Meet Amy Life!
Amy Life is one of our current Events and Communications Interns. In this blog post, she discusses what she’s been up to before and during her internship and her hopes for the future.
Hello! My name is Amy, and I’m a fourth-year student studying French and Philosophy. I joined GENDER.ED last summer as a Communications and Events intern, and I’ve stuck around into the academic year, too! It’s been an incredible experience so far, filled with many opportunities, and I can really see the difference it's made to my confidence!
Studying French and Philosophy has been a complete dream for me, and I’ve loved that the courses for both subjects have given me so much new feminist insight into the world. I hadn’t heard about epistemic injustice before coming to University and now it is something I feel passionate about, especially as it's a philosophical concept with real-world implications. Recently, I’ve been studying Iris Murdoch and it’s fantastic to hear from women philosophers in a male-dominated subject.
In my second year at University, I was President of the Feminist Society and helped lead campaigns about spiking (which I had the chance to speak about on BBC Radio 4!), as well as being one of the organisers of the #MeTooEdiUni movement. Both these roles taught me how to campaign for the issues I feel passionate about, and I hope that this knowledge and experience is something I use throughout my life as, sadly, this sort of work is rarely finished.
After spending my third year abroad in France, I returned to Edinburgh and joined GENDER.ED as an intern. It was exciting to work at IASH over the summer, especially at their wonderful home in Hope Park Square, and I got to see a different side of the University and the wealth of research that goes on. Helping at GENDER.ED’s book festival event was one of my highlights of the summer. I’ve loved all the work that I’ve been able to do at IASH and GENDER.ED. Helping to edit the new Dangerous Women manuscript was an enjoyable task and I enjoyed reading about so many fascinating women who have shaped history. I especially recommend looking at the blog post about Lilian Lenton for a captivating story of one woman’s fight for women’s suffrage!
Through working for GENDER.ED, I’ve also found a new interest in archive history. Despite dropping out of history a-level to do drama (much to the chagrin of my grandmother, who taught history), I’ve always been passionate about local history and the history of people like me. Being tasked with finding out about a feminist conference that happened 50 years ago allowed me to explore a passion for history and introduced me to the wealth of information still to be uncovered in archives around the country. I hope to embark on more archive projects in the future!
I’m incredibly grateful to have had this opportunity and to have met and worked with so many wonderful people. I know that wherever my future takes me, the experiences I’ve had working with GENDER.ED will be of great benefit to me.
Author Bio
Amy Life is a fourth-year French and Philosophy student and an Undergraduate Communications Intern for GENDER.ED. She has previously been the president of Edinburgh University’s Feminist Society and is one of the founders of #MeToo Edinburgh University.