She Speaks Volumes

By Feral Culture Lab

Short and sweet summaries of fundamental feminist texts from the past 500+ years. She Speaks Volumes provides a primer for critical moments in the history, theory, and philosophy of feminism. Each e... more

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FAQs about She Speaks Volumes:

How many episodes does She Speaks Volumes have?

The podcast currently has 23 episodes available.

She Speaks Volumes episodes:

February 01, 2024 Perspectives on the Witch Trials
She Speaks Volumes is created by Daniella Sorrentino
CREDITS:
Voice-Actors + Narrators
Margaret Alice Murray, excerpts from witchcraze read by Verna Sorrentino
Scottish Witches: Marnie Thompson, JP Wright, Susan Harden
Joan of Arc: @katsuky
Interviews with:
Yvonne Owens
Dr Liz Williams
LINKS TO PURCHASE or READ BOOKS REFERENCED: detailed bibliography below.
Witch Cults in Western Europe
Witchcraze
Abject Eroticism in Northern Renaissance Art
Miracles of Our Own Making
Research
BBC Bitesize. “Case Study: James vi and the North Berwick Witch Hunt.” Accessed May 29, 2023. https://www.bbc.co.uk/bitesize/topics/zj77xbk/articles/zmr6hcw.
Dictionaries of the Scots Language. “Dictionary of the Scots Language,” n.d. https://dsl.ac.uk/.
King, James, G B Harrison, and James Carmichael. King James the First, Daemonologie (1597) : Newes from Scotland, Declaring the Damnable Life and Death of Doctor Fian, a Notable Sorcerer Who Was Burned at Edenbrough in Ianuary Last (1591). San Diego, Ca: Book Tree, 2002.
Llewellyn Barstow, Anne . Witchcraze : A New History of the European Witch Hunts. New York, N.Y.: Harperone, 1994.
Murray, Margaret Alice. The Witch-Cult in Western Europe, 1921.
Owens, Yvonne. Abject Eroticism in Northern Renaissance Art : The Witches and Femmes Fatales of Hans Baldung Grien. London ; New York ; Oxford ; New Delhi ; Sydney: Bloomsbury Visual Arts, 2020.
saint-joan-of-arc.com. “Joan of Arc: Trial of Condemnation Searchable Transcipt,” n.d. https://saint-joan-of-arc.com/trial-condemnation.htm.
Williams, Liz. MIRACLES of OUR OWN MAKING : A History of Paganism. S.L.: Reaktion Books, 2021.
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35min
July 04, 2022The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington: Surrealist Storytelling and female friendship
She Speaks Volumes: A primer for a millennia of often neglected writings by female philosophers, artists, and scientists.
created by Daniella Sorrentino
Donate Here: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SheSpeaksVol

S2:E2: The Hearing Trumpet by Leonora Carrington: Surrealist Storytelling and Female Friendship.
Excerpts from The Hearing Trumpet are ready by Verna Sorrentino
This episode is based on The NYRB edition of The Hearing Trumpet published in 2021.
The Hearing Trumpet was written in the 1950s, and was originally published in 1974.
Listen to the SSV episode on Carrington's Down Below
FROM WIKIPEDIA: Mary Leonora Carrington OBE (6 April 1917 – 25 May 2011[1]) was a British-born Mexican artist, surrealist painter, and novelist. She lived most of her adult life in Mexico City and was one of the last surviving participants in the surrealist movement of the 1930s.[2] Carrington was also a founding member of the women's liberation movement in Mexico during the 1970s.[3][4] read more
Research Links:
Leonora Carrington's - Art work: https://www.wikiart.org/en/leonora-carrington
Museo Leonora Carrington: https://www.leonoracarringtonmuseo.org
Article about Carrington and Varo: https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artists/leonora-carrington-7615/love-friendship-rivalry-surreal-friends

Books I used for research:
The Surreal Life of Leonora Carrington by Joanna Moorhead.
Leonora Carrington: Surrealism, Alchemy and Art by Susan L. Alberth
Magia,...
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24min
May 20, 2022 Down Below: Leonora Carrington - surrealism + feminism
She Speaks Volumes: Season 2 Episode 1.
Down Below: Leonora Carrington - surrealism + feminism
Down Below written by Leonora Carrington published by NYRB 2017 (originally published 1972).
Excerpts read by: Verna Sorrentino.
https://www.nyrb.com/products/down-below?variant=29716648135
Leonora Carrington was born in April 6, 1917 in Lancashire, England, and died May 25th, 2011 in Mexico City. She studied art in London, and in Italy. In 1937 Carrington moved to Paris, and was a central figure in surrealist circles. She lived in Sant Martin d’Ardeche with her lover Max Ernst before fleeing to Spain as the Nazi’s encroached on France. In Madrid she was involuntarily committed to an asylum. After her treatment she managed to evade being sent to a sanatorium in South Africa by her parents. She married Renato Leduc and moved to Mexico City, where she would live for most of the rest of her life. A complete biography is available here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonora_Carrington#Mexico
If you liked this episode please consider supporting my work! You can ‘Buy Me a Coffee’ right here: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/SheSpeaksVol
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19min
February 11, 2022 Rags. Petrol. Matches. Virginia Woolf's Three Guineas.
To support the podcast please donate at: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/FeralCulture
She Speaks Volumes: The Primer for 500 years of feminist philosophy, history
Season 1 Episode 8: Three Guineas by Virginia Woolf.
Created by: Daniella Sorrentino for the Feral Culture Lab: feralculturelab.com , dsorrentino.com
Virginia Woolf is voiced by Fiona Thraille: https://thraille.weebly.com
In this episode we are listening to excerpts from the essay Three Guineas written by Virginia Woolf in 1938. Three Guineas is a satirical book length essay written as England is on the brink of World War 2. The essay is in response to a letter she has received asking her for a donation towards peace efforts, and posing the question, ‘how can women help prevent war?
For this episode I used:
Virginia Woolf: A Room of One’s Own and Three Guineas published by Penguin Classics - April 2019 Introduction by: by Michèle Barrett
Listen to the She Speaks Volumes episode: A Room of One’s Own
I also Used the following sites as references:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Woolf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1939
https://www.bl.uk/people/virginia-woolf
http://www.virginiawoolfsociety.org.uk
Credit to:
SFX:
freesound.org
00489 Aircraft Run 2 - Robinhood76
https://freesound.org/people/Robinhood76/sounds/62049/
O1777 machine gun - Robinhood76
https://freesound.org/people/Robinhood76/sounds/96376/#
Military-alarm - kizilsungur
https://freesound.org/people/KIZILSUNGUR/sounds/96973/#
Music:
https://www.soundstripe.com
Sweata Weatha - Dresden, The Flamingo
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24min
February 03, 2022The Most Dangerous Woman in America: Emma Goldman
When the failure of modern dictatorship and authoritarian philosophies becomes more apparent and the realization of failure more general, Anarchism will be vindicated.
~ Emma Goldman
She Speaks Volumes: Season 1 Episode 7Emma Goldman, The Most Dangerous Woman in America.
Episode created by: Daniela Sorrentino, for Feral Culture Lab
Your donations help me the voice actors!
DONATE HERE: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/FeralCulture
Living My Life Volume 1 - written By Emma Goldman
Published by Dover Publications, New York, 1970.

Emma Goldman is voiced by: Halia Hirniak.
Emma Goldman was born June 27th 1869 in Kovno in the Russian Empire. She died May 14th 1940 in Toronto Ontario, Canada. In her almost 70 years she witnessed, often firsthand, World War 1, the early part of World War 2, the Russian Revolution, The Spanish Civil War, the rise and fall of the American Trade Unions, the depression, and the rise and rise of capitalism. she fought for workers rights, wealth distribution long before it was a thing, campaigned for birth control and the rights of women. At heart she was an anarchist, and idealist and most surprisingly a romantic. Yet she was called the most dangerous woman in America...but dangerous for who?

For research and references I also used:
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/special/index
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emma_Goldman
https://jwa.org/womenofvalor/goldman

The interview with Ruth Kinna is the bonus episode. Her books can be found here:
https://www.penguin.co.uk/authors/128925/ruth-kinna.html
And an essay here
https://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/professor-ruth-kinna-the-theory-and-practice-of-anarchism

Check out the Anarchist Library for tons of essays and publications on anarchy, including the works of Emma Goldman.

MUSIC:
Dresden, The Flamingo; An Old Fashioned Magic Show:
https://app.soundstripe.com/songs/12943
SFX
Inchadney: Northsea. https://freesound.org/s/587759/
Plantmonkey: Gulls on the isles of Sicily; https://freesound.org/s/377107/
Canardo55: Herring Gull 1: https://freesound.org/s/538016/
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24min
January 26, 2022 The Cage of Obscene Birds: Harriet Jacobs - Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl
She Speaks Volumes: The Primer for 500 years of feminist philosophy, history
Season 1 Episode 6: In the Cage of Obscene Birds: Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs.
Created by: Daniella Sorrentino for the Feral Culture Lab: feralculturelab.com , dsorrentino.com
Harriet Jacobs is voiced by Portia Cue, VoiceOnCue.com
To support the podcast please donate at: https://www.buymeacoffee.com/FeralCulture
For this episode I used two editions:
Jacobs Harriet, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself, Penguin Books, London, Eng 2000
Jacobs Harriet, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself, (Enlarged Edition), The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, Cambridge Massachusetts, and London Eng. 2009
I also used the following web-pages as references:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harriet_Jacobs
https://www.humanitiestexas.org/news/articles/before-and-after-civil-war
https://www.britannica.com/event/American-Civil-War
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slave_narrative
https://www.britannica.com/art/slave-narrative
Here is the link ton the slave narratives from the Federal Writers Project in the Library of Congress:
https://www.loc.gov/collections/slave-narratives-from-the-federal-writers-project-1936-to-1938/about-this-collection/
BIO: Harriet Jacobs was born into slavery around 1813, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, is her auto-biography, her own account of her life in slavery, and the harrowing years, decade she spent on the run, after her escape.
“You may believe what I say; for I write only that whereof I know. I was twenty-one years in that cage of obscene birds. I can testify, from my own experience and observation, that slavery is a curse to the whites as well as to the blacks.” Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl

MUSIC:
Swing Low Sweet Chariot: written by Wallace Willis, c1865, performed by Antioch Mass Choir, licensed via soundstripe. https://app.soundstripe.com/artists/563
Oh, Freedom: writer unknown. c1865 performed by Antioch Mass Choir, licensed via soundstripe. https://app.soundstripe.com/songs/13065

Sound Effects:
Rain on a Summer Day
"Vlatko Blažek Varaždin, Croatia e-mail: [email protected]

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26min
October 12, 2021 Vindication of the Rights of Woman: the foundation of modern feminism
She Speaks Volumes, the primer for over 500 years of feminist philosophy, history, and writing is produced by the Feral Culture Lab
Written and created by Daniella Sorrentino.
Mary Wollstonecraft is voiced by Fiona Thraille
In this episode we are listening to excerpts from the book that would lay the foundation of western feminism, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, written by Mary Wollstonecraft, and originally published in 1792.
Episode extracts from Project Gutenberg edition
Research from the Penguin Classic edition.
Mary Wollstonecraft was born April 27, 1759 in Spitalfields, now part of London’s East End. Instability in the family’s finances, and her father’s drunken rages prompted her to seek employment outside of London as soon as she was able. She worked first as a ladies companion in Bath, and as governess in Ireland, she also briefly started her own school. Finding none of these careers suitable she returned to London to embark on a career as a writer. ‘The first of a new genus’, she would write in a letter to her sister.
A complete list of her works can be found in the bibliography on her wikipedia entry.
Music:
Mandoline Concerto in C, Vivaldo (1729) from the Internet Archive
La Marseillaise, (1792 ) Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle, from Wikimedia Commons
Soundscape source credits:
"Rain on Windows, Interior, B.wav" by InspectorJ (www.jshaw.co.uk) of Freesound.org
"Wind, Realistic, A.wav" by InspectorJ (www.jshaw.co.uk) of Freesound.org
“Dry Thunder”, by JusKiddink of Freesound.org
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22min
July 04, 2021 She Speaks Volumes - Trailer
A brief introduction to the She Speaks Volumes podcast.
Learn more at: shespeaksvolumes.ca
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1min
February 14, 2021 Simone de Beauvoir's The Second Sex
She Speaks Volumes, Season 2 - Episode 1,
The Second Sex by Simone de Beauvoir
produced by: Feral Culture Lab, Jan 2021
Website: https://www.feralculturelab.com/ (www.feralculturelab.com )Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FeralCultureLab (https://www.facebook.com/FeralCultureLab)
Episode 1:
Season 2 of the She Speaks Volumes podcast begins with an excerpt of The Second Sex by philosopher Simone de Beauvoir. The Second Sex is a harbinger of what we have come to call Second Wave Feminism. The book examines the question ‘What is woman?’ from an existential-feminist perspective.
Sappho: 630-c. 570 BCE, a prolific, lyrical poet, Sappho had great influence over the poets of her own time. Sappho is best remembered today as a lesbian, rather than a poet; but in her own times she was represented as a promiscuous heterosexual. It wasn’t until a few centuries after her death that she was talked of as a lesbian, her reputation as a lover of women brought us the term sapphic, and defined a cultural history of lesbianism. read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sappho (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sappho)
Christine de Pizan: 1364-c. Proto-feminist, considered the first woman to earn her living as a writer; and ‘the first woman to pick up her pen in defence of her sex’ (Simone de Beauvoir). Christine de Pizan was a poet and writer at the court of King Charles the VI. In addition to writing several works on military tactics and history she wrote The Book of the City of Ladies (https://podcasts.captivate.fm/media/a92fe639-32bc-4f97-82f0-e058a1478048/cityofladies-pt1.mp3 (covered in season 1 of She Speaks Volumes)) and The Treasury of the City of Ladies.: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christine_de_Pizan
Mary Wollstonecraft: 1759 - 1797. Writer, philosopher, proto-feminist. Along with A Vindication of the Rights of Woman, Wollstonecraft wrote novels, history books, and travel literature. She died from complications giving birth to her second daughter Mary Shelley, author of Frankenstein. Covered in She Speaks Volumes- S1 Episode 4. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Wollstonecraft (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mary_Wollstonecraft)
Olympe de Gouges: 1748 - 1793. Playwright, political activist, abolitionist, and early feminist. She wrote Declaration of the Rights of Woman and the Female Citizen amongst many other plays, political pamphlets, and manifestos. She was executed by the new revolutionary government during the Reign of Terror for anti-revolutionary activities. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olympe_de_Gouges
Isabella the Catholic: an active monarch, her reforms and influence bought changes to the wealth, and safety of Castille, she married Ferdinand II of Aragon, unifying Spain. She was then considered the first Queen of Spain. She was an devout Catholic, complicated in our understanding today as converting Jews, Muslims and Indigenous Peoples of North America was a motivating factor for her, but she was vehemently opposed to slavery. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_I_of_Castile (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isabella_I_of_Castile )
Elizabeth of England: 1533 - 1603, Queen Elizabeth I the iconic ‘virgin-queen’ who reigned England from 1558, upon the death of her half-sister until her own death in 1603. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_I (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_I )
Catherine of Russia: 1729 - 1796, Catherine the Great, she was empress of Russia from 1762 until her death in 1796, Russia’s longest serving female monarch. She was credited with revitalizing and modernizing Russia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_the_Great (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_the_Great)
Catherine of Siena: 1347 - 1380, a lay member of the Dominican Order, was a mystic, activist, and author who had a great influence on Italian literature and the Catholic Church. Canonized in 1461, she is also a Doctor of the Church. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catherine_of_Siena...
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19min
December 28, 2020 Virginia Woolf's - Three Guineas
She Speaks Volumes, A Feral Culture Lab Podcast
https://www.feralculturelab.com/ (https://www.feralculturelab.com/)
In this episode I am reading an excerpt from Three Guineas - a satirical book length essay written by Virginia Woolf in 1938, with England on the brink of World War 2.
The essay is a response to a letter she has received asking her for a donation towards peace efforts, and asking the question, ‘how can women help prevent war?’ I don’t know if she really received the letter or not, but my feeling is she did, or something like it.
Three Guineas is her response, and she queries if she is in fact qualified to answer the question. In doing this she explores the roles women play in education, the professions, and in the private household.
Within the letter are two hypothetical letters from two other organizations, one asking for help rebuilding a women’s college, the other asking for donations to a women’s professional organization. Through these letters Woolf explores the relatively recent ability of women to be educated, to earn their own money, and to vote. (At the time of this essay Women had only had the vote for the 10 years, though the daughters of educated men had been able to vote for 20.
email me at: [email protected]
or Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/FeralCultureLab (https://www.facebook.com/FeralCultureLab)
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15min

FAQs about She Speaks Volumes:

How many episodes does She Speaks Volumes have?

The podcast currently has 23 episodes available.