rhea Storr, Latif Tas, Miriam Ticktin, Tiqqun, Rosa-Johan Uddoh, Iris Uurto, Nafu Wang, Kyla Wazana Tompkins, Katri Vala, Vron Ware, Wages Due Lesbians, Wages for Housework, Francis Whorrall-Campbell, Linda Zerilli.

Contact us

If you would like to join the reading group mailing list or propose a focus for a session, or invite us to lead a meeting, please contact: feministduration@gmail.com 

Website Design by Angelica Bollettinari

FDRG Repertoire for Mundos Habitables (Liveable Worlds)

FDRG Repertoire for Mundos Habitables (Liveable Worlds)

Feminist Duration
2025

The Feminist Duration Reading Group has contributed to the Library of Mundos Habitables (liveable worlds). Mundos habitables is an initiative for practices, textures, resources, and imaginaries of accompaniment. Initiated by curator Susie Quillinan, it is both a physical reading room in Lima, Peru (sala de lectura) and a digital platform.

The online resource includes contributions and experiments from artists, curators, activists, and other researchers. It seeks to create resources for noticing, narrating, and cultivating practices of multispecies accompaniment towards more liveable worlds.

The FDRG Repertoire features nineteen readings that have inspired and sustained us across meetings held over years, as well as shaped our ways of organising and holding space.  Selections, introductions and annotations were made by nine contributors to the FDRG programme. These range from early participants and Working Group members who helped to shape the group’s trajectory, to occasional participants, and long-running collaborators.  

In some cases, contributors took the opportunity to speak back to authors whose work has been inspiring and influential, but whose recent views and critical omissions they now wish to challenge and take a distance from.

We selected nineteen texts by the following authors (full details are below): adrienne maree brown, adrienne maree brown and Cara Page, Adriana Cavarero, Adriana Cavarero with Elisabetta Bertolino,Eli Clare, Leopoldina Fortunati, Jo Freeman, Johanna Hedva, Marie Elizabeth Johnson, Jamaica Kincaid, Carla Lonzi, Lea Melandri, Milan Women’s Bookstore collective, Pauline Oliveros, Tabita Rezaire, Adania Shibli, Trinh T. Minh-ha, Kyla Wazana Tomkins.

The FDRG Repertoire was selected by Giulia Casalini, Maddy Costa, Kezia Davies, Lucia Farinati, Sabrina Fuller, Barbara Mahlknecht, Gabby Moser, Sara Paiola, and Helena Reckitt.

FDRG Repertoire for Mundos Habitables (Liveable Worlds)

adrienne maree brown, ‘FRACTALS: the relationship between small and large’ in Emergent Strategy: Shaping Change, Changing Worlds, 2017

Recommended by Giulia Casalini

FDRG Event: Letters to the Future, January 2023, Organised by Maddy Costa, Diana Damian, Mary Patterson

 adrienne maree brown and Cara Page, ‘The Legacy of Uses of the Erotic,’ in Pleasure Activism: The Politics of Feeling Good (Emergent Strategy), 2019

Recommended by Kezia Davies

FDRG Event: The Uses of the Erotic and its Legacies, December 2019, Organised by Kezia Davies

 Adriana Cavarero, ‘On the Outskirts of Milan,’ 1997

Recommended and commented on by Lucia Farinati

FDRG Events:

Nothing Worth Doing is Done Alone, January 2021 , produced by Sabrina Fuller, Helena Reckitt

Adriana Cavarero, November, 2015, organised by Lucia Farinati

Adriana Cavarero with Elisabetta Bertolino,’ Beyond Ontology and Sexual Difference: An Interview with the Italian Feminist Philosopher Adriana Cavarero,’ differences Journal, 2008

Recommended by Sara Paiola

FDRG Events: Italian Feminisms and the Practice of Entrustment, Nov 2, 2017,  organised by Sara Paiola and Lucia Farinati

Adriana Cavarero, ‘On the Outskirts of Milan,’  1997, in Relating Narratives: Storytelling & Selfhood (first published in 1997, in Italian, English translation 2000)

Recommended by and commented on by Lucia Farinati

FDRG Event: Adriana Cavarero, November, 2015, organised by Lucia Farinati

 Eli Clare, Stones in My Pockets, Stones in My Heart, 2015

Suggested by Helena Reckitt

FDRG Event: Masculinities: Eli Clare, Stones in my pockets, stones in my heart, organised by Helena Reckitt, June 20, 2020

Leopoldina Fortunati, The Arcane of Reproduction: Housework, Prostitution, Labor and Capital (1981; trans 1995) 

Suggested by Barbara Mahlknecht 

FDRG Event: Between Militant Demand and Creative Refusal: Moments of the Wages for Housework Campaign, June 2024, organised by Barbara Mahlknecht with Leopoldina Fortunati

Jo Freeman,‘The Tyranny of Structurelessness,’ 1972

Suggested by Maddy Costa for the Department of Feminist Conversations

FDRG Event: Reading Conflict, Reading Solidarity, Feb 2025, organised by Katrin Lock and Helena Reckitt

Inspiration for talk by Helena Reckitt and Gabrielle Moser, ‘The Tyranny of Structurelessness,’ about FDRG and Emilia-Amalia, College Art Association and OnCurating, February 2024

Johanna Hedva, ‘Sick Woman Theory,’ 2020 (based on original 2016 essay)

Suggested by Sabrina Fuller, Kezia Davies, Helena Reckitt & Maddy Costa

FDRG Events:

What Do We Mean When We Talk About Care? March 2024, organised by Beth Bramich, Katrin Lock, and Helena Reckitt, with guest artist Leah Clements

Collectivity and Care, May 2023, organised by Sabrina Fuller, Taey Iohe, Helena Reckitt, and Dot Zhihan Jia

Marie Elizabeth Johnson, ‘Kvennafridagurinn,’ in Women in Iceland, 1984

Suggested by Sara Paiola

FDRG Event: Icelandic Women’s Strike of 24th October 1975, November 2016, organised by Lynne Friedli and Valeria Graziano 

Jamaica Kincaid, Jamaica Kincaid: My Garden (book), July 2023 

Suggsted by Sabrina Fuller

FDRG Event: Jamaica Kincaid: My Garden (book), 23 Jul 2022, Organised by Sabrina Fuller and Mariana Lemos, with the support of Angelica Bolletinari and Helena Reckitt 

Carla Lonzi, ‘Let’s Spit on Hegel,’ 1970

Suggested by Helena Reckitt

FDRG Event: Carla Lonzi, Antonella Nappi and La Libreria delle donne di Milano/Milan Women’s Bookstore Collective, March 2015, organised by Helena Reckitt

Lea Melandri, Love and Violence: The Vexatious Factors of Civilization. 2011, English translation 2019

Recommended by Sara Paiola

FDRG Event: Lea Melandri, Love and Violence, March 2018, organised by Sara Paiola

Lea Melandri ‘Loving Mothers: Prisoners of a Dream,’ in Love and Violence: The Vexatious Factors of Civilization, 2011, English translation 2019

Suggested by Sara Paiola

FDRG Event: Lea Melandri, Love and Violence, March 2018, organised by Sara Paiola

Milan Women’s Bookstore collective, ‘The Practice of Doing,’ in Sexual Difference: A Theory of Social- Symbolic Practice, trans. Patricia Cicogna and Teresa de Lauretis, 1987

Suggested by Sabrina Fuller & Helena Reckitt

FDRG Events:

Nothing Worth Doing is Done Alone, January 2021, produced by Sabrina Fuller and Helena Reckitt

Feminist Readings, Hypatia Trust, Jan 2019, organised by Giulia Antonioli, Sabrina Fuller and Helena Reckitt

Women Acting Collectively, June 2018, organised by Sabrina Fuller

The Feminist Practice of Affidamento (Entrustment), April 2018, organised by Helena Reckitt

Italian Feminisms and the Practice of Entrustment, Nov 2017, organised by Angelica Bollettinari, Sabrina Fuller, Roisin O’Sullivan and Helena Reckitt  

Libreria della Donne di Milano (Milan Women’s Bookstore Collective), August 2016, organised by Helena Reckitt 

Pauline Oliveros, Tuning Meditation

Suggested by Helena Reckitt

FDRG Event: Unbecoming Chorus, July 2025, organised by Tatiana Bogacheva, Anna Bunting-Branch, Jane Frances Dunlop, Catherine Grant, Athina Petsou, Helena Reckitt, Trish Scott, E. Scourti, and Ana Vicente, in dialogue with Beth Bramich and the Feminist Duration Reading Group's Auto Collective

Tabita Rezaire, ‘Decolonial Healing: In Defence of Spiritual Technologies,’ 2019

Suggested by Helena Reckitt

FDRG Events:

Collectivity and Care, May 2023, organised by Sabrina Fuller, Taey Iohe, Helena Reckitt, and Dot Zhihan Jia

What Do We Mean When We Talk About Care? March 2024, organised by Beth Bramich, Katrin Lock and Helena Reckitt, with guest artist Leah Clements  

Adania Shibli, Minor Detail, 2017

Suggested by Sabrina Fuller

FDRG Events: three online readings in October and November 2023, organised by Taey Iohe

 Trinh T. Minh-ha, ‘Grandma's Story,’ in Woman, Native, Other: Writing Postcoloniality and Feminism, 1989

Suggested by Helena Reckitt

FDRG Events:

Writing Yourself In: FDRG in Concrete Garden: Imagining Worlds, February 2025, organised by Beth Bramich, Sabrina Fuller, Taey Iohe, Katrin Lock, Helena Reckitt, and Dot Zhihan Jia

Trinh T Minh-ha on Storytelling and Postcoloniality, P2,  2021, organised by Dot Zhihan Jia with the support of Beth Bramich, Sabrina Fuller, and Taey Iohe

On Friendship and Feminist Organising, January 2021, produced by Sabrina Fuller and Helena Reckitt 

Kyla Wazana Tomkins, ‘We Aren’t Here To Learn What We Already Know,’ 2016

Suggested by Gabby Moser

FDRG Event:  Questioning Through Writing, May 2017, organised by Gabby Moser

 

All About Our Mothers

All About Our Mothers
Opening up the Family Album: an experiential approach, Workshop led by Rosy Martin

Opening up the Family Album: an experiential approach, Workshop led by Rosy Martin