GENDER.ED - EUSA Undergraduate Feminist Trailblazer Awards: 1st Prize Winners

2025 was the fourth year of the GENDER.ED-EUSA Undergraduate Feminist Trailblazer Awards. The awards celebrate outstanding contributions to feminist scholarship and activism within the University of Edinburgh community. The winners of the 2025 GENDER.ED-EUSA Undergraduate Feminist Trailblazer Award 1st Prize are Rutendo Hoto and Claudia Efemini, co-founders of Black Women* at Edinburgh! We asked them to reflect on their feminist work, and what motivates them.  

What does feminism mean to you?  

Rutendo: Feminism, to me, is a worldview and a daily practice rooted in radical empathy and the rejection of misogyny in all its forms. As a woman of African descent, my feminism is deeply grounded in the lived realities of Black women, shaped by our histories, cultures, and socio-political contexts. I draw on the work of bell hooks, who reminds us that feminism is not simply about equality between men and women, but about the ongoing work of dismantling all systems of domination, including sexism, racism, and classism.  

I am also moved by the work of Audre Lorde who teaches that there is no such thing as a single-issue struggle because we do not live single-issue lives. She challenges us to not only name difference but to use it as a source of strength, creativity, and transformation. This is the feminism that motivates me: one that disrupts gendered power dynamics, honours emotional truth, and insists that another way of being is not only possible, but necessary. 

Becoming more conscious of the deep-rooted gender-based violence in Zimbabwe - from rape and sexual assault to child marriages, period poverty, and female genital mutilation - led me to position myself in spaces of advocacy. I began educating my peers about gender inequality and gender-based violence, fundraising to support girls affected by period poverty, and collecting donations to help cover school fees and provide learning materials.  

My feminism was born out of a growing awareness that the world can, and must, be different for those affected. Feminism, for me, is not only a means to resist harmful systems. It is also a way to rest, reimagine, and rebuild the world for the girls and women who deserve futures free from violence, scarcity, and silence.  

Claudia: Feminism to me is a commitment to imagining and building a world that rejects misogyny in all its forms. It is about empowerment and awareness, not just as abstract concepts, but as lived practices that center the voices and experiences of women affected by systems of oppression. As a Black woman, I have come to understand feminism as deeply personal and profoundly political, rooted in the belief that liberation must be intersectional. 

My feminism is shaped by the understanding that activism is not one dimensional. It can be loud and militant, but it can also be quiet, grounded in care, creativity, and radical rest. Writing is one of the ways I channel this belief. My writing, including my dissertation ‘Our World: An Exploration of Print Culture as a Tool of Black Women’s Activism in Late Twentieth Century Britain’, reflects my passion for uncovering and amplifying the stories of Black women who resisted through art, intellect, and community building. 

Exploring the archives for this project was transformative. I was not just researching history, I was locating myself within a feminist lineage that made space for Black women to define themselves beyond the confines of white and patriarchal structures. Black women’s publications from magazines to newspapers to poetry books theorised survival, joy, resistance, and care. They allowed Black women to emerge as historical agents, a notion echoed in Black feminist thought which insists that the personal is always political, and that storytelling is itself a radical act. 

Feminism involves a continual challenge to oppressive systems, but it also requires carving out spaces for rest and renewal. It means acknowledging and addressing the full complexity of our experiences—our struggles, our joys, and all the nuances in between. For me, feminism is an intersectional practice of hope, resisting, and reclaiming narratives while engaging in the ongoing work of change whether through advocacy, community building, or acts of care for ourselves and others. 

What motivates your feminist work?  

Rutendo: What motivates my feminist work is the belief that a better world is possible — one where girls can simply exist, without fear, and where the fullness of Black womanhood is recognised, supported, and celebrated. As I have grown in my feminist thinking, especially during my time at the University of Edinburgh, I have become increasingly motivated by the need to decolonise feminism. Much of my work has centred on resisting the ways mainstream feminism can homogenise women’s experiences and erase the perspectives of women of the global majority. This is what inspired the founding of Black Women* at Edinburgh.  

What drives me now is the urgent need to create spaces that reflect and protect our humanity — where Black women can lead well, learn well, and be well. At a predominantly white institution like Edinburgh, where Black students make up just 2% of the student population (according to the University’s most recent Race Review), advocacy is not just meaningful, it is vital. We are underrepresented in numbers, and too often in narrative. That is why we advocate not only for ourselves but also for structural change.  

Through our community, we have challenged how intersectionality is understood on campus, opened conversations with other feminist societies, and partnered with institutional networks like GENDER.ED. What motivates me is the possibility of reshaping feminist discourse, ensuring that race and gender are studied not just as abstract concepts, but from the perspective of those who live these realities.  

Claudia: Being a history student, much of what inspires my feminist work comes from the women who came before us. I think about my mother, grandmothers, and great aunts, and their stories. I also draw inspiration from Black women in the archives at the University of Edinburgh, and writers such as Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie and bell hooks. This academic year, I have been especially moved by Black British women activists in print like Claudia Jones and Stella Dadzie. Encountering their feminist consciousness and activism propelled me to develop my own, grounded in my lived reality. My dissertation explored how print culture served as a tool for Black women’s activism in late twentieth century Britain. While researching at the Feminist Library in Peckham, I encountered publications like FOWAAD, Speak Out!, and We Are Here and realised we could create our own at Edinburgh. Launching Nurtured Magazine created an opportunity to reclaim our narratives and document our presence and creativity at the university. Taking a pen out of historical Black women in print made the experience ever more fulfilling.  

I share Rutendo’s urge to decolonise at Edinburgh, and I am deeply concerned by the recent race review that revealed the significant underrepresentation of Black students (2%, as Rutendo mentioned) and staff (less than 1%) at the University of Edinburgh. These disparities uphold a system that centers whiteness and often marginalises Black women’s experiences – something BWE actively seeks to change through mentorship, events, and community building. From our running club to our magazine to our mentorship programme, I credit the resilience and creativity of the women who came before me for my drive to continue this vital work. 

 Who else do you consider a ‘Feminist Trailblazer’?  

Rutendo and Claudia: We have reflected on this question a lot over the past year, and we continue to return to one truth: some of the most inspiring feminist trailblazers we know are people we know personally. For us, trailblazing is not necessarily about visibility or scale. It’s about the quiet work that shifts culture, even when no one is watching. 

We consider the members of Black Women* at Edinburgh to be feminist trailblazers in every sense of the word. In 2025, we published what we believe to be the first publication by and for Black women at the University of Edinburgh. It was a physical manifestation of our desire to reclaim our narratives and make space for our voices. Alongside this, we curated a series of programmes that addressed the everyday challenges Black women face in higher education; tackling imposter syndrome, self-esteem, and the weight of micro-aggressions. We also prioritised our physical and mental wellbeing through initiatives like our Running Club, carving out moments of rest and community in a system that rarely makes room for either. 

Another group we want to acknowledge as feminist trailblazers are the seven women co-founders of the BlackED movement. Formed in the wake of the murder of George Floyd, their work focused on improving institutional support for Black students at the University of Edinburgh. The space they created was our first encounter with a Black feminist community on campus. Their vision and advocacy influenced the creation of Black Women* at Edinburgh, and we see their legacy in many of the programmes we continue to build. 

These are the kinds of feminist trailblazers who motivate us most — the ones who dare to build something new, and who understand that liberation is not just about theory, but about practice. Their work reminds us that the most lasting change often begins in the community. 

In your opinion, what does a feminist utopia have that our current society is lacking?  

Rutendo: In a feminist utopia, the values of collective care, racial empathy, and Black sisterhood would no longer be radical, they would be foundational. It would be a world where feminist thought is not only intersectional in name, but in practice. Where those who benefit from structural privilege, including many of our white feminist peers, engage in deep, uncomfortable reflection and actively work to dismantle the systems that uphold their advantage. 

In this imagined world, there is no gap between theory and action. Feminism lives in the everyday, in the decision to create spaces that speak to our specific realities, as we did when we founded a society for Black women at Edinburgh. It is a space where advocacy is not performative, but transformative. Where representation is not symbolic, but meaningful. Too often, as Black heritage students, we’ve found ourselves invited in only to serve as tokens.  

A feminist utopia would reject that entirely. It would also be a world where we, as the owners of our stories, reclaim them fully, where platforms like our magazine Nurtured become the norm rather than the exception. And crucially, it would be a place where gender-based violence is met not with institutional apathy, but with responses that are empathetic and restorative. One that recognises that justice must be healing, not just procedural. That, to me, is what’s missing, and what we are working to build, even now. 

Claudia: ​I believe our society currently lacks a genuine commitment to intersectionality. During my exchange year at McGill University in Montreal, I attended a magazine launch with a friend by the McGill Women in Leadership society. As I read the introductory piece, I was struck by its discussion of women’s liberation that cited the 1920 women’s suffrage victory in the United States as a universal milestone for women. Yet, there was no acknowledgment of the racist laws that continued to prevent Black, Indigenous, and Asian women from voting after the passing of the 19th amendment. I remember feeling immediately excluded and disappointed by this glaring absence of intersectional awareness. I thought about the omission of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 when Black women like myself in America secured the right to vote. This experience taught me the vital importance of feminist spaces being critically self-reflective, questioning whether they truly embrace intersectionality rather than assuming they do. 

Our differences across race, class, ability, sexuality, and more, are fundamental to who we are. A feminist utopia, to me, would be a world where these differences are not only acknowledged but genuinely considered and celebrated in our pursuit of liberation. It would be a world where moments like that exclusion at the magazine launch I attended last year would no longer occur because feminism actively centers all women. A world without a ‘mainstream’ or ‘alternative’ feminism, but rather a unified space where all women can collectively feel safe, valued, and empowered to thrive. 

Author Bios:  

Rutendo Amanda Hoto is a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, holding an MA (Hons) in International Relations and International Law. She was the founder of Black Women* at Edinburgh (BWE) and the former President of the African and Caribbean Society. As a passionate feminist advocate and educator, Rutendo is committed to creating safe, equitable, and sustainable spaces for marginalised communities. She was also the first Board Pioneer of Engender, Scotland’s feminist policy organisation, and previously co-founded @wearenotbroads, an online platform addressing rape culture among young Zimbabweans. Rutendo writes on her personal blog, The Practice Notebook, and is currently pursuing legal studies in England. 

 Instagram: @ama.nda_h | @blackwomenatedinburgh | @nurtured.mag 

Claudia Efemini is a graduate of the University of Edinburgh, holding an MA (Hons) in History and Politics. She was a co-founder of Black Women* at Edinburgh (BWE) and served as Vice President of BWE in 2024/25. She is a recipient of The Guardian's Scott Trust Bursary. As part of this traineeship, she is currently studying an MA in Newspaper Journalism at City St George's, University of London, and undertaking work placements at The Guardian. She also does freelance journalism, writing pieces across culture, business, and technology for publications like The Guardian, Black Ballad, and BLK Brit. Her time spent building BW*E together with Rutendo and the BWE committee was incredibly powerful and it is an immense joy to see projects like our running club and magazine, Nurtured, still going strong as well as new projects blossoming. 

Instagram: @claudiaefemini | @blackwomenatedinburgh | @nurtured.mag