Rhiannon Love Auriemma

Feminist Theorist, Writer, Educator, & Activist

Rhiannon love auriemma

In 2022, I received my PhD from Northwestern University’s Political Science Department. My research focuses on feminist theory, politics, and intersectionality. My dissertation project, “(Being a) Feminist (is a) Struggle”, explores debates about the meaning of intersectionality within feminist movements such as SlutWalk NYC, The Women’s March, and #MeToo. I theorize how these movements deploy the concept of intersectionality and demand particular political sensibilities of participating feminist activists.

Research

My research explores the political ambiguities, contradictions, and political demands that accrue around the concept of intersectionality. In doing so, I elaborate how intersectionality and, by extension, Black feminism becomes representative of “Good Feminism” in a moment in which feminists are particularly and peculiarly attached to enacting normative ethical judgements about one another. I uncover how different iterations of feminist politics—liberal feminism, White Feminism, and sex negativity—are constructed and deployed as “Bad Feminism”. I trouble these distinctions between good and bad feminisms (and, at times, feminists) through acts of text interpretation and by critically assessing feminist critique’s functions, demands, and failures.

I am primarily interested in reading intersectionality as politically ambiguous but still invested in the juridical. In doing so, I hope not to limit what types of political projects and aspirations can be tied to intersectionality. Rather, I hope to uncover how intersectionality helps us to rethink radical and resistant politics so that we might not be so intent on sorting feminisms into categories of “good” and “bad”. I explore how engagement with the law can produce radical and resistant politics and what role intersectionality has in this engagement. What types of politics and political analysis does intersectionality demand of us? How might we embrace “bad” parts—the representational, the juridical, and the governing aspects— of feminism and resist the temptation to turn away from that which we deem contentious? In turning to Black feminist theories of the law and intersectionality’s political tensions and ambiguities, I put forth a conception of feminist activism that embraces contradictory and contentious ways of speaking, acting, and doing feminism in relation to civil rights law and institutional policies.

Conference Papers

117th American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2021
“Intersectionality, Masculine Domination, and Black Feminist Ambivalence”
116th American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2020
“Intersectionality, Solidarity, and Linked Fate in Feminist Politics”
Western Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2020
“Radical & Resistant: Intersectional Politics in Feminist Theory and Praxis”
National Women’s Studies Association Annual Meeting, 2019
“The Demand for Intersectionality: Intersectional Feminism and American Politics”
115th American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2019
“Radical & Resistant: Intersectional Politics in Feminist Theory and Praxis”
114th American Political Science Association Annual Meeting, 2018
“The Demand for Intersectionality: Intersectional Feminism and American Politics”
National Women’s Studies Association Annual Meeting, 2018
“‘Feminism will be Intersectional or it will be Bullshit’: Politics and Intersectionality in Feminist Theory and Practice”

Research Interests

Intersectionality
Black Feminism(s)
Critical Race Theory
Feminist Theory & Philosophy
Critical Theory
Contemporary Political Theory
Post/Anti-Colonial Theory

Activism & Advocacy

In 2011, I co-founded a feminist activist collective at The New School and mobilized students to demand the adoption of a comprehensive sexual assault policy. The NS Feminist Collective successfully spearheaded the reform of the university’s sexual assault policy that same year. Following this success, the Collective collaborated with other student groups to fight for gender neutral bathrooms, the recognition of the Trans Day of Remembrance, and for continued dialogue on anti-racist and anti-colonial feminism across the university.

I collaborated with university partners on the Yes Means Yes Campaign, a multi-media awareness campaign on radical consent and sexual violence on college campuses. Through the campaign, I was invited to develop trainings on prevention and response to residential advisors, incoming accepted students, and campus hearing panel participants. The campaign went viral on Tumblr in 2012. I have presented my work on the Yes Means Yes Campaign and the sexual violence policy reform to the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CALCASA), the Manhattan Borough President’s Office, and the New York City Center Against Domestic Violence.

Following the policy reform, I began working with The New School’s Student Health Services as a Peer Health Advocate. My focus remained on sexual violence prevention and sexual health. I took over the organization of Take Back The Night, The White Ribbon Campaign, and The Clothesline Project during Sexual Assault Awareness Month. I co-founded a peer-to-peer sex education collective which developed and implemented a course curriculum for freshman seminars and students living in residential housing.

In 2013, I collaborated with several students to initiate the creation of the Baldwin-Rivera-Boggs Social Justice Hub, a social justice organizing space in the newly built University Center. Currently, I volunteer as a mentor to first generation and low income college students through Northwestern’s We Are First program. Beginning in Fall 2020, I will be serving as a research assistant for the Northwestern Prison Education Program.

Teaching

My primary aim as an educator is to encourage students to creatively and compassionately articulate their political commitments while remaining open to critical, respectful engagement with alternative viewpoints. Through close engagements with a wide range of texts and media, I enable students to evaluate their own political views and values as well as competing arguments. Throughout my academic career, I have been committed to creating and sustaining safer spaces for student communities. As an educator, I believe that remaining an accessible resource for students is of the upmost importance. Doing so entails both supporting students in the creation of their own spaces as a mentor and maintaining the classroom as an accessible place for learning. My prior teaching and organizing experience has taught me the value of collaborating with students on classroom ground rules that aim to help students feel safe to explore sensitive subjects and of asking students how they would like to be addressed in the classroom. My approach to teaching is to encourage students to view their identity and background as an asset to their education rather than a hindrance. As a student, I frequently felt that my gender and economic background set me apart from my peers, most of whom were affluent men. I encourage my students to feel comfortable engaging their experiences in the classroom as valuable critical tools. Finally, I believe that an inclusive and diverse syllabus allows students to see themselves reflected in bodies of scholarship that might seem elite or inaccessible. There are material aspects to inclusivity as well. Many low-income students struggle to pay for expensive course materials. Because of this, I strive to make as much of my course material available to students at a minimal cost. Finances should not limit access to quality education.

Feminist Theorist, Writer, Educator, & Activist