Contact: TesijaJ@ceu.edu; Tesija_Jelena@phd.ceu.edu
I am a PhD candidate in Comparative History and a doctoral researcher for the ZARAH project, which explores the history of women's labour activism in Eastern Europe and on a transnational scale, https://zarah-ceu.org/. My PhD dissertation focuses on the history of the International Co-operative Women's Guild (ICWG) and the contributions of Central and Eastern European members, with a focus on Yugoslavia in the post-World War Two period, to shaping its gendered labour activism. I hold two master's degrees, one in Journalism and one in Gender Studies. My master's thesis in Gender Studies (2014) focused on the history of Yugoslav women’s socialist organization from the 1950s. Before starting my PhD, I worked as a feminist journalist, an independent researcher, a lecturer, and an activist, covering topics related to labour and women's movements.
My areas of interest include the gender history of the (Yugoslav) cooperative movement; the history of feminisms and women's labour activism; historical perspectives on and theories of gender and social reproduction; and the historical relationships between socialism and feminism.
In 2024, I co-edited with Selin Çağatay, Alexandra Ghiț, Olga Gnydiuk, Veronika Helfert, Ivelina Masheva, Zhanna Popova, Eszter Varsa, and Susan Zimmermann an edited volume Through the Prism of Gender and Work. Women’s Labour Struggles in Central and Eastern Europe and Beyond, 19th and 20th Centuries (Leiden: Brill), https://brill.com/display/title/68995. In 2023, I co-edited with Alexandra Ghit, Veronika Helfert, Ivelina Masheva, Zhanna Popova, Eszter Varsa, and Susan Zimmermann, a special issue on Women’s Labour Activism in Central and Eastern Europe and Internationally in the Twentieth Century, Journal of Contemporary Central and Eastern Europe, 31 (2), https://www.tandfonline.com/toc/cdeb20/31/2?nav=tocList.
In 2023, I published my first article on the ICWG “‘Millions of Working Housewives:’ the International Co-operative Women’s Guild and Household Labour in the Interwar Period”, Journal of Contemporary Central and Eastern Europe 31 (2): 321-338, https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/25739638.2023.2227517.
From November 2021 to April 2023, I curated the ZARAH blog series III and IV, which are available here: https://zarah-ceu.org/blog/.
