Suzanne Lacy's Three Weeks in May: Feminist Activist Performance Art as "Expanded Public Pedagogy"

Abstract

This article examines Suzanne Lacy's performance, Three Weeks in May (1977), which established her New Genre Public Art, also referred to as the practice of "expanded public pedagogy," in which activism, education, and theory intersect. As a political activist committed to fighting oppression, Lacy learned ways to affect cultural attitudes, the criminal justice system, and the media through her visceral performance that forced discussion about the formerly silent subject of rape. She wielded her strategic agency through this performance to challenge gender norms, end the silence about the subject of rape in American culture, and contribute to the anti-rape movement in the United States.