Published 13 June 2021 at 19.27
Domestic. A new gender study is now sounding the alarm that female forest owners in Sweden are not interested in feminism. In addition, women adopt “masculinity norms” by organizing chainsaw courses, warns the gender scientist.
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The starting point in Emmeline Laszlo Ambjörnsson's dissertation at Stockholm University is that “forest production is male coded”.
Through interviews and observations, she wants to “understand how female forest owners who participate in their own networks act based on norms about what is considered feminine and masculine “, writes SU.
The result is alarming. Admittedly, the women's networks in forest production have been “created as separate arenas for women in forest production”. Nevertheless, the study warns of “a widespread reluctance among female forest owners to politicize their networks”. >
– The networks came from a frustration as a woman to be marginalized in forest production. You did not feel sufficiently visible as the owner. But many women in the networks do not want to say it, which is paradoxical. It is difficult to work with change work when feminism is seen as extreme and radical and gender equality as something that has already been achieved, says Emmeline Laszlo Ambjörnsson.
She also sounds the alarm that female forest owners act on the basis of “masculinity norms”. The idea of the “strong” forest owner “is an ideal that is about being physically active in the forest and working with, for example, chainsaws”.
– A common activity in the women's networks is that you have chainsaw courses. This type of activity has become a “rite” that makes you recognized as a forest owner, warns Emmeline Laszlo Ambjörnsson.
Emmeline Laszlo Ambjörnsson “also raises spatial power relations” and “believes that identity connects to the notion of the countryside” .
– Many in the study felt strong solidarity with the forestry corps in general. The female forest owners were happy to link their identity to the countryside, as a way of also collectively resisting what is understood as urban movements, such as feminism or the environmental movement, she says.