Views and Reviews

Abstract

In the last few decades, we have witnessed a crucial blossoming of feminist critical inquiry, fed by an impassioned exploration of gender as an important socio-historical category. The best of this kind of probing analysis can be seen in the work of “Equity in Canadian Theatre: The Women’s Initiative,” here reviewed by Kim Renders, which uses the lens of gender to examine systemic inequalities in the Canadian theatre industry, both in the form of women’s exclusion from professional positions (and especially positions of power) and in the male-centred material produced on national stages. Certainly, the report reminds us, we live in a country where theatres continue to churn out white male seasons and where Harold Blooms continue to champion the white male canon. And certainly, this means we must continue the feminist struggle. This may be the case more than ever at present, in an age of post-feminist cynicism and, more perniciously, at a time when young women seek out liberating feminist “experiences” in the form of productions like Girls Gone Wild.