Memory activism for gendered and sexual citizenship

This chapter addresses memory struggles and memory activism in support of gendered and sexual citizenship from intersectional and transnational perspectives. It argues that it is productive to combine research in the fields of gendered and sexual citizenship with memory
studies, notably concerning memory activism. Transnational and intersectional approaches have linked national issues to multilevel politics of citizenship and belonging. Postcolonial and decolonizing feminist critiques focusing on the notion of place have re-emerged, such as ‘the politics of location’, and approaches to the analysis of borders and ‘bordering’ projects. Decolonizing feminist approaches have suggested decolonizing the colonized production of knowledge about gendered citizenship by moving away from Western-centric definitions of gender and sexuality in theorizations of sexual and gendered citizenship and by decolonizing intersectionality. Time and memory struggles tend to remain in the background of these discussions. It is suggested combining a focus on the politics of location with the politics of memories in research on gendered and sexual citizenship. It uses the example of Black Lives Matter mobilizations across the world to discuss how the memory politics in which these mobilizations are involved are part (or not part) of struggles over the formulation and realization of gendered and sexual citizenship.