On April 23, a Book Day was celebrated with a Murcian accent, but with expert voices that took attendees to Viking lands, to the Middle Ages or the year 0, to rescue the figure of female references in history.
The Scientific Culture and Innovation Unit (UCC+i) of the Vice-Rector's Office for Scientific Transfer, Communication and Dissemination of the University of Murcia hosted the round table 'Lost pages: women' on April 23 in the Literature Chamber of La Merced who wrote history'. An event that traveled in time to rescue witches sentenced to burn at the stake and poets or warriors condemned to live in oblivion. Those in charge of searching among the remains of the past were Adela Muñoz, professor of Inorganic Chemistry at the University of Seville; Sandra Ferrer, journalist and writer; and Laia San José Beltrán, historian and expert disseminator in Nordic culture; moderated by the UMU researcher and disseminator Claudia García Cobarro.
“For most of history, Anonymous was the name of a woman,” said Virginia Woolf, and neither literature, nor science, nor art was a place for the gender that supports half the world. Now, it is the researchers themselves who are recovering their legacy and reclaiming their names, especially during the last thirty years. For Sandra Ferrer, the starting point was Eve, the one who was born from the rib of man: «All of us who have a Christian education know what the Bible, Genesis and the myth of Adam and Eve are. In this discourse the woman was inferior to the man because she had caused the original sin.
Centuries later, at the end of the Middle Ages, the poet and philosopher Christine de Pizan was a pioneer in questioning that female inferiority was not natural, but cultural. In 'The City of Ladies' (1405) she brought together women from history and mythology such as the poet Sappho or Dido and Semiramis, founders of Carthage and Babylon, to demonstrate that oppression was the only cause that prevented them from growing.
Warrior with woman bones
The Viking warrior Birka could also have been part of that idealized city. Since the excavation of her tomb in 1889, Birka has been spoken of as being the greatest warrior of the Viking world, a kind of Norse Cid. But in 2017, new DNA analysis revealed that behind two shields, a sword and an axe, there was a woman. “This is a very clear case that when an investigation is carried out with prejudices it goes wrong,” concluded the historian and popularizer Laia San José Beltrán during the round table.
Throughout the session, the three experts were in charge of highlighting scientific dissemination as part of the process to increase the number of female role models in our society, a task that has been engraved in their last years of their careers. All those attending the event received a carnation to commemorate Book Day.
The professor of Audiovisual Narrative and Deontology of the University of Murcia Gabriel Ródenas will give the seventh conference of the cycle of 'The UMU and Scientific Culture' entitled Film Festivals: A journey from the big screen to popular culture. On Tuesday, April 30, at 6:30 p.m., in the Ámbito Cultural Room of El Corte Inglés, an interactive talk will address the role of film festivals and how the winners influence public preferences, as well as their function as powerful marketing and dissemination tool. They will talk about everything that happens backstage, how it works and how film awards become a reflection of current social concerns. Admission is free, however, due to limited capacity, prior registration is required on the UMU events page.
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