Equality matters from diverse angles at the annual Equality Days

Cancel culture, digital violence, class division in Iceland, attitude changes attributed to #metoo, fertility rights among disabled women, imbalance of power in sports, mental health stories, versatile experience of international students in Icelandic Universities, relationships between queerness and feminism, student neurodiversity, and designing Inclusive Internationalisation in Higher Education are among diverse topics offered at this year's Equality Days. Equality days will take place 14-18 February; mostly online.

The Equality Days take place for the 14th time with a programme that tackles equality matters from diverse angles. The programme reflects the energy currently in public and social media on equality, diversity, and activism for equality in Iceland. The aim of Equality Days is to promote discussions and understanding of issues of equality; as well as to celebrate what has been achieved in the battle for a better and more just society. 

To ensure accessibility and at the same time be in line with current infection control measures; most of the events will be online.

The programme will be launched at noon on Monday 14 February when rectors of all universities in Iceland come together to discuss the universities' policies on equality issues, and what needs to be done going forward. Equality Days is a collaborative project at all the Icelandic universities and the events take place in either Icelandic or English, and the programme can be found on the Equality and Diversity website at the University of Iceland. Participants and lecturers are from the university community and various institutes, companies, organisations, and trade unions. 

International students are becoming a more prominent group in Icelandic universities and their versatile experience in Icelandic universities will be addressed as well as more equal opportunities for university students for exchange studies.  Equality days combine various aspects of equality and feminism and focus on diversity, privilege, silencing, the struggle for equality, power, and discrimination, and student representatives from all of the seven Icelandic universities will come together and discuss the most urgent equality issues. 

Two exhibitions will be put up during Equality Days. One is a photographic exhibition entitled "Where are you from?" where a map of the world and of Iceland will be set up in Reykjavík University along with pins. Anyone can put a pin in the map at the location that they call their origin, or more than one if applicable. The other one is a collection of posters "I want to work", an exhibition organized by students in the vocational study programme for disabled people at the University of Iceland. The exhibition is a call for more equal job opportunities for disabled people. There will be a podcast in English on diversity and equality with three doctoral students at Reykjavík University diving into equality matters from diverse points-of-view. 

The programme for all the universities can be found on the Equality Days Facebook page.