colectivo LASTESIS, Rita Segato & Franziska Schutzbach

The protests of the Chilean collective LAS­TESIS have become exemplary for feminist manifestations all over the world. They make critical theories experienceable through the performance of chants and group choreographies in the public space. One of their formative inspirations is the Argentine-Brazilian anthropologist Rita Segato, a key thinker of decolonial feminism. For decades, she has been researching gender-based violence – in particular the increasing rate of rape and femicide in many Latin American countries. In addition to her academic work, Segato is involved in human rights initiatives and feminist groups. Her internation­ally influential texts are now available in German with «Wider die Grausamkeit» (2021) and «Femi­zid» (2022). In Zurich, Segato (digitally present) and colectivo LAS­ TESIS meet the Swiss gender researcher Franziska Schutzbach. In her most recent publication, «Die Erschöpfung der Frauen» (2021), she challenges the ubiquitous demands of emotional and sexual availability which cause women to perform invisi­ble, unpaid and exhausting care work. The event connects the various perspectives on the resist­ance women put up to withstand the exploitation of their energy, their psyche and their bodies. It also addresses how the public space can be experienced as an unsafe and threatening environment as well as a place for visible collective empowerment and social resistance. (mr)