The Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine contributed to the strengthening of Ukrainian national identity and Ukrainian nationalism. Historically, feminism and nationalism have had a complex relationship, and scholarly research shows several cases of the negative effects of nationalism on women, including the instrumentalisation of women by nationalists without changes that help to raise their social status. Without denying the legitimate examples of such interactions, I argue that it is important to examine early Ukrainian feminism (late 19th century – first decades of 20th century) and its nationalist elements through an intersectional lens. Even though intersectionality isn’t typically applied to national and gender identities, I argue, using examples from texts by Ukrainian feminists (in particular, N. Kobrynska, O. Kobylianska, O. Pchilka, M. Rudnytska), that such a perspective allows us to see Ukrainian feminism and its interaction with nationalism in a different light. I claim that the positive attitude of Ukrainian feminists towards the national struggle can be explained not only by the difficult political climate with the rising popularity of nationalism but also by the fact that for the female authors themselves, the woman question and the nation question did not necessarily contradict each other and were not strictly separated. That is because, as Ukrainian women at a time when an independent Ukrainian state was absent, they felt double oppression as representatives of a stateless nation and as women. An intersectional analysis of the origins of Ukrainian feminism can be helpful in the context of modern Ukraine when the question of the balance between feminism and nationalism arises again, along with the issue of the dissolution of the feminist interests in the nationalist ones.
For many, the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine has contributed to the strengthening of Ukraine’s national identity (this is evident from the polling data here and here). This has led to a renewed interest in nationalist and feminist intersections for women and feminist activists in Ukraine. This can be seen in organised discussions about feminism and militarism, the interconnection of war, nationalism, and feminism, as well as anticolonial feminist solidarity. As for feminism and anticolonialism, the gap between the Ukrainian feminist movement and some well-known international feminist organisations became evident after the full-scale invasion. This gap is due to tensions between feminist pacifism and supplying Ukraine with weapons, as well as the colonial lens, which positions Ukraine as a mere object of conversation rather than a subject that can speak for herself. Examples of such differences can be found in a review paper by Anastasia Mykytenko and in an appeal to Western feminists by Oksana Potapova.
However, the question of the interaction between nationalism and feminism is also relevant for the state as a whole because women play a significant role both in daily life and in the defence of Ukraine. War exacerbates gender inequality and discrimination, as women bear an even greater burden of caring for families in the absence of a significant number of men; at the same time, women actively engage in volunteer activities, voluntarily join the Armed Forces of Ukraine, and make a significant contribution to maintaining the resilience of Ukrainian society.
In this paper, I focus on the ideas of Ukrainian feminists of the late 19th and early 20th centuries in order to argue that it is productive to consider their writing through an intersectional lens1 that focuses on Ukrainian national and woman identities. Such an approach allows us to view the combination of feminist and national aspirations among women as an organic unity inseparable from one another rather than a compromise or even a partial defeat of feminism due to the spread of nationalist ideas.
1 Earlier, historian Yana Lys has also suggested considering Ukrainian feminism through an intersectional lens.
Ukrainian feminism and nationalism
The Ukrainian feminist movement2 dates back to at least the second half of the 19th century, which coincides in time with the formation of Ukrainian nationalism. The relationship between nationalism and feminism has been historically complex. Women were actively involved in the national liberation struggle, but research shows that it did not help women’s emancipation, and their contribution to the national liberation struggle was largely ignored.
For instance, historian Olesya Khromeychuk points out that OUN (Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists) and UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army) militarised women not despite but because of their femininity: women were actively used to carry out operations as they could appear less suspicious and easily blend into the civilian population. Thus, the nationalist militarisation of women between the 1930s and the 1950s did not promote women’s emancipation but merely exploited femininity for the sake of the national liberation struggle, which held conservative views about women’s role in society (Khromeychuk, 2018). Khromeychuk also mentions a Ukrainian feminist from the first half of the 20th century, Milena Rudnytska, whose approach contradicted the OUN’s ideology because Rudnytska did not support the idea that Ukrainians should seize power forcibly. In contrast, nationalists intended to return women to the domestic hearth after the national liberation struggle ended (Khromeychuk, 2018, p.10).
The paternalistic attitude of the OUN towards women has also been shown by historian Marta Havryshko, who argues that violence and exploitation towards women were common among the OUN members. For example, OUN resorted to punishing the women who had sexual relations with those whom OUN considered their enemies and even murdering these women as a warning or threat to those male “enemies” (Havryshko, 2018, pp. 39–41). As for the women who engaged in the national liberation struggle, OUN used female sexuality for underground activities and even officially encouraged women to use their own beauty and cunning to gather intelligence (Havryshko, 2018, p. 45).
Historian Oksana Kis analyses Ukrainian women’s experience in the national liberation struggle from a somewhat different perspective. She draws attention to how little is said about women in the context of the national liberation struggle and how women’s experience is ultimately largely ignored (Kis, 2013). Based on the memories of Ukrainian women in the underground, she writes about the importance of personal relationships with OUN members and UPA fighters as a motivation for women to join their activities, also drawing attention to the complexity of women’s experience in the underground, where they largely “performed traditional roles of housewives, caretakers, and consolers”, being simultaneously desirable (for their support) and undesirable (for allegedly distracting men from the fight) in the national liberation struggle (Kis, 2013, p. 594). Although nominally nationalists praised motherhood and insisted on the importance of this role for women, in practice, women often had to choose between raising children in the difficult conditions of hiding and leaving children with other people for the sake of underground activities (Kis, 2013, pp. 595–598).
Without downplaying the obvious tension between the woman and nation questions, it’s worth noting that they have something in common. A researcher of the Ukrainian women’s movement and historian, Marta Bohachevsky-Chomiak stresses that the Ukrainian people and women had to justify their aspirations for autonomy in their subordinate positions while facing accusations of selfishness (1982, p. 16). Milena Rudnytska drew attention to the common features: the belief in their strength, creative impulse, and importance for a bright future.
It is clear from the aforementioned studies that the national liberation struggle is related to the struggle for women’s rights. However, the inclusion of women in the former often did not lead to obvious gains for the latter. In my opinion, to understand the interaction of the questions regarding women and the nation, particularly through the ways they are intertwined for women themselves, we should turn to intersectionality.
2 There are different approaches in the research literature on how and whether we distinguish the women’s movement from feminism. I rely on the distinction proposed by the editors of the “A Biographical Dictionary of Women’s Movements and Feminisms”, according to which the women’s movement includes “writings and activities that aimed to improve women’s status and position”. In contrast, feminism’s aims at “women’s equality with men and/or to challenge patriarchal structures” (Haan, Daskalova & Loutfi, 2006, pp. & 4–5).
Intersectional lens
For intersectionality, I rely on the definition and conceptualisation of this approach by philosopher and legal scholar Tina Botts: “Intersectionality represents the idea that forms, modes, or “axes” of oppression (such as race, gender, class, sexuality, and ability status) overlap and fuse in the lives of the oppressed, resulting in an account of oppression that highlights its complexity and its resistance to being addressed through means that focus exclusively on one form, mode, or “axis” of oppression or another” (Botts, 2017, p. 343). While intersectionality is commonly traced to Kimberlé Crenshaw, Botts points out that it has appeared as a concept since at least the 19th century in Black feminism in the USA, particularly in an episode described by Anna Julia Cooper (Botts, 2017, p. 344). Cooper describes arriving at a train station, where she sees two separate rooms, “FOR LADIES” and “FOR COLORED PEOPLE”, which leads her to wonder which room she should enter as a woman of colour (1892, p. 96). This situation highlights the necessity of intersectionality because it is impossible to understand Cooper’s experience merely as that of a woman or a Black person.
Tracing intersectionality until at least the end of the 19th century is extremely helpful for this paper since I suggest applying intersectionality to texts of the same time period. However, I would like to emphasise that by no means am I equating the experience of Ukrainian women to that of Black women. I merely believe that intersectionality helps us analyse the ways nationality is intertwined with gender.
It is important to note that there are different opinions about the appropriateness of employing intersectionality in cases without a racial element, considering that this approach was developed specifically within Black feminism. Namely, as Jenny Morrison emphasises, some argue that if intersectionality is used for the analysis of any intersections (and not just those of gender and race), there is a risk that Black women become marginalised while white women are prioritised. Others argue that analysis of only race and gender poses a risk of marginalisation of other categories, such as class or sexuality (Morrison, 2021). I use the term “intersectionality” because I find it useful for cases of overlapping forms of oppression and because I am unaware of an alternative and more appropriate approach for the overlap between nationality and gender.
Of course, the overlap of Ukrainian national identity with gender is significantly different from the overlap of race and gender. A Black woman does not choose her race and can’t hide it; she can’t assimilate into the white racist culture of the 19th century. But a Ukrainian woman of the same time period does not necessarily look significantly different from a Russian woman. Hence, a Ukrainian woman makes a choice against assimilation to emphasise her own Ukrainian identity, even though she could make her life easier by accepting an imperialist Russian identity and language. For example, the well-known Ukrainian writer and feminist Olena Pchilka (1849–1930) was outraged by restrictions on the Ukrainian language in the Russian Empire and considered herself a Ukrainian. In contrast, the renowned Soviet feminist Alexandra Kollontai (1872–1952), born in Saint Petersburg to a family of Ukrainian origin and having worked for some time in Kyiv, did not consider herself Ukrainian. A highly illustrative example regarding national identity is that of the family of an ideologist of Ukrainian radical nationalism, Dmytro Dontsov. Dmytro Dontsov and his sisters, Olena and Kateryna, identified as belonging to the Ukrainian nation, whereas two of their brothers, Serhii and Volodymyr, self-identified as Russians (Erlacher, 2021, pp. 53–56). Thus, unlike race, national identity can be chosen, at least in some cases.
The Nation Question and the Woman Question
In this section, I focus on how feminism and nationalism, or at least the woman question and the nation question, are intertwined throughout the texts of famous Ukrainian feminists. I chose the texts of four authors for the analysis: Natalia Kobrynska, Olena Pchilka, Olha Kobylianska, and Milena Rudnytska. Although the history of Ukrainian feminism includes many prominent figures, I focus specifically on these four for several reasons. I considered their activism, genre of texts, regional diversity, and contributions to Ukrainian feminism. I have chosen slightly less known figures than, for example, Lesya Ukrainka to draw attention to them. In the article, while primarily analysing texts, I selected figures who embody feminism in their writings and public activities. Natalia Kobrynska and Olena Pchilka made significant contributions to the development of Ukrainian feminism by publishing the first Ukrainian women’s almanack, The First Wreath. Olha Kobylianska formulated the idea of Ukrainian feminism and wrote consistently feminist texts. Thanks to Milena Rudnytska, Ukrainian feminism flourished institutionally in the Union of Ukrainian Women (Soiuz Ukrainok) organisation. Kobrynska, Pchilka and Kobylianska represent early Ukrainian feminism, while Rudnytska represents a more mature and institutionalised feminism.
The texts selected cover different genres: Olena Pchilka’s is a novella, Natalia Kobrynska’s texts are sociological essays, Olha Kobylianska has a speech and a novella, and Milena Rudnytska’s texts are journalistic articles.
These women lived in different regions: Kobylianska was from Bukovyna, Kobrynska and Rudnytska were from Galicia, and Pchilka lived in different regions of Ukrainian lands that belonged to Austria–Hungary and the Russian Empire. Nevertheless, there are certain connections between them. As mentioned above, Natalia Kobrynska and Olena Pchilka were co-editors of the first Ukrainian women’s almanack, The First Wreath, which they published in Lviv in 1887. Olha Kobylianska and Natalia Kobrynska also collaborated to collect signatures for a petition by Czech women to the Austrian government about women’s right to higher education (Bohachevsky-Chomiak, 1988, p. 87). In her articles, Milena Rudnytska frequently mentions Natalia Kobrynska as a leading figure and pioneer of the Ukrainian women’s movement (Rudnytska, 1998, p. 809).
The interconnections, regional and genre diversity, and significant contributions to the development of Ukrainian feminism provide a useful, albeit not exhaustive, cross-section of examples.
Feminist novella by Olena Pchilka
Olena Pchilka is an outstanding figure in Ukrainian feminism and nationalism. The publication of the first Ukrainian women’s almanack was an important event that consolidated Ukrainian women. Not only was she a co-editor of The First Wreath (1887), but she also wrote a poem under the same name, serving as an introduction to it, as well as the novella Female Friends (Tovaryshky) (1887). The intertwining of the national and woman identity of the author can be traced in both texts. In the poem, Pchilka calls for women’s solidarity, also aiming to help their homeland (Ukraine):
“Unite, my sisters! In our grove so fair,
Wreaths of labour we’ll declare,
To benefit our dear homelánd,
The woman’s heart we’ll freely hand!” (Pchilka, 1887a, p. 4).
Female Friends is a story about Lyuba and Raisa, two Ukrainian women from the Poltava region (under the Russian Empire), who decided to go to Zurich to study medicine at the university (Pchilka, 1887b). The text is full of feminist thoughts, but it also regularly addresses the question of national identity. The story begins with Lyuba’s mother lamenting that her daughter wants to pursue higher education, even though women of that time should not be concerned with such matters (Pchilka, 1887b, p. 231). For Lyuba herself, a pivotal moment in her life was a childhood episode when she accidentally found Eneida3 at home, which greatly impressed her. The book was interesting and entertaining and written in Ukrainian, not Russian. However, her friend Raisa said that “it is composed in a peasant manner and is something indecent” because Raisa grew up in a family where everything was done “in a noble manner” (Pchilka, 1887b, pp. 253–254). The text contains various small situations that reveal Raisa’s unwillingness to know and understand the Ukrainian language and aspirations. Meanwhile, Lyuba and their friend Kost regularly engage in debates with Raisa on this matter, as they believe it is necessary to nurture Ukrainian culture and return home to educate their people upon completion of their studies abroad (Pchilka, 1887b, pp. 264–266).
The story also describes a significant feminist achievement: Raisa becomes the first woman to deliver a scientific report at the University of Zurich, a feat that Kost comments on as follows: “It is full recognition of the rights of woman in such an honourable area as science! It proves that intelligent women’s strength can pave its way through routine forms of life… It proves that our women can and will persevere not only in listening but also in speaking the word of science from the stage” (Pchilka, 1887b, p. 305). After her speech, however, two of their acquaintances, Kornievich and Kuzmenko, dismiss her speech as small and empty, Kuzmenko derogatorily adds that if Raisa had just come to the podium and showed her tongue, she would have still received applause (Pchilka, 1887b, p. 310).
In the end, Raisa stays to work as a teaching assistant at the university, the boys return home, and Lyuba travels to Vienna to further her medical education in obstetric courses because she wants to learn how to alleviate women’s suffering and be “a skilled counsellor to poor sisters, and perhaps, a liberator from the death of some” (Pchilka, 1887b, pp. 319–320). One day, in Vienna, Lyuba encounters two Ukrainian students from Galicia (under Austria–Hungary) in the cafeteria, and she is impressed that they speak not Russian but very good Ukrainian. She reflects on how the Ukrainians from Galicia did the right thing by “developing their own language for cultural needs, and we? … we switch to Russian when engaging in more serious conversation! This is not right!” (Pchilka, 1887b, p. 324).
Even at the level of the plot and unfolding events, it is easy to see how feminist and Ukrainian national elements interact. There is tension between Raisa and Lyuba, both of Ukrainian origin and brave women aspiring to get higher education. However, one shies away from her heritage, while the other considers her Ukrainian identity crucial. Vienna becomes a place of convergence of Lyuba’s feminist and nationalist concerns. In Vienna, Lyuba seeks to acquire knowledge and skills useful specifically for helping women (through obstetrics), and there she encounters the sound of the Ukrainian language, which makes her concerned about the attitude and use of Ukrainian and Russian by “us” (Ukrainian women and men from the Russian Empire).
3 Eneida (1798) is the first literary work published completely in the modern Ukrainian language. Written by Ivan Kotliarevsky (1769–1838), it is a parody on Virgil’s Aeneid.
Feminist essays by Natalia Kobrynska
Let us now turn to co-editor of The First Wreath, Natalia Kobrynska. In this book’s introduction, she emphasises the importance of this publication in the context of the woman question. She says the book is for “mature minds” rather than those who think positively of women’s lack of education and relegation to the domestic sphere. She also notes the importance of the almanack as a publication that, for the first time, unites Ukrainian women “in the name of our national unity in the field of common affairs and a question that is common to all women” (Kobrynska, 1887a, pp. 1–3). Though it is a diverse collection of texts, each contribution addresses issues that are relevant to the woman’s question. The national aspect is also significant: these are texts by Ukrainian women from territories under two empires (Russian and Austro-Hungarian). They are united not only as women but as Ukrainians.
While Natalia Kobrynska is famous as a fiction writer, the almanack contains her nonfiction texts: several essays that lean toward the field of feminist sociology and a methodological feminist text about the goal of women’s society in Stanislaviv (contemporary Ivano-Frankivsk). These texts reveal information about women, particularly Ukrainian women, of her time. However, I will focus on a few bright examples that, in my opinion, well illustrate the intersection of the woman question and the nation question for Natalia Kobrynska.
For instance, Kobrynska sees the primary goal of women’s society as the “awakening of the women’s spirit through literature”, and among the reasons for turning to literature, she mentions women’s education, the portrayal of the social order, the unity of Ukraine, and freedom of speech (Kobrynska, 1887c). Kobrynska believes that reading books allows women to obtain education at a time when they had no right to pursue higher education at universities, that literature is good at describing both the positive and negative aspects of society and that free speech existed in literature during times when the press remained silent on multiple occasions; as for Ukraine, she says that “Rus-Ukraine, despite being politically divided, is being united by literature” (Kobrynska, 1887c, pp. 457–460). I believe that for Kobrynska, women’s and national identity are so intertwined that, in justifying the aim of the women’s society, she mentions how literature unites Ukraine, which is politically divided.Moreover, she opens an essay about women in Galicia with the following sentence: “Sad is the history of our people and sad is the fate of its women” (Kobrynska, 1887b, p. 68). In the article, she laments that each time, “until the hour of true national self-cognition struck”, Ukrainian intellectuals have been choosing to serve other peoples; regarding women, she reflects on the issues of women’s subjection to men, domestic violence, and the low level of women’s education (Kobrynska, 1887b, pp. 68–72). Writing about women’s education, she mentions the dominance of Polish language and literature in the educational process but also states that women play a key part in some reading rooms, and, in areas where there are no reading rooms, “young women read Ruthenian books that are published by our societies to peasants on Sundays and holidays” (Kobrynska, 1887b, pp. 74–100). This essay also demonstrates the interconnected nature of the woman and nation questions in the flow of Kobrynska’s thought, in which she transitions multiple times between the two spheres.
A Conceptualisation of Ukrainian Feminism by Olha Kobylianska
Although the work of Olha Kobylianska was not included in the almanack, her writing was also filled with interesting considerations that emphasised the significance of both the woman and the nation’s questions. A significant contribution to the conceptualisation of feminism in the Ukrainian women’s movement is the speech by Kobylianska, Something on the Idea of the Women’s Movement (1894). Her perspective looks very bold, stating that the idea of women needing nothing in life except marriage “belongs not in the 19th century but to a quiet corner in the abyss alongside sphinxes from bygone times”, because nature endowed women not only with motherhood but also the right “to be an end in themselves, precisely in the sense in which a man can be an end in himself – to study so that one can have one’s own piece of bread and be one’s own master – until he decides to take the responsibilities of becoming a husband and father”. This definition of feminism as being one’s own end is developed further (two years later) by Kobylianska in her novella Tsarivna (1896). At the end of this speech, she calls on women to unite and work in order “to be able to stand on our own feet in life, to become the pride of our fathers, brothers, husbands, and to be the bedrock of our people, the foundation of our nation, and so that it may be famous for its womanhood.” Therefore, even here, in a primarily feminist speech, there is room for the argument that this is how women become the bedrock of their nation. Her novel Tsarivna (Princess) is called “the first consistently feminist novel in Ukrainian literature” by Marta Bohachevsky-Chomiak (1988, p. 105). It is about a young Ukrainian woman, Natalka, who is deeply concerned with “the woman question” and strives for her own independence, engaging in regular arguments with various people about the place of women in the world. This is how Natalka thinks of her own ideal of
life, which echoes the above-mentioned speech of Kobylianska: “To have the freedom to be an end in oneself! First and foremost, to be an end in oneself, to work for one’s own spirit like a bee; to enrich it, increase it, bring it to the point where it becomes radiant, beautiful, thrilling… To be first and foremost an end to oneself, and then either become something grand for the sake of one forever or devote oneself to work for the sake of everyone” (Kobylianska, 1927, pp. 164–165).
For Natalka, the woman question is also connected to the nation question because when discussing the oppression of Ukrainians by Poles, she says: “As long as a fraction of my people shares my feelings, we will not perish! I am imbued with its being like a plant with sunlight, and those who feel this way cannot perish” (Kobylianska, 1927, p. 206). Then she is asked by another character what she can do as a woman for her people, and Natalka replies that if she loves it passionately and admits her belonging to it in everything and everywhere, then that will be enough (Kobylianska, 1927, p. 206). Significantly, she mentions her own Ukrainian identity. This echoes the earlier idea that national identity is a choice that can be expressed or hidden, unlike race.
An embodiment of Ukrainian feminism in the views of Milena Rudnytska
I chose Milena Rudnytska as the final figure for this text because she is a woman who embodied the earlier ideas of Ukrainian feminism, both in her written work and in public activities. Milena Rudnytska is primarily known as the head of the Union of Ukrainian Women. This powerful Ukrainian women’s organisation had (according to Rudnytska) “more than 100 thousand members”. It adhered to “the position of unity and independence, hostile to the Soviet Union and imperialist Poland” (Rudnytska, 1998, p. 37). She envisioned Kyiv as the capital of the Ukrainian state. She had a democratic political vision, as evident in her affiliation with the Ukrainian National–Democratic Alliance, the biggest Ukrainian political party in Poland at the time and opposition to the right-wing radical activities of the OUN (Bohachevsky-Chomiak, 1988, pp. 154–174). Unlike the OUN, the Ukrainian National–Democratic Alliance was willing to make some concessions with the Polish government. They agreed with the temporary goal of Ukrainian national autonomy, albeit with the intention of ultimately gaining independence. The party also condemned the terrorist activities of the OUN and generally opposed violent methods for advancing national interests (Kalyniak, 2013).
Writing about the “new woman” who emerged as a result of the women’s movement, Rudnytska says that this woman “consciously creates her own life” and “chooses her own field of activity, defines her own life goal” (Rudnytska, 1998, p. 108). I believe this is similar to Kobylianska’s idea that a woman must be an end in herself. But Rudnytska (1998, p. 76) goes further and says that for thousands of years, the cultural contribution was predominantly male rather than human because women were unable to participate in shaping it. But now, women can take a step forward, form values, and enrich human culture (1998, p. 108).
Milena Rudnytska believed the national idea deeply permeated the Ukrainian women’s movement. She emphasised the importance of the Women’s Congress of 1934, organised by the Union of Ukrainian Women, both for boosting women’s organisations’ work and strengthening connections between various Ukrainian territories (Rudnytska, 1998, p. 158). I find such argumentation quite similar to Kobrynska’s words regarding the significance of the women’s almanack. In her speech at the opening of the Women’s Congress, Rudnytska says that everyone present is “united by the national idea and the idea of women’s movement” and that their feminism is the belief that “in creating national culture and in the struggle of the Nation for its existence, will and power, Ukrainian women have a big part to play” (Rudnytska, 1998, p. 164).
Rudnytska also wrote a paper about nationalism and feminism. In the paper, she insists that mutual accusations of feminism and nationalism are unjustified. They must proceed coherently as allies, for via implementation of the creative capabilities of a woman, feminism will be able to “bond the liveliness and energy of the nation”. In contrast, the nation is the form of social life “to which the historical evolution led us.” Historian Olesya Khromeychuk wrote that “the fact that Rudnytska criticised only the methods used by the nationalists rather than the very idea of national emancipation as the ultimate goal, above individual liberation, meant that, toward the late 1930s, the feminist approach to state building was decidedly losing to the militarised nationalism propagated by the OUN” (Khromeychuk, 2018, p. 14). However, I believe Rudnytska’s position remained largely coherent throughout the 1920s and the 1930s. Her vision of feminism was inseparable from national liberation. For Milena Rudnytska, just as for her predecessors, it was important that she was not just a woman but a Ukrainian woman.
Conclusion
Ukrainian nationalism, as understood by historians, is in serious conflict with women’s interests in general and with feminist interests in particular. However, this does not mean that feminism and nationalism are fundamentally incompatible. On the contrary, in this paper, I demonstrated that for early Ukrainian feminists, the national and the women’s questions were interrelated. Ukrainian feminism initially developed not only as a defence of women’s interests but also as a defence of Ukrainian interests in the context of imperialist threats. In my opinion, the intersectional lens helps to understand its development through intertwining Ukrainian and woman identities. It does not mean that we should justify the practices and views of Ukrainian nationalists when they contradict feminist interests. For me, this means that for Ukrainian feminism, caring not only for women but also for Ukraine is not only possible but also quite characteristic.
In contemporary Ukraine, although some of the challenges of intersectional feminism have been overcome, many still remain. Ukraine is an independent state, the Ukrainian language is protected by law, and Ukrainian women have equal access to education. However, the Ukrainian state is under existential threat because of the war waged against it by Russia. Sexism is still prevalent in Ukrainian society, and women earn significantly less than men while also doing significantly more unpaid work and being less involved in political decision-making.
In my view, women who care about Ukrainian identity and the existential struggle of the Ukrainian nation and state will benefit from the experience of early Ukrainian feminists who actively combined the nation’s and the women’s questions. Their perspective shows that it is possible and natural to deal with both questions simultaneously, so there is no need to sacrifice one for the other. This still leaves open the question of how to deal with gender inequality in the context of war or, later, the postwar situation. However, an intersectional lens provides a framework for feminism and nationalism to find common ground. It reinforces that the importance of the nation question for women does not indicate a disregard for women’s interests but that they can be inseparable.
Acknowledgement: I would like to thank Stefaniia Sidorova for telling me about the Ukrainian Feminist Network, for our discussions, and for encouraging me to apply. I am also profoundly grateful to my academic advisor during a PhD exchange in 2022 at the University of Glasgow, Professor Rebecca Kay, who guided me throughout my research and without whom the arguments and ideas presented in this text would not have been possible. I also thank the team of the Ukrainian Feminist Network, particularly Hanna Manoilenko, for helping to improve the text and giving me an opportunity to publish it.
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