Spanning 790 acres, Hampstead Heath is one of the biggest green spaces in London. The vast expanse of greenery, brimming with some of the best views of the capital, as well as freshwater swimming ponds, is such a sizeable chunk of land it even has its own police force known as Hampstead Heath Constabulary.
This summer, Hampstead Heath was home to HowTheLightGetsIn, the world’s largest philosophy and music festival. The event attracted high-profile thinkers from around the world with 90 speakers at more than 100 events taking place across the weekend.
I was fortunate enough to give a talk at the festival, which was founded in 2010 by Hilary Lawson, an English philosopher who is the director of the Institute of Art and Ideas, for a panel discussion titled ‘Cracking Girl Code’. The event discussed whether individualism has taken over the feminist movement, as well as what a feminist utopia would look like.
In the debate, I discussed everything from police violence against women, to the fact between two and three women are murdered each week by their partners or exes, to the extortionate cost of childcare shutting women out of the workplace. As well as the disproportionate number of women on poverty wages in low-paid precarious forms of employment in the UK, and the importance of adopting an intersectional feminist approach.
HowTheLightGetsIn will return to Hay-on-Wye on the spring bank holiday in 2022 before coming back to London next autumn. You can read about presale details here.
