The Trinity College Dublin Students’ Union (TCDSU) Gender Equality Committee has today launched a new campaign to promote feminism in Trinity. The campaign, entitled “Feminists of Trinity”, will see Trinity students expressing their views on feminism in “Humans of New York” style photographs.
The campaign will feature a photo of someone in Trinity, whether it be a student or staff member, along with a caption on what feminism means to them and already has 80 profiles including Seanad candidate and Reid Professor of Criminal Law, Ivana Bacik, with more staff to be photographed next week.
Speaking to The University Times, TCDSU Gender Equality Officer, Louise Mulrennan, explained that the aim of the campaign is to be “positive” and to “re-associate” the word “feminism” with “gender advancement and equality.”
Auditor-elect of Trinity Law Society, Hilary Hogan, and incoming Chair of the Central Societies Committee (CSC), Ludivine Rebet, are also included in the campaign. Mulrennan emphasised that the campaign will include students from across campus, ranging from captains of sports teams to other chairs of societies.
Mulrennan hopes that this campaign will show how inclusive the feminist movement is: “We want to engage with people from all aspects of college, all disciplines, all ages, and particularly all genders.”
While some people were directly asked to be involved in the campaign, Mulrennan adds that they approached people walking through front square as well, in an effort to get an honest and diverse view of feminism in Trinity.
This is a similar approach to the “random” style of Humans of the New York, which achieves massive engagement internationally across social media.
Mulrennan hopes to achieve similar engagement and discussion with the feminist profiles, which she calls to date “inspiring and encouraging.”, and would “love” for the campaign to be successful enough to run and continue again next year.
The campaign will run until Friday, April 8th.
