Violence, Resistance, and the Limits of Liberation in Hispanic Caribbean Literature: Black Bodies and Lo Real Maravilloso in Alejo Carpentier’s The Kingdom of This World 

By Serdzhan Ibryam Hasan
Magical realism, a literary mode in which supernatural or extraordinary events are presented as ordinary parts of everyday reality, is often understood not only as a literary genre but also as a political strategy for engaging with a history marked by violence, erasure, and silence.

Fashion and mending in a feminist wardrobe – A reflection on overconsumption, repair, shared responsibility and the life cycle of the clothes we wear

by Júlia Vicente
In a world that profits from diposability, what does it mean to repair a piece of clothing? This article considers the environmental and feminist implications of overconsumption and the increasing popularity of fast fashion. It also explores how choosing to repair rather than replace items can be a personal, political and collective act of resistance.

The Koto as Coded Communication and Queer Expression: A Decolonial Reading of J.G. Spalburg’s Bruine Mina, de Koto-Missi

by Noa de Kievit
Colonial archives are never neutral repositories of the past. Rather, they are shaped by regimes of visibility and erasure that determine which subjects can appear as knowable historical actors and which lives remain partially absent from the historical record.

Democracy Goes to Die in Prisons? Resistance of Political Prisoners Against Autocratisation in India

by Sadaf Javed
With the global rise in authoritarianism, civil liberties across democracies are taking a hit. While most democratic governments have historically tried to suppress dissent or systemic change, the threshold of the state’s tolerance to criticism has significantly lowered in the last decades. India was once heralded as the world’s largest democracy.

Vic Porter, Nothing about us without us (Nichts über uns ohne uns), 2019 © Vic Porter

Celebrating International Whores’ Day from the streets of Lyon to Berlin: The fight for Sex Workers’ rights is far from over

by Nanette Ashby
Lyon, France, 2nd June 1975. More than 100 sex workers occupied the Saint-Nizier Church demanding to have their voices heard. They insisted on the release of ten sex workers who had been jailed for solicitation just days prior, as well as the cessation of police harassment, fines, abuse and stigma attached to their work.

Reclaiming the “Witch”: Black Feminist Resistance and the Limits of Négritude in Maryse Condé’s I, Tituba, Black Witch of Salem

by Serdzhan Ibryam Hasan
The figure of the “witch” has historically functioned as a socio-political construct used to discipline individuals who threatened dominant religious, patriarchal, and racial orders. In early modern contexts such as the Salem witch trials, accusations of witchcraft operated as mechanisms of social control through which women who transgressed religious and patriarchal expectations were marginalised and punished.

The Price of Love – Emotional Capitalism and Gendered Power

by Clara Sophie Feldmann
Is there such a thing as morally legitimate capitalism? In modern capitalist societies, morality often appears curiously displaced from and at odds with the dominant economic values. Principles such as competition, profit maximisation, and efficiency sit uneasily alongside ethical ideals of justice, empathy, and solidarity.

Queer Mythmaking in Madeline Miller’s The Song of Achilles: When Heroes Fall in Love (and Fall Apart)

By Noa de Kievit
In classical Greek epics, heroism is traditionally defined through martial glory, public recognition, and the pursuit of immortal fame. In The Song of Achilles (2011), however, Madeline Miller reimagines this tradition by shifting the focus of the Trojan-war myth from battlefield triumph to emotional intimacy and queer desire.

The (im)possibilities of being a female scientist in Enlightenment Europe: how women navigated gender roles in eighteenth-century science

by Pia van de Schaft
As a consequence of the increased appreciation of empirical research, a new scientific culture emerged. Intellectuals collaborated in national scientific academies while amateurs gathered in scientific societies of their own. Especially in Western Europe, the growing interest generated pathways for some women to engage with the sciences.

Unattainable Desire: Queer Longing and Utopian Temporality in Woolf’s The Waves (1931)

by Serdzhan Ibryam Hasan
The Waves (1931) is widely regarded as one of Virginia Woolf’s most significant experimental modernist novels. Published in 1931, the novel traces the experiences of six characters, Bernard, Jinny, Louis, Neville, Rhoda, and Susan, from childhood to adulthood as they confront the death of their friend, Percival.