Luciana Percovich
Biography
Luciana Percovich, Ph.d in Modern Literatures and Languages at Università degli Studi di Milano. A member of the Italian Women’s Movement since the Seventies, she lived and worked in Milano as a teacher, an editor, a translator and an author. She is a member of the Libera Università delle Donne di Milano (link 1 below). As director of a series of books on women’s history and spirituality (link 2 below) she has introduced, and made their books available to Italian readers, the works of many women authors and activists. An essayist on women’s health, science, anthropology and mythology, with Laima Association, the International Indigenous Cultures of Peace conferences were organized in Torino (2012, 2013, 2015) and in Rome (in honor of Marija Gimbutas, 20 years after her death, 2014). With a team of women, they have created the websites that are linked 3/4 below.
Main books:
- La coscienza nel corpo. Donne, salute e medicina negli anni Settanta, Franco Angeli, Milano, 2005;
- Oscure Madri Splendenti. Le origini dl sacro e delle religioni, Venexia, Roma, 2007;
- Colei che dà la vita, Colei che dà la forma. Miti di creazione femminili, Venexia, Roma, 2009;
- She who gives Life, She who gives Form, E-Book, link 5 below
- Verso il Luogo delle Origini. Un percorso di ricerca del sé femminile. Castelvecchi, 2016.
Website 1: http://www.universitadelledonne.it
Website 2: http://www.venexia.it/civette saggi
Website 3/4: http://www.autricidicivilta.it
Website 3/4: http://www.presitoriainitalia.it
Website 5: https://www.venexia.it/libri/collane/i-galeoni/she-who-gives-life-she-who-gives-form/
NOTE: Luciana Percovich’s in-person Goddess Conference contribution is pre-recorded.
Programme
Women on the Edge of Time. The Italian Cauldron of Crones
One of the most dramatic aspects of being a Crone is the awareness of the importance and of the difficulties of passing one’s own or common inheritance to younger sisters.
Whether they are blood or symbolic daughters or younger women: how do we pass on our legacy of more than fifty years of research, gains and failures, knowledge and inventions, wisdom and treasures?
How do we get them to fully recognize the gift they are receiving from our bridge generation and how do we set ourselves free of a burden we have to let go of?
How do we ensure that this passage is not an ego-matter, but a crucial political act of honouring the Symbolic Mother within us, who has no place nor recognition in the patriarchal world?
In analyzing how crucial it has been, and continues to be for the rise and preservation of patriarchy, we have learnt that the never ending attention and the meticulous perseverance of males rests in concealing, erasing and mystifying women’s world-view and achievements. Since the beginning, male strategy operates through preventing the transmission of women’s legacy to the next generations. Forcing every generation to begin from zero. And more, forcing daughters and sons to think that this is the right way to make room for themself, killing their mothers again and again.
Today Crones are the vessels of a pioneering generation which has made great advancements in the struggle of women and are motivated by the strong desire not to disperse their achievements.
But mother/daughter relations in patriarchy are a very complicated, encrusted dynamic, whose most common manifestation is rebellion and conflict. Mothers and daughters still automatically repeat this tragic deceit. We know that women who are not free cannot birth free women nor men, and we are all not yet free from wounds of millenial efforts to make us mute and inoffensive for the in-human order of patriarchs.
What do Mothers still need to understand in order to pass their legacy freely and generously?
On this and on other similar issues the Cauldron of Crones is working in Italy, trying to invent their own practices and forms. A work in progress of which I’m giving you some hints.