The Future of Women’s and Gender History Research

About the network

The goal of this network is to strengthen and secure women’s and gender historical perspectives in research, archival formation, and historiography in the long term, in a time marked by both increasing digitalization and an increasingly polarized social climate. Digital tools and platforms create new opportunities for collection, documentation, and dissemination, but also raise questions about representativity, selection, and future accessibility.

By bringing together different perspectives and competencies, the network seeks to contribute to making women’s lives, experiences, and agency in the past and present more visible, as well as creating a forum for discussions on how women’s and gender history can be developed, preserved, and communicated in an inclusive and sustainable way.

Join the network

Membership is open to all researchers and organizations interested in these issues. Are you or your organization interested in the network or would you like to join? Contact the network administrator Rachel Pierce.

The organization of the network

The network is based on a collaboration between KvinnSam, The Stockholm Museum of Women's History, and Museum of Women's History in order to strengthen and develop knowledge, visibility, and accessibility concerning women’s history, living conditions, and agency in Sweden through long-term and mutual knowledge exchange between museums, archives, and research-related work.

By gathering and combining the respective competencies of the parties — exhibition production and public activities, local and national women’s historical knowledge, as well as archives, documentation, and research — the collaboration will contribute to a more inclusive historiography and to ensuring that more stories about women’s lives and experiences reach a broad audience.

The collaboration also aims to create sustainable structures for cooperation between institutions working with women’s history, gender, feminism, and equality, as well as to strengthen the national infrastructure for knowledge about women’s history.

Network meetings

The next meeting is planned for 25-26 November 2026 in Umeå. The theme will be "Gaps in history - a conversation about important stories that are missing from our archives, collections, and history; how research, archives, and museums can make these stories visible and accessible."

We will use the exhibitions at the Women's History Museum as a jumping-off point for discussions about representation, collaboration, documentation, and historical silences. Together, we will discuss the shared challenges and opportunities in collecting and making these stories available, while also considering the perspectives, experiences, and stories specific to northern Sweden.

The meeting will include presentations, discussions, and exchange of experience and information between national actors. We are also planning a public meeting to discuss questions of women's history, the future, knowledge production, and access with a broader public.

At least one meeting is organized each year with rotating responsibility between KvinnSam, the Stockholm Museum of Women's History, and Museum of Women's History Each meeting includes a presentation on a current project or work connected to the purposes and goals of the network.

Each meeting has a designated theme. At the end of every yearly meeting, the network decides on the theme for the coming year's meeting.

Newsletter

A newsletter from the network is distributed annually and focuses on ongoing work, projects, and research that secure the future of women’s and gender research. Contact the network administrator Rachel Pierce to gain access to the newsletter.