Scenes in and outside the library: Continuity and change in contesting feminist knowledge on the semi-periphery

Abstract

Feminist sociological research is well institutionalised in the Czech Republic with two major departments at the Institute of Sociology of the Czech Academy of Sciences. However, it would be wrong to believe that the knowledge produced by them goes uncontested. In the article, we analyse the de-legitimizing strategies used to discredit and denounce such knowledge in two particular cases that entered the media in 2015 and 2017. In the first case, feminist sociologists criticized an exhibition of photographs of nudes presented as part of an event aimed at attracting schoolchildren and youth to science. In the latter case, a Czech documentary director criticized a rhyme, which strictly delineates roles for boys and girls and appears in a Czech reading book. Both the cases were followed by several analyses and comments by Czech gender studies scholars, and articles employing different strategies to specifically denounce feminist knowledge and expertise. Using thematic analysis, we present three strategies used to denounce feminist/gender studies knowledge and to highlight both its local specificities and commonalities with the global and pan-European ?alliance in spirit? identified by Sabine Hark (2017). We conclude by pointing out some local repercussions of the novel ?antigenderism discourse?, its links to other critiques typically found in Central and Eastern Europe and to the pan-European trends.