Hearing Feminist Voices: Writing with Feminist Theorists, Series 1 (2026 – 2027)
In Hearing Feminist Voices: Writing with Feminist Theorists, we will write together in conversation with feminist theorists and consider how creative writing is a space for the making of Mad feminist theory. In this workshop series, we will write with feminist theory by hearing the voices of feminist theorists as a Mad feminist practice and by considering selected ideas from feminist theory as we write through theory and consider together how our writing practices are forms of and informed by feminist theory – ultimately, shaping feminist theories through our writing by hearing these voices, calling them from the past to the present and into future. We will dive into writing our way through questions of selfhood, experience, suffering, strength, power, and joy by turning to feminist theorists and writing through fragments of their theoretical lenses, which can act as prompts and inspiration for us to think and write together. ‘Writing into theory’ is a practice feminist writers have been engaging in for more than a century. By hearing feminist voices, we will explore and write through the feminist theoretical constructs of writers such as bell hooks, Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf, Audre Lorde, Angela Davis, Sonia Sanchez, bell hooks, and others. In this Hearing Feminist Voices: Writing with Feminist Theorists series of workshops, we will write with some of the great feminist genre-changers, exploring what it means for a writer to create new knowledge by doing that very thing. The Mad Collective will be the first to experience and, therefore, to shape this workshop series, which will eventually be offered to others, in the form of workshops and courses.
* Led by Jessica Lowell Mason
2026 – 2027 Hearing Feminist Voices Workshop Series Roster
“Starting at the Wound: Writing with bell hooks Part I”
January 2026
“‘You, Dr. Martin’ and Our Potent Accusations: Writing with Anne Sexton”
May 2026
“Lighting the Lamp on our Webs of Fiction: Writing with Virginia Woolf Part I”
August 2026
“Mad Feminist Ingenuities at the Edge of Rage: Writing with Audre Lorde” (co-facilitated with Nicole Crevar) October 2026
“This is Not a Small Madness: Writing with Sonia Sanchez”
November 2026
“Are Psych Wards Obsolete: Writing with Angela Davis”
January 2027
“Histry-onic Poetic Responses to Paternal Pathologization: Writing with Sylvia Plath”
February 2027
“Playing with Patriarchal Language & Rationality: Writing with Gertrude Stein”
April 2027
“Theorizing Consciousness, Not Just Metaphor: Writing with Virginia Woolf Part II”
May 2027
“Perilous Poetries of Dangerous Divinest Sense: Writing with Emily Dickinson Divinest Sense”
August 2027
“Re-Conceptualizing the Wickedary: Writing with Mary Daly”
October 2027
“Talking Back in a Chorus: Writing with bell hooks Part II”
November 2027
This workshop is offered to and through and for the Mad Writing Collective. If you are interested in being part of the collective and/or the workshop series, please contact Ivan at madwritingcollective@gmail.com and Jess at madwomenofwny@gmail.com.
A Look Ahead:
Series II of Hearing Feminist Voices, a 2028 – 2029 workshop series, will feature theorists such as Therí A. Pickens, Patricia Hills Collins, Susan Stryker, La Marr Jurelle Bruce, Leslie Feinberg, Minnie-Bruce Pratt, Adrienne Rich, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Martha Nussbaum, and others.
Madwomen in the Attic 
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