Dr Kate Lister from Leeds Trinity University will be visiting City Campus on Tuesday 17th April 2018, 6 p.m.-7.30, MK045 to deliver a public lecture, ‘A Nasty Name for a Nasty Thing’: A History of C**t’. The lecture is free, no tickets are required, and all are welcome.
Walter Kirn called c**t ‘the A-bomb of the English language’, and he’s absolutely right (Kirn, 2005). In 2016, Ofcom (the regulator for UK communications) ranked swear words in order of offensive, and the C-Bomb came out on top. The British Board of Film Classification’s guidelines state that the word c**t can only be used frequently in films that are rated 18+. Feminists have long maintained an uneasy relationship with the word, unsure if it is empowering or demeaning. But, how did we end up here? How did a word that signifies the vulva end up being ranked as one of the most offensive words in the English language? Join Kate Lister in an exploration of c**t and find out just how it ended up on the linguistic naughty step.
About the Speaker: Dr Kate Lister researches the history of sexuality and sex work. She owns and curates the online research project, Whores of Yore. She is a lecturer at Leeds Trinity University, a columnist for The Independent and on the board of the international sex work research hub.
B Colbert
transculture 