Seed Talks: Folklore & Women: The Power of Folklore in Reclaiming Female Stories (16+)The Glee Club Birmingham

Book ticket Times & prices Times & prices

With Dr Ceri Houlbrook
How have myths and fairytales shaped feminist thought? Explore the power of folklore, its symbols and role in today’s society. With Q+A.

Advance price

£17.50 VIP Front Row
£10.50 Earlybird Show Entry
£12.50 Standard Show Entry
£14.50 Final Release Show Entry
£14.50 Wheelchair Final Release Show Entry
+ £2.50 booking fee per ticket

Times

Doors open 6:30 PM
Last entry 7:00 PM

More info

Seating type Unallocated
Food available Yes
Minimum age 16+

Seed Talks: Folklore & Women: The power of folklore in reclaiming feminist stories with Dr Ceri Houlbrook (Birmingham) & Dr Shelby Judge (Glasgow)

How have myths and fairytales shaped feminist thought? Explore the power of folklore, its symbols and role in today’s society. With Q+A.

For centuries, feminist writers and thinkers have turned to myths, legends, fairytales, religious stories, and cultural traditions to make sense of women’s experiences. All of these come under the umbrella of ‘folklore’. This talk will explore the enduring relevance of folklore, asking how these stories can be reclaimed and reimagined for the 21st-century feminist.

We’ll trace figures like the witch, the shapeshifter, and the maiden across different traditions, examining the societal norms they were created to enforce and how feminist thinkers have reshaped them into symbols of resistance and possibility.

Finally, we will ask why we continually return to ancient stories to tell new ones — does this suggest that we’re out of new stories, or is it a part of a longstanding literary tradition in women’s writing, to look back, to subvert dominant myths, and to challenge the patriarchal ideas embedded in our society?

Dr Ceri Houlbrook, Senior Lecturer in Folklore and History, is the Programme Leader for the MA Folklore Studies at the University of Hertfordshire. She is also a Council member of the Folklore Society. Her primary interests are the modern adaptations of stories, ritual practices, and popular beliefs. She has written several scholarly books on folklore’s journey through the past and present, as well as folklore-inspired fiction.

Dr Shelby Judge is a Lecturer in Creative and Cultural Industries at the University of Derby, where she researches digital feminist and popular feminist responses to Incels and the Manosphere. She recently completed her PhD in English Literature at the University of Glasgow, producing the thesis Contemporary Feminist Adaptations of Greek Myth, and her work in this field is ongoing due to the genre’s proliferating nature. Shelby has published on topics including #MeToo and the Trojan War, 21st-century adaptations of Helen of Troy, transgender adaptations of Frankenstein, and transgender readings of Ovid. She has delivered public lectures on toxic masculinity in Greek myth and sea monsters in Scottish folklore, and is a regular contributor to the Literary Encyclopedia, where she has written on the poetry of Carol Ann Duffy and Margaret Atwood, as well as entries on Laura Bates and Janice Hallett. She also serves as a committee member for the Transatlantic Literary Women network, funded by the US Embassy and BAAS.

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