What is a Manifesto? a public declaration of policy and aims, especially one issued before an election by a political party or candidate.
A manifesto is a published verbal declaration of the intentions, motives, or views of the issuer, be it an individual, group, political party, government or an artistic movement. In etymology (the study of the origin of words and the way in which their meanings have changed throughout history), the word manifesto is derived from the Italian word manifesto, itself derived from the Latin manifestum, meaning clear or conspicuous.
Some of the most well known manifestos to people in the United Kingdom are political manifestos, the three main parties; Labour, the Conservatives and Liberal Democrats were the parties in the last election in 2017.
Jersey also has a Manifesto, which is called ‘Reform Jersey Manifesto’. Below is a link to the Manifesto that the Deputy in the states assembly presented in 2016 as the ‘MANIFESTO – 2016’ Senatorial By-election
Examples of other manifesto’s:
- 1 The Bible and the Ten Commandments.
- 2 The US Declaration of Independence.
- 3 Martin Luther King’s I Have a Dream speech.
- 4 The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.
- 5 Apple Ad: Here’s to the Crazy Ones.
- 6 Andre Breton’s Surrealist Manifesto.
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- FEMINISM MANIFESTO’S:
The manifesto has been an important genre for feminist writers because the form enables women’s voices to be heard at their most provocative, independent, irreverent, and demanding. Feminist manifestos are often short and pointed declarations of identity and politics that use radical rhetoric to upend the status quo of gender and sex. Whether they take the form of letters, brochures, pamphlets, or even full-length books, feminist manifestos try to change reality by using the power of words to resist male domination and to envision women’s liberation. There were many feminist manifesto’s that occurred during my focused time period of second wave feminism, such as: ‘The Women identified Women’ written by a radical lesbian formation as well as Valerie Solanas’s 1967 SCUM Manifesto. The 1960s and ‘70s witnessed the creation of some the most iconic feminist manifestos, thanks to renewed global and local women’s liberation movements.
However, during research i came across a feminist manifest from 1991 which caught my eye and highlighted how radical manifestos can be. I watched the short clip which was created around the riot grrrl manifesto and thought this would be an interested example of how radical feminist were and the protests that they were making to continue their fight for rights throughout the waves of feminism.
“Grrrl Love and Revolution: Riot Grrrl NYC” (Women Make Movies, 2012)
The Riot Grrrl Manifesto:
BECAUSE us girls crave records and books and fanzines that speak to US that WE feel included in and can understand in our own ways.
BECAUSE we wanna make it easier for girls to see/hear each other’s work so that we can share strategies and criticize-applaud each other.
BECAUSE we must take over the means of production in order to create our own moanings.
BECAUSE viewing our work as being connected to our girlfriends-politics-real lives is essential if we are gonna figure out how we are doing impacts, reflects, perpetuates, or DISRUPTS the status quo.
BECAUSE we recognize fantasies of Instant Macho Gun Revolution as impractical lies meant to keep us simply dreaming instead of becoming our dreams AND THUS seek to create revolution in our own lives every single day by envisioning and creating alternatives to the bullshit christian capitalist way of doing things.
BECAUSE we want and need to encourage and be encouraged in the face of all our own insecurities, in the face of beergutboyrock that tells us we can’t play our instruments, in the face of “authorities” who say our bands/zines/etc are the worst in the US and
BECAUSE we don’t wanna assimilate to someone else’s (boy) standards of what is or isn’t.
BECAUSE we are unwilling to falter under claims that we are reactionary “reverse sexists” AND NOT THE TRUEPUNKROCKSOULCRUSADERS THAT WE KNOW we really are.
BECAUSE we know that life is much more than physical survival and are patently aware that the punk rock “you can do anything” idea is crucial to the coming angry grrrl rock revolution which seeks to save the psychic and cultural lives of girls and women everywhere, according to their own terms, not ours.
BECAUSE we are interested in creating non-heirarchical ways of being AND making music, friends, and scenes based on communication + understanding, instead of competition + good/bad categorizations.
BECAUSE doing/reading/seeing/hearing cool things that validate and challenge us can help us gain the strength and sense of community that we need in order to figure out how bullshit like racism, able-bodieism, ageism, speciesism, classism, thinism, sexism, anti-semitism and heterosexism figures in our own lives.
BECAUSE we see fostering and supporting girl scenes and girl artists of all kinds as integral to this process.
BECAUSE we hate capitalism in all its forms and see our main goal as sharing information and staying alive, instead of making profits of being cool according to traditional standards.
BECAUSE we are angry at a society that tells us Girl = Dumb, Girl = Bad, Girl = Weak.
BECAUSE we are unwilling to let our real and valid anger be diffused and/or turned against us via the internalization of sexism as witnessed in girl/girl jealousism and self defeating girltype behaviors.
BECAUSE I believe with my wholeheartmindbody that girls constitute a revolutionary soul force that can, and will change the world for real.
MY MANIFESTO:
Make photo’s of:
- A Feminist
- Adolescents exploring their sexuality
- Women expressing their Femininity
- Women being exploited – similar to actresses in the 1970’s
- Women where the rule of technicality is broken (grainy/blurred)
- Portraits with strong facial expression and stance