Norm Critical Desire

Presenter
Josefin Olsson, PhD student in Gender Studies at Umeå University.

Title
Norm Critical Desire

This presentation centres on Josefin Olsson’s dissertation project in which she develops a feminist critique of norm critique, based on a poststructural and psychoanalytical framework. The study includes three different cases exploring the constitutive effects and political implications of norm critique as a concept and practice, with the aim to understand the practical and political consequences of the concept and to analyse implementations of norm critique as part of a more complex political development. Josefin Olsson is especially interested in how norm critical pedagogy, as a theoretical concept, is constructed and filled with meaning through narrative descriptions about its historical development and theoretical framework. While norm critique has developed into a well-used tool in the work against discrimination and for equal opportunities in Sweden it has also been subjected to extensive criticism. Mostly in the context of media discussion where the concept, from the political right, has been associated with a so called “gender ideology”. Outside the academic fields it is a controversial concept that positions its proponents on a left/feminist/liberal side on the political scale, and its critics on the right wing/nationalist/anti-gender side.

During the seminar, Josefin Olsson puts a special focus on the internal academic discussions and definitions of the concept of norm critique. Josefin presents some of the results of her study and raises the question of whether psychoanalytic feminist theory can contribute to norm critique.

Josefin Olsson is a PhD student in Gender Studies at Umeå University. Her main research interests concern feminist theory, feminist cultural studies, and Swedish gender equality. In her dissertation she explores the political implications of ‘norm-critique’ as a tool for social justice and change.