APFF invites Feminists and Women’s Rights Activists for Workshops

Under the theme of Feminist World-Building: Creative Energies, Collective Journeys, the 4th APFF will be a space for Asia Pacific feminist movements to dream, build and lead critical pathways to a  new feminist world. The Forum will run across three days, moving and weaving through these guiding questions:

• Day 1: Where We Are
• Day 2: Where We Want To Be
• Day 3: How We Get There

Workshop Objectives

Workshops will run throughout the three days of the Forum and are required to contribute to the following objectives:

• To engage in a cross-regional, cross-issue, cross-movement, and cross-generational sharing of skills, strategies for advocacy, and best practices in the movements.
• To reflect on the systemic oppressions they face, trace the roots of the most difficult and persistent struggles, identify the new forms of the oppressors, and overcome the internal fractures.
• To reinvigorate the solidarities and alliances across movements and generations, and catalyse greater feminist movement-building among the local, national, regional, and global allies.
• To build a new roadmap and commitment to the feminist world that celebrates and supports all as equal people on a shared planet.

Workshop Sub-Themes

The APFF is a diverse space of feminist imagining, and workshops can be submitted against the following sub-themes. Please note that this is not an exhaustive list; if you see a sub-theme where your workshop proposal fits but the topic of your proposal is not mentioned in the description, you can still submit your workshop proposal.

• Feminists Against Globalisation: One of the biggest threats feminists are fighting across the regions are economic policies that underpin privatisation, deregulation of labour, unjust economic pacts and coalitions, and create enabling environments for foreign investment at the expense of local communities, particularly women and marginalised groups. This workshop sub-theme explores processes of globalisation and neo-liberalism in the current contexts, the different ways it impacts and the resistance of the movements.
• Feminist Frontiers- Resisting Hegemony and Militarism: Geo-political conflicts in Asia and the Pacific have continued to rise, and not just in isolation; authoritarian regimes collude with neo-liberal corporations and military forces to maintain the power of the ruling elite. This continuous power play for economic, political, and military supremacy has a multifarious impact on the lives of the most marginalised communities in the region. The greatest hope for peace and justice lies in the resistance of WHRDs, feminists, and grassroots activists. This workshop sub-theme will focus on a feminist response to militarism, and build a collective feminist analysis that can act as a roadmap for the interventions.
• Feminist Spotlight on Deepening Shadows: In the past few years, they have witnessed a global backlash against human rights and feminist movements, rapidly increasing militarism and authoritarianism as the handmaidens of patriarchy, and a rollback of hard-won victories that have resulted in shrinking of spaces, free speech, and freedom of expression. They have also seen alarming new trends in the form of anti-rights and anti-gender movements, and the global funding flows that prop up anti-rights actors in the countries and regions. This sub-theme will create space and dialogue on new and emerging threats to the movements, and identify the key work they must do to build a feminist world.
• No One Has Become Poor By Sharing: As global politics and neoliberal economies shape and impact the realities, the movements envision and work towards alternative models of development that prioritise economic and redistributive justice. They see this in action when feminists innovate new modalities of resource mobilisation ranging from local funding to community-based crowd-sourcing. Under this sub-theme, they explore feminist visions of the global political economy, including alternative economic models and feminist resourcing of the movements.
• Feminists Fighting Back! Feminist strategies for advocacy and organising are diverse in issues and methodologies, from occupying Western-dominated global policy spaces, to utilising international policy mechanisms and holding the states and the regions accountable against international commitments; to building regional networks and solidarities that bridge man-made borders, to feminist litigation and legal strategies. This category is focused on workshops which strengthen the movements through collective advocacy and different modalities of feminist organising.
• There is No Plan(et) B: The climate crisis only worsens by the day, and the resistance grows fiercer; feminists and activists are fighting on the frontlines for climate justice, food sovereignty, equitable access and people’s control over resources, challenging narratives of false solutions, and claiming loss and damages. This sub-theme is for workshops which address the issues and strategies used by the movements and organisations in fighting for the planet.
• Nothing About Us, Without Us: While they are demanding accountability from powerful people and institutions, they must also hold space for the  own movements to cultivate a culture of accountability, one which enables to examine how they succeed- or fail- in including the most marginalised voices in the resistance and advocacy. This includes the indigenous, LGBTQIA+, disabled, and caste-oppressed communities. This workshop sub-theme is all about building a culture of accountability within and beyond the movements.
• Nurturing Our Movements, Nurturing Ourselves: Feminist wellness at the APFF positions the movements and collectives as the site of building a feminist ethics of care, because by focusing on the well-being of the movements, they are able to ensure the well-being of every individual within the movement. Whether it is focused on spiritual and cultural practices, or bringing feminist practices into the workplace, this workshop sub-theme is all about sustaining the  movements on a journey of feminist world-building.
• Making the Revolution Irresistible: The feminist bag of tricks is anything but predictable; feminist work and activism have always utilised art, media and journalism, music, theatre, poetry, and literature as a means of resistance. This sub-theme is for workshops which teach creative methods of feminist work and share ways of incorporating it in the activism, as well as strategising around the challenges which feminists, women’s rights activists, and WHRDs face as artists, creatives, and media practitioners using their craft as part of their resistance.
• Feminist Skill-Building: The feminist toolbox has always been bottomless, with skills ranging from Do-It-Yourself (DIY) projects like feminist ‘zines or creating a podcast or web-series; to building communication skills, developing or launching a social media campaign, or learning to write funding proposals; to developing crowd-sourcing initiatives, building solidarity in a grassroots movement, or organising a local protest. This sub-theme is for workshops which aim to build or enhance different skill-sets for feminist knowledge-building, advocacy and organising..
• Feminist Ways of Knowing & Being: In all the work and movements, feminists are doing the labour of preserving the knowledge, traditions, and political herstories of the movements, many of which have been culturally preserved by generations of women, transgender, and non-binary folks. This ranges from feminist archiving and documentation; inter-generational feminist political education; representing indigenous voices within the national narratives; preserving oral traditions of knowledge and storytelling; and honouring cultural rituals such as collective grieving. This sub-theme is for workshops which explore, honour, or inform the ways the movements build and sustain feminist knowledge and ways of being.
• Feminist Art and Performance: This category is for performances ranging from music, poetry, theatre, dance, to art installations, interactive exhibits, and games. Interactive exhibits and art installations can be for a specific day of the APFF, or for all three days.

Workshop Criteria

• Workshops must follow participatory methodologies with interactive discussions and activities to fully engage participants. They encourage applicants to be innovative in their workshop design by utilising art, music, poetry, theatre, audio-visual methods, etc. in their methodologies.
• Workshops must be focused on a minimum of one sub-theme. Workshops which are focused on multiple sub-themes will also be considered in recognition of the intersectionality of the struggles and issues.
• Workshops should consider physical and cognitive accessibility requirements of participants. They encourage proposals which are inclusive in design and methodology.
• Workshops should endeavour to minimise environmental impact and incorporate a feminist ethics of care for people and for the surroundings. They encourage proposals which reflect on the creation of spaces, inclusion and diversity of identities in spaces, and ensuring gentleness and harmony with the Earth and its resources.

For more information, visit APFF.