Smeenge, 9797025 - The body's significance in acquiring a feminist awareness: the meaning of bodywork and bodily exercises in the FORT movement (1975-1990) as a specific habitus for Dutch feminists

Abstract

In the 1970s, second-wave feminism emerged in the Netherlands, as well as feminist discussion groups. Here, women discovered how their own experiences as women were bound to societal structures. Following these groups, the FORT (Feministische Oefengroepen Radicale Therapie) movement started in 1975, which focused even more on raising the feminist awareness of women. Women in FORT did not only discuss their experiences, but actively tried changing their behavior and mannerisms. This was done through physical exercises, such as hitting pillows. Until now, the relevance of feminist awareness-raising groups in the Netherlands has remained underexposed in historiography, as has the role and meaning of the body in Dutch feminism. Following the argument of Ruberg (2020), who states that researching body history allows us to gain new historical insights, I argue that examining the role of the body in Dutch second wave feminism can offer new, significant perspectives on the history of the Dutch women's movement. In particular, I focus on how FORT groups reflected on the gendered (bodily) socialization of women, and whether the feminist values of that time were anchored in the bodily exercises practiced in FORT. The three themes I focus on are: (1) space and expression, (2) sexuality, and (3) physical appearance. Following the ideas of Young (1980), I ground my work in a theoretical framework based on phenomenology, which posits that the ways in which women experience and use their bodies are determined by societal structures. To adequately understand the line between gendered socialization in childhood and the FORT movement, I use the concept of habitus. This was originally coined by Bourdieu (2000) to explain how the use of body language is related to class, but was later further developed by Huppatz (2012) and Miller (2016) to explain how gendered socialization in childhood (the original habitus) is reinforced in occupations and leisure activities in adult life (the specific habitus). In my research, I investigate what FORT and its bodily exercises meant as a specific habitus for the women involved, and whether FORT was a continuation or a break in terms of gendered (bodily) socialization. For my methodology, I interviewed four women who participated in a FORT group in an oral history conversation, and asked them about their experiences with the body in feminist awareness-raising. I studied feminist literature from that time to understand how the body was viewed in relation to gender and society, as well as FORT exercise materials to understand whether and how feminist norms and values were made physical in this. Ultimately, I conclude that body work in FORT has played a major role for the women involved in acquiring agency over their bodies and increasing their feminist awareness. The feminist values of that time were reflected in the specific habitus of FORT, a safe space in which women could practice new behaviors. Through the exercises, participants learned how their bodily experience was connected to social structures, and they were able to achieve more congruence between their inner experience and bodily behavior.