Elevate Difference

Hey, Shorty!: A Guide to Combating Sexual Harassment and Violence in Schools and on the Streets

mandy — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 09:00:00 +0000

By Meghan Huppuch, Mandy Van Deven, Joanne N. Smith

Difficulties concentrating in school, shame, depression, guilt, fear, low self-esteem, poor body image, and powerlessness are just some of the repercussions that victims of sexual harassment at school experience, according to research conducted by Girls for Gender Equity (GGE). This Brooklyn-based nonprofit organization works to “improve gender and race relations and socioeconomic conditions for [the] most vulnerable youth and communities of color.” Joanne N. Smith, Mandy Van Deven, and Megan Huppuch of GGE have collaboratively written Hey, Shorty!, which tells GGE’s story, while providing a model for teens to teach their peers what constitutes sexual harassment and how to prevent it. The book also gives activists, educators, parents and students a hands-on guide to combat sexual harassment and violence in their schools and neighborhoods.

In September 2001, just a few months after GGE had started meeting to play basketball, an 8-year-old girl was raped on her way to school in the area. In response to the victim blaming that GGE founder Joanne Smith heard, she decided to discuss gender stereotypes and discrimination with the girls in the league. This evolved into Gender Respect Workshops, developed and facilitated by Mandy Van Deven with male and female students in the classroom. She discovered that sexual harassment was a major issue in the lives of the students, particularly girls and LGBTQ youth. Soon after, the Sisters in Strength program was born, and today it has become a paid year-long internship for teen girls of color to advocate for the enforcement of sexual harassment policies in New York City public schools through workshops and direct action.

Sisters in Strength’s first task was to raise awareness about the problem in the community, which led to their making Hey... Shorty!, a short film that later won Best Youth Documentary at the Roxbury Film Festival. They screened their film at the Street Harassment Summit, where they shared what they had learned with other members of the community.

A second Sisters in Strength project involved hands-on participatory action research. The teen interns collected information through surveys, focus groups, and slam books, or notebooks with written prompts that students can respond to anonymously. After compiling their data, they concluded that sexual harassment was rampant and normalized. Their research results were presented at GGE's Gender Equality Festival to other community organizations. Under Meghan Huppuch’s leadership, GGE went on to form the Coalition for Gender Equity in Schools with more than twenty other area organizations.

The work of GGE may well have given us the solution to bullying that we have so desperately sought. When we are sexually harassed, we believe we are alone and somehow deserve this treatment. In other words, we internalize our pain and suffer in silence. But from GGE’s research and community action, we see that this pervasive problem lies not within the person being harassed, but with the external forces that perpetuate and enable sexual harassment to exist in our schools and on our streets.

GGE is an empowering initiative for teens, our future leaders, and Hey, Shorty! is an essential resource for parents, teachers and community leaders who want to take action against bullying and sexual harassment in their communities. Chock full of capacity-building activities and ideas, Hey, Shorty! is indispensable for anyone who wants to create an environment where everyone thrives.

Written by: Heather Leighton, April 30th 2011

Gender, Sexuality, and Meaning: Linguistic Practice and Politics

andrea — Sat, 30 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Sally McConnell-Ginet

Oxford University Press

Showcasing twelve articles by noted linguist Sally McConnell-Ginet, Gender, Sexuality, and Meaning weaves together some of her most provocative and influential work on language, gender, and sexual meaning-making from the last three decades. In her many fruitful collaborations with colleagues, students, and friends, McConnell-Ginet argues that language is not a passive craft, but rather, an active process of meaning-making that has its roots in the social identities, contexts, and statuses of the speakers and listeners.

Insisting upon a gendered reading of a host of subjects—among them high school cliques, name changes following marriage, assumptions in the phrase cleaning lady, presumptions of heterosexuality, and speech in cross-sex friendships—McConnell-Ginet’s writings have laid the groundwork for seeing gender in seemingly benign moments of communication, and in extending such gendered readings into the realm of other often-unnoticed power dynamics present within language. Language is never politically neutral or merely a string of words, but rather, deeply rooted in systems of inequality.

As a wonderful addition to the Oxford University Press series on language and gender, Gender, Sexuality, and Meaning serves both as a historical consideration of McConnell-Ginet’s impact on the field of linguistics, and as a collection of ideas that remain highly relevant. Beginning with a review essay that tackles the difference between intended and received meanings, the impossibility of “authentic selves,” and the role of gender in shaping content and social meaning, McConnell-Ginet establishes herself as accessible, clear, grounded in research, and persistently feminist.

From the seemingly mundane act of reading the Harry Potter series to the politicized language of phone sex workers, she traces the social and stylistic meanings of language across a broad range of modern scenarios. She then establishes the basis for a feminist linguistics by erasing the possibility of “mere linguistics” (Chapters 1 and 2) followed by clear arguments for gender within linguistics (Chapter 3) and linguistics within feminism (Chapter 4). The book delves into “communities of practice” like high schools and political organizations (Chapter 5) and returns to her groundbreaking Signs piece on gendered intonation (Chapter 6), along with her early work on gendered pronouns and assumptions of default masculinity (Chapter 9). The collection concludes with chapters on motives and actions in speaking (Chapter 8), naming and labeling as gendered (Chapter 10), and queer semantics (including a particularly astute critical analysis of the word lesbian) (Chapter 11).

While the book occasionally veers towards the more dry and technical aspects of sociolinguistics (for example, it helps to have a working knowledge of illocutionary and perlocutionary speech, lexical semantics, prosody, rules of phonology, and variationist sociolinguistics), she nevertheless offers access points both to those solidly within the field of linguistics and to those approaching it from the outside.

Reading Gender, Sexuality, and Meaning provokes questions about the basic assumptions present in everyday occurrences and commonplace linguistic practices. Readers will undoubtedly have many “aha!” moments when excavating their own communication habits, phrases, and ways of making meaning through words. The volume happily skips from subject to subject in order to expertly reinforce her conclusions: all language is tainted with assumptions about gender, and all forms of communication are inseparable from power. Collectively, McConnell-Ginet’s work provides a timely, convincing, insightful, and engaging basis for linking together the limitations, surprises, and possibilities of language.

Written by: Breanne Fahs, April 30th 2011

Reading Lips: A Memoir of Kisses

payal — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Claudia Sternbach

Unbridled Books

Let the whole world put on a pair of rubber gloves and plunder and pillage. We have no secrets any longer. We have become public property.

Women who write about their lives face challenges that male writers do not. Not only are women charged with writing about their own lives, with creating selfhood on paper, they are somehow additionally responsible for upholding the idea of womanhood. In this way, they bear the responsibility for representing, and in a sense, for creating the lives of all women. (Considering the diversity of possible identities which women take on for themselves, this is at the very least, a difficult task.)

While we might ask whether a woman writer should even be obligated to tell a story other than her own, for women who read life writing, the question might as easily become: which parts of a woman’s life are hers and which belong, through the construction of womanhood, to all women? Which part of this woman’s life is mine?

In Reading Lips: A Memoir of Kisses, Claudia Sternbach navigates the terrain of personal memories and public ones. Through her nimble use of language, which is delightfully suffused with sarcasm, she connects with women of various ages and experiences. The emotions of the moments, if not the moments themselves, ring true to experience.

“But please,” she writes to her future husband, “You and your soon-to-be platonic friend, enjoy the pool. Enjoy the tennis courts. Bring her up here to the rose garden for a picnic.”

Sternbach also connects with women by wittily drawing on cultural references or events that are familiar to every reader: “…Ma won’t let me leave until my plate is cleaned. Because you know about those starving babies in China.”

While Sternbach never states that she is speaking to a specific idea of womanhood and, in fact, directly backs away from the idea that she speaks for anyone, the effect of this effort to form a connection with other women and their lives is that Reading Lips is less a story of one woman’s life, and much more a celebration of the experience of living a woman’s life. It is a celebration of an idea of womanhood in which “Teddy put his lips right up to mine and they stayed there … and right then I could see our whole long lives.”

Written by: Elizabeth Brasher, April 29th 2011

A Journey with Two Maps: Becoming a Woman Poet

gwen — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Eavan Boland

W.W. Norton

“But if the tradition would not admit me, could I change its rules of admission?” Eavan Boland asks in her new book, A Journey with Two Maps. This volume honors the accumulated change wrought by earlier woman poets, the self-claimed permission for women to write identities outside of the feminine, and the female victory of bringing the ordinary into the canon. She also proselytizes for a transcendence of the binary: that the writer can perceive the contradictory aspects of poetry’s history and practice and reconcile them through her work, and then use these two maps to reach a poetic destination.

Boland frames critical reviews of women poets - including Sylvia Plath, Adrienne Rich, Elizabeth Bishop, and Gwendolyn Brooks – with an opening autobiographical essay on her perception of the creative process as influenced by her painter mother, and closes with a “Letter to a Young Woman Poet.” She presents insights of her youth, such as the realization that the sublime is not some entity storming through the heavens in order to overwhelm those who make art, but rather, their creation. Boland also describes her appreciation of Plath, not as the scribe of self-inflicted internal terrors, but as a champion of the domestic, wisely selecting Plath’s explication of “Nick and the Candlestick”: “A mother nurses her baby son by candlelight, and finds in him a beauty which, while it may not ward off the world’s ill, does redeem her share of it.”

She acknowledges that her appreciation of Brooks grew from perceiving her as an author in the tradition of urban documentarians – like Hughes, Eliot, Sandburg, and Crane – to a “critique of race and nation,” and acknowledges that this understanding was cautiously negotiated through qualified comparison with her experience of Irish colonialism, not through some claim of instant affinity. I was also introduced to Charlotte Mew, a writer who I spontaneously liked due to her wry to response to the mundane social inquiry, “Are you Charlotte Mew?”: “Unfortunately, yes.” She also wrote the lines, “It may be that what Father said is true, If things are so it does not matter why.”

A Journey with Two Maps, Boland illuminates, in prose both fluid and lucid, the reasons why, pertinent to the efforts of woman writers, and the significance of the matter.

Written by: Erika Mikkalo, April 28th 2011

Challenging the Prison-Industrial Complex: Activism, Arts, and Educational Alternatives

gwen — Wed, 27 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Edited by Stephen John Hartnett

University of Illinois Press

As a feminist concerned with social justice, in the past year or so I’ve become convinced that dismantling the prison-industrial complex should be a top priority amongst feminists.

This anthology, Challenging the Prison-Industrial Complex, edited by Stephen John Hartnett, argues as much, stressing that this very goal “should be at the head of a new human rights agenda for the twenty-first century.” In making this argument, the anthology is comprised of two sections of essays: “Diagnosing the Crisis” and “Practical Solutions, Visionary Alternatives.” The anthology further incorporates artwork and poetry by those who know the dehumanization and injustice of the system firsthand – those incarcerated – in an attempt to “remind readers that the prison-industrial complex does not house monsters but humans.”

The first section addresses how the United States of America has become a “punishing democracy.” That is, a democracy that spends more on prisons than on public education and spends more on punishment than on rehabilitation. In “Diagnosing the Crisis,” the authors note how we became a country with countless prisons and a swelling prison population. Several authors cite the “war on drugs” as a historical policy shift, one which paved the way for zero-tolerance policies which heavily affect – and actually target – communities comprised of poor and working class people of color.

Other essays in this section address how the defunding of public education and social programs works to benefit the prison-industrial complex. I especially appreciated Rose Braz’s and Myesha Williams’ essay “Diagnosing the Schools-to-Prisons Pipeline: Maximum Security, Minimum Learning,” which clarifies how the term high school “dropout” is misleading. They suggest replacing it with “pushout” – a term that more accurately conveys how the current public education system (due to issues of defunding and racism) betrays students of color from at-risk communities and practically ensures their entry into the criminal justice system.

The second half of Challenging the Prison-Industrial Complex offers hope and ideas for change through activism and the arts. Essays underscore the need for educational opportunities in prisons, as university professors take it upon themselves to offer college-level courses, GED preparation courses, and college entry exam courses to inmates. Several essays also demonstrate the empowering effects of offering creative workshops and classes to inmates.

These essays detail the hard work, tribulations, and results of providing playwriting workshops in prisons as well as enlisting inmates to stage Shakespearean plays. Such activism provides opportunities for inmates to reclaim their humanity and their voices, as well as provides communities a glimpse into the prison-industrial complex and the people caught up in the system.

The inmates’ artwork and poetry are powerful additions to this anthology. As with any academic text related to social justice, there is the possibility of elevating so-called experts’ thoughts and voices on an issue while simultaneously silencing or absenting the voices of the very people affected the most. Challenging the Prison-Industrial Complex seeks to create a balance between the two, in which voices of those both inside and outside the system work in tandem to convey a greater realization of what is happening in our schools, in our communities, and in our prisons.

Ultimately, the conversation surrounding dismantling the prison-industrial complex needs to be happening outside the walls of academia. This is an issue that relates to racism, classism, immigration reform, youth, budget spending, the militarization of our police forces, racist and inaccurate media coverage, the privatization of prisons, physical as well as sexual violence within our prisons, and the disenfranchisement of entire communities across the country – just to name a few. Feminists should be taking an active role in this fight. Abolishing the prison-industrial complex should be routinely discussed and debated on feminist blogs and in feminist publications alongside our efforts to end sexual violence and our fight for reproductive rights.

Challenging the Prison-Industrial Complex provides a framework for this discussion as well as steps to dismantle the system. We should all heed the authors’ warnings and advice and work together to reimagine a new democracy.

Written by: Kristen Lambert, April 27th 2011

Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away with Another Spoon

mandy — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 18:00:00 +0000

By Nathaniel Kusinitz, Jacinta Bunnell

PM Press

Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away With the Spoon review, short version: If you have children, know children, or were ever a child yourself, you need this new coloring book by Jacinta Bunnell and Nathaniel Kusinitz.

Long version: As a child of the Free to Be...You and Me seventies, dressed androgynously by a pair of liberal-minded parents, I never dreamed that I would have difficulty recreating a gender-neutral environment for my first child, born at the turn of the new millennium. What I didn't know was that there was a counter-revolution afoot, and it believed that infants should only wear onesies of blue or pink. Despite great social and legal victories made for GLBTQ civil rights since I was a kid, gender nonconformity remains a huge threat to the status quo—and while grown-ups can get away with picking and choosing their participation in the Gender Games (I have not worn makeup in almost twenty years), the battle lines for children remain fixed. I daresay they've hardened, no thanks to the complete Disney Princessification of childhood culture, as any walk through the kids' aisles at Target will tell you.

What's a parent to do? Why, pick up a copy of Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away With the Spoon, of course! While the title might lead a parent to believe that this is merely a gay re-imagining of old Mother Goose rhymes, the real theme of the book is freedom. A furry, sharp-toothed beast with accessorizes with sparkly gems that Paris Hilton might envy. A “breadwinner in the family” is a man who's the proud winner of a baking contest. A mermaid decides “I am making my way out of this fairy tale and starting a new life with two strong legs and a voice.”

In my favorite picture, an adorable kid in a dinosaur t-shirt holds a to-do list that reads: “1. plant garden 2. fix carburetor in truck 3. start presidential campaign 4. end war.” If either of my children presented such a list to me, I could quite happily drop dead on the spot, knowing that my life's purpose was fulfilled! Really.

My only complaint with the book is its price. I realize that this is an important, educational project from a morally noble, independent publisher, but come on—there is no parent in earth, radical or otherwise, who is going to lay down ten bucks for a coloring book. Coloring books get scribbled on, ripped up, scrunched into backpacks and quickly destroyed. I want to pay three bucks for it, tops. I may be a sellout for suggesting this, but I wouldn't mind if the Human Rights Campaign got behind Sometimes the Spoon Runs Away With the Spoon and lent its considerable financial and political power to making copies available in libraries and classrooms. Every kid deserves to meet this great group of gender-fluid friends and to color outside of these pages' lines.

Written by: Shannon Drury, April 26th 2011

Elizabeth Packard: A Noble Fight

andrea — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Linda V. Carlisle

University of Illinois Press

In 1860, it was legal for a man to send his wife to an insane asylum against her will, based on his word and that of one or two witnesses. The asylum could deny patients the right to legal representation as well as visits and uncensored correspondence with friends. And a man could sell his property and take his children across the country without consulting his wife, because the property and children were considered his, even if her inheritance and income had contributed to that property. This was the world in which Elizabeth Parsons Packard lived.

Born in 1816 in Dare, Massachusetts, she lived a fairly conventional life her first forty-four years, marrying Calvinist minister Theophilus Packard, bearing him six children, and moving from town to town and state to state as he sought ministry opportunities. But during the family's residence in Manteno, Illinois in the 1850s she began to exhibit greater independence from her husband, dabbling in Spiritualism, espousing unorthodox (some would say heretical) religious opinions and confessing to romantic (although unconsummated) feelings for another man. Prompted by this “abnormal behavior,” in 1860 Theophilus had his wife committed to the insane asylum in Jacksonville, Illinois.

Packard was released after three years and declared sane in the jury trial she was denied when forced into the asylum. While her release may have been partially due to efforts of friends on her behalf, it was also because Andrew McFarland, the superintendent of the Jacksonville asylum and a leading figure in the psychiatric community, had become exasperated with her demands and complaints, terming her “an unendurable annoyance.” The antagonism between Packard and McFarland, which continued after her release through both of their writings, is painted in detail in this book, as are the evolving psychiatric standards and practices of the time.

Packard was not reunited with her children upon her release, as her husband had taken her younger children back to Massachusetts with him. (Her oldest sons were living on their own by that point.) A woman of tremendous resources, she began writing pamphlets and lobbying state legislatures for changes that would give both the mentally ill and married women greater rights.

Elizabeth Packard: A Noble Fight is an engaging portrait of Packard's life and crusade. She emerges as a shrewd campaigner who took advantage of stereotypes of weak females who needed the protection of strong men (legislators) because of their powerlessness; her personal charisma went a long way in lobbying efforts. Modern readers may be disappointed that she did not broaden her efforts to include greater rights for all women or claim full equality with men. Nor did she divorce her husband (although they never lived together after her time at the asylum) since she viewed divorce as scandalous. However, such statements and actions might have turned society against her and hurt her cause.

Kudos to Linda Carlisle for bringing to light the forgotten story of a woman who challenged prevailing ideas about the treatment of the mentally ill and the rights of women. Academic biographies of this sort are often quite dry, but Packard crafts an engaging narrative. Her passion for this cause shines through and creates a compelling read.

Written by: Karen Duda, April 26th 2011

Georgic Stories

gwen — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Mariko Nagai

University of Missouri, Kansas City, BkMk Press

Mariko Nagai’s Georgic Stories is a book worthy of its acclaim, but that does not necessarily imply that I want to read it again. When I recounted it to a friend once I finished reading it, I did not feel as if I was describing the stories or engaging in critique as much as I was repeating a terrible testimony. The stories demand retelling: they are compelling views of a world where the pinnacle of joy is a child’s possible, but not guaranteed, escape from starvation.

With its title inspired by Virgil’s work on rural life, the tales contained in the pages manifest his observation, “Shameful work conquers all.” The characters and their predicaments are so fundamental that they aren’t even given names. Well, one protagonist is; the prostitute, Monkey, is referred to by the insult given to her by customers when she started her profession.

Nagai’s ten stories unfold in a torn and barren landscape devoid of any poetry other than that of pain and desperation. Virgil’s didactic hexameters provided detailed descriptions of the plow, the merits of the olive tree over the vine, and the virtues of a simple bucolic life over the corrupt bustle of the city. The tales in this Georgic offer a manual on how to survive the unsurvivable in a world where all are corrupted by need.

The narratives brutally manifest Brecht’s “Food before ethics.” “Grafting” starts with words as meager as the village stores: “Harvest. Another failure. Third year in a row.” After the second failure the villagers sold their daughters, now they attempt to reduce want by carrying their elderly off to a mountain to abandon them.

In “Bitter Fruit,” rare kindness is displayed when a bathhouse proprietor advises a prostitute on how she might induce a miscarriage by standing in a freezing river. The attempt fails, and her child is born into prostitution. A woman in a different story adopts the vocation when a plague-stripped land and town desolated by war leave her with no other means of procuring food for her children, and the sole male in the community to serve as client is the village idiot. Some stories come directly from the trials of history; women in Manchuria at the end of WWII, a woman imprisoned for her role in a town’s execution of a downed American pilot. One is inspired by a folktale and contains vicious whimsy.

I can wholly recommend Georgic Stories. Instead of keeping it to reread, perhaps you can give to a friend. Perhaps she will be inspired to write the georgics of China, Darfur, the Ukraine, Argentina, Chile, and all other lands ravaged by flood, drought, and war, lands too many too name.

Written by: Erika Mikkalo, April 25th 2011

These Open Roads

beth — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 03:49:38 +0000

By Haroula Rose

When I received Haroula Rose’s album These Open Roads in the mail, I couldn’t help but judge it immediately based on the cover. It’s yellow with 70s fonts and on the back, you’ll see Rose dressed in a hippie-styled shirt, standing amongst a field of tall grass. My immediate assumption was a pretty girl who probably has a pretty voice and nothing beyond that. I had hoped to be wrong after listening to the album. Unfortunately, I was far from it.

These Open Roads, while a very conventional indie-folk album, isn’t without meaning. The album implies notions of self-identity, of finding oneself, and the emotional difficulties one faces when attempting to do so. I found this to be the case with songs such as “Brand New Start,” “New Year’s Day,” and “Love Will Follow.” Other songs like “Another Breakup Ballad” and “Lavender Brown” feature heartbreak and radiate feelings of isolation. Rose wrote all eleven songs in the album (the twelfth track is more of a soft ode without any lyrics) and based on the consistency of her lyrics, I’m guessing she put a lot of effort into inserting common themes throughout the record.

Rose’s songs have a delicate, personal feel to them and the instrumentals are soothing. But while listening to the album, I always felt there was something missing. Something extra that makes her album stand out—perhaps something more intimate or unique in the lyrics.

Rose, a Los Angeles-based singer/songwriter, certainly has a voice that fits in with the league of modern indie singers. Her voice is reminiscent of a softer, less mature version of KT Tunstall or Judy Collins. It’s a sweet voice that’s not hard on the ears, but it’s nothing that can set her apart from the crowd of other female folkies with guitars that we see singing in small cafes around the city.

Written by: Farhana Uddin, April 24th 2011

Herizons Magazine (Winter 2011)

beth — Sun, 24 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Edited by Penni Mitchell

When I first moved to Canada, Herizons was virtually the only magazine I came across that dealt with feminism and issues concerning women. My understanding of the women’s movement before that point was primarily focused on within the U.S., and it’s not exactly the same. The laws are different in Canada. Thus, they affect women in a different way and Herizons helped me understand that.

There are several things that non-Canadian readers might discover in this issue. To name a few: there are over 500 cases of missing Aboriginal women within the nation; the Ontario Court of Appeal now allows Muslim women who file sexual assault complaints to wear the niqab, if they choose to; Ottawa will hold a global women’s conference this summer; and a Quebec bill proposes that Muslim women be prohibited from receiving or delivering public services while wearing a niqab. These are issues that are addressed articulately in this issue through the contributing writers of Herizons.

The only problem is that these facts aren’t necessarily recent news, not for people living in Canada at least. These are topics that any Canadian resident might know if they follow the national news. Such is the trouble with distributing a quarterly magazine. By the time it’s out on print, the topics feel very backdated. Issues such as Muslim women in Canada having certain rights while wearing the niqab have been out since last year and as someone who regularly follows women’s news in the country, I was already well-read on the various opinions and attitudes that come with it.

However, there were some parts of Herizons' winter issue that educated me. Did you know that a young woman in her twenties recently started the first women’s magazine in Afghanistan? I certainly didn’t. Not until now. It’s called Negah-e-Zan, meaning "A Vision of Women," and is committed to women’s empowerment. There’s also a great, lengthy Q & A piece with Kate Bornstein, author of Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women and the Rest of Us, and performance artist S. Bear Bergman. Bornstein and Bergman have put together an “anthology of new transgender voices” called Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation. In the interview by Mandy Van Deven, they discuss the obliteration of the gender binary and what feminism can learn from trans politics.

Herizons is undoubtedly packed with great content about feminist views. But I would say that this issue works better on the international scale. It would probably be more interesting to a non-Canadian who is interested in learning more about how the women’s movement is perceived and enacted in another country.

Written by: Fadi Gabir, April 24th 2011

The Ultimate Guide to Cunnilingus: How to Go Down on a Woman and Give Her Exquisite Pleasure (2nd Edition)

mandy — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 18:00:00 +0000

By Violet Blue

Cleis Press

The Ultimate Guide to Cunnilingus is described by the author as a sex-positive, no-nonsense explanation of cunnilingus. The book includes information Violet Blue acquired from guidebooks, the internet, and surveys she sent to people from diverse backgrounds in the United States, Europe, and Canada. The text includes snippets from these interviews interspersed with educational information, hand-drawn illustrations, and erotic stories.

Blue does a great job of taking a pro-sex, feminist stance on the subject of cunnilingus in most instances, noting the shame that many women feel about their vaginas and apprehension that some women might have being the recipient or giver of oral sex. She discusses possible shame and discomfort in a supportive manner and makes sure to point out that the goal of any sexual encounter is too-often focused on orgasm and not the enjoyment that the individuals derive from the sexual contact. She provides common-sense strategies for overcoming fears about giving or receiving cunnilingus that I think are applicable for both men and women.

There are a few instances in which negative societal views of women’s sexuality are subtly reinforced by the language the author uses. For example, when discussing waxing, Blue refers to pubic hair as “the offending hair” and states that vaginas are a “woman’s finest feature.” While there are a few wording choices that may play in to poor body image or shame associated with sexuality, overall The Ultimate Guide to Cunnilingus is intended to help individuals feel empowered by their sexuality, and for the most part it accomplishes this.

The author also approaches the book from a non-heteronormative worldview, discussing cunnilingus in the context of same and opposite sex encounters, and even the pictures illustrate both same sex and opposite sex couples. While the book attempts to be as inclusive as possible, it falls short in a few instances. The author periodically makes global statements such as “sex is all about reciprocation,” which fails to take into account the myriad types of sexual relationships people have (for instance, stone butches may not wish to have reciprocal sexual encounters). Still, the attempt to write for a diverse audience is commendable and the attention paid to disability and oral sex is laudable.

My favorite section was the tongue techniques section, which provided tips I hope to add to my own oral sex tool kit. Other techniques are discussed in the book, including: genital massage, the use of sex toys, S/M strategies, and anal penetration. Blue acknowledges that not every reader will be interested in all of the varieties of sex play that can be incorporated into oral sex, but nonetheless provides a variety of information for differing sexual appetites. One additional great asset of this book is the section on suggested erotic books, videos, and the sex store resource list at the back of the book.

The Ultimate Guide to Cunnilingus delivers what it purports to: a non-judgmental, pro-sex guide to going down on a woman. I wish more attention had been paid to the techniques than the anatomy and safe-sex sections; however, I also recognize the importance of this information in any guidebook. This is a book I am happy to add to my personal collection and I am sure that many readers will benefit and enjoy its content as well.

Written by: K. Payne, April 23rd 2011

Feminism for Real: Deconstructing the Academic Industrial Complex of Feminism

mandy — Sat, 23 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Edited by Jessica Yee

Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives

Jessica Yee and I have a lot in common, personally and politically. For one, last year we were both curating collective published works that simultaneously construct and deconstruct contemporary feminist theory while broadening the scope of who is seen as legitimate enough to be a theory-maker. I wasn't aware of her work, and so far as I know, she wasn't aware of mine either. Despite being topically similar, the results of both projects are strikingly different. And I have a few theories about why.

Feminism FOR REAL brings together twenty written works, both poetry and prose, penned by a variety of radical activists. While the authors are diverse in their backgrounds, they converge on one belief: academia, boo! This is a pretty common refrain among activists, one I've sung over and over myself. But it's also one that now feels a little off key to me for its wholesale exclusivity and apparent lack of understanding of the ways activism and and academic are necessarily interdependent. For that reason, I found myself having to put forth some effort to read many of these pieces where they're at, instead of with condescension.

I want to be clear about a couple of things: 1) although it is a frequent accusation tossed my way, I am not an academic and 2) I claim the sentiment in the paragraph above as a part of my own personal struggle and processing, not a failing of this anthology. Too many times we patronizingly press our lips together, just waiting to inform the young'ins that they'll see things differently one day. And even though they might, that's no excuse for bolstering one's sense of superiority at another's expense, nor choosing not to interrogate the things that contribute to our own self-righteous point of view. In fact, it's just this kind of ageist trope that Yee and crew (rightfully!) rail against in Feminism FOR REAL.

So every piece in this book didn't speak to me—so what?! The ones that did were exciting to read and filled me with validation. Megan Lee's "Maybe I'm Not Class-Mobile; Maybe I'm Class Queer" is an excellent examination of the complex conflicts held by those of us who have been able to 'escape' our families' poverty while maintaining the desire to embrace our working class identity and advocate for us and for them. Andrea Plaid discusses the unintentional delegitimizing of Ann Marie Rios, and therefore all nontraditionally educated sex workers, by professional (read: degreed) sexologist Bianca Laureano in "No, I Would Follow the Porn Star's Advice." And ending with Kate Klein's "On Learning How Not to Be An Asshole Academic Feminist" (re)assured me that Yee and I are probably on the same page with our personal and political intentionality.

Pick up Feminism FOR REAL if you're looking to gain an worthwhile education, and perhaps a bit of critical self-awareness too.

Written by: Mandy Van Deven, April 23rd 2011

Gladdy’s Wake

mandy — Fri, 22 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By B.K. Anderson

Second Story Press

It took me a while to really sink my teeth into Gladdy’s Wake. The book weaves in and out of three generations, each tying together through family, hints of religion, and the story of Nawal Habib, a devout Muslim. Nawal (once Janie Kelly) is suspected of terrorism, an act that reunites her with her estranged brother, Frank (now a priest) and hospitalized father, Daniel (a once devout Catholic); both of whom she left to eventually reinvent herself as Nawal Habib. The story runs through Nawal’s family tragedy, her rebellion, the birth of her son, and eventual religious transformation, all the while introducing the reader to her grandfather, James Kelly, a womanizing Irish immigrant interested in fast cash with no real ethical principles, lest it regard his passion: Gladdy Sage.

Though each story is captivating, the book is fractured and difficult to engage in. It seemed that each time I fell into the story, the author interfered with an abrupt switch from one narrator to the next. It was not until the near end of the novel that Anderson’s transitions became fluid and absorbing, the way a book should really grab your attention and not let go.

Nevertheless, the story is a unique twist on the post-9/11 novel and introduces the reader to the challenges of belief systems and the interconnectedness of the human race through the passion of moral conviction. While the protagonists devote their lives to different ideologies, from Islam to Catholicism, atheism and the idolization of romantic love, each struggle with the reality of their idols and the conflicts that exist within themselves and their systems of belief. In this way, Gladdy’s Wake takes a critical look into how we follow faith and why we accepts conceptions of the “moral life” that contradict our character.

Nawal struggles with jihad and the role of women in Islam; Frank with the Catholic vilification of his hidden sexual orientation; Michael Kaminsky (Gladdy’s object of affection and James Kelly’s match) struggles with his Jewish heritage in the Communist revolution; and James Kelly with the real Gladdy Sage – an alcoholic escapist, devoted to Michael Kaminsky and the drink. None of the characters in Anderson’s novel are able to see their deities for what they are. Each blinds himself or herself, excusing as a way of maintaining the pedestal upon which they have placed their flawed idea of morality.

In turn, the story employs a seemingly fractured start to reveal the connection between the disconnected by relating the characters on a moral level. In this way, the author recovers her initial shortcomings. Though this lends the question, what makes a book? Its ability to capture its audience upfront, or to engage its reader with a critical approach to a heavy issue?

Written by: Ani Colekessian, April 22nd 2011

Betrayer

annette — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By The On Fires

What things come from Australia? Lots of bitey poisonous things. The fabulous and flamboyant movie The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert. AC/DC. Australian Toaster Biscuits (do you remember Australian Toaster Biscuits? I do. They were amazing.) The On Fires also come from Australia. Are The On Fires as amazing as Australian Toaster Biscuits? Do they wear shorts all of the time like Angus Young? Can they do a mean Gloria Gaynor impression, while sporting a dress made out of flip-flop sandals? Perhaps most importantly, can they wrestle lots of bitey poisonous things like Steve Irwin? These are all questions I would like to have answered.

First things first: are they as amazing as Australian Toaster Biscuits (A.T.B. for short)? The amazing thing about A.T.B. is that they are sweeter and more substantive than regular English muffins. So the real question here is, are The On Fires sweeter and more substantive than English muffins? The closest English band to an English muffin would have to be the Spice Girls, for their rather dense exterior and the air-filled emptiness at the center. I would have to say I prefer The On Fires to the Spice Girls. The On Fires have a certain level of sweetness; on tracks like “Without”, that are both emotion-filled and packed with energy. Similar to A.T.B., The On Fires also have a certain level of substance that is lacking in their English muffin counterparts. They obviously are influenced by bands like The Mars Volta and Social Distortion, while the musical influences of the Spice Girls are clearly more along the lines of The Archies, if The Archies wore sexy pants.

Question number two: Do they wear shorts all of the time like Angus Young? The answer appears to be no. I see a sherpa hat on their guitar player in the liner notes, but no shorts. Which brings us to the question can they do a mean Gloria Gaynor impression, while sporting a dress made out of flip-flop sandals? As I have yet to see them in concert, I cannot say whether they are capable of such a feat. However, according to their website, their previous band name was “Asleep in the Park” until a fan shouted “you’re not asleep, you’re on fire!” so I can only imagine that they have quite a lot of enthusiasm on stage. In addition, their song “Melancholy” is obviously influenced by Queen, which clearly indicates they are at least friends of the family, if you know what I mean.

Finally, the most important question of all: can they wrestle lots of bitey poisonous things like Steve Irwin? Again, it doesn’t appear they wear shorts all of the time, so I cannot be sure they can match the awesomeness of His Royal Majesty of Crocodile Hunting (R.I.P.), Steve Irwin. They do have plenty of punk-rock swagger on tracks like “Coming Home,” which I suppose would be needed when faced with certain death at the fangs of something bitey and poisonous. However, they do a riff on the Ventures’ tune “Wipeout” during the song, which is probably not something you want to hear when faced with wrangling a death adder or a blue-ringed octopus. So, I suppose, the jury is out on the answer to this question.

I hope I have sufficiently answered these questions regarding The On Fires and various elements of Australia. In closing, I would have to say that they are far more enjoyable than Silverchair, and not nearly as enjoyable as AC/DC, although they do have a fair amount of rock and roll attitude. Just one more question, though: Why do people from hot climates wear sherpa hats?

Written by: Emily S. Dunster, April 21st 2011

Come Over

annette — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Patty Carpenter and Dysfunctional Family Jazz Band

Epiphany Records

Patty Carpenter and the Dysfunctional Family Jazz Band (PCATDFJB) are a troupe of musicians who are also family members. Singer Patty was married to saxophonist Scotty, and they had daughter (who is also the band’s other singer) Melissa. Patty and Scotty broke up, and Patty married the band’s manager, Charles, and together they had son Travis who plays bass. This album is essentially like being trapped on a couch in the living room of your new neighbors watching an endless slide-show of their family’s summer vacation.

Little did you know how creepy your new neighbors were. “My Baby” stomps in with snarling saxophone and electric guitar. The song’s lyrics are about a rebellious child growing up, “My baby’s going away. And I hope it will be okay/Such a young girl hurrying out the door.” Okay, fine so far. But then the song gets a little bit too, er, tactile? “I can hold her when she needs my touch... Someday I know that she’ll go away/But I will stay close to her heart.” Now I’m confused. I thought this was a song about mother/daughter relationships? Is this the kissing family from Saturday Night Live?

PCATDFJB waffle between Sonny Clark-esque jazz, zydeco, and reggae. “Love Bound” is a song about daughter Melissa and husband Alan getting married in Jamaica. I know this because it says so, under the lyrics to the song in the liner notes: “we cooked up this song to celebrate the first anniversary of Melissa and Alan. Their wedding in Jamaica required a reggae saga. You had to be there. Now you are.” It really is great that this family willingly shows so much affection for each other. Frankly, though, I don’t really want to be invited to their wedding. I just don’t know them well enough to be interested. I suppose you could argue that there are plenty of great songs out there written about people and events that most listeners have no personal connection to. Paul Simon wrote about wife Peggy Harper in songs like “Run That Body Down,” and it works. But then, Mr. Simon didn’t write in the liner notes to his album, “My wife and I were going through a very difficult time, which would eventually end in a bitter divorce. You had to be there. Now you are!” Speaking of Paul Simon, he also made reggae work for a white dude. Unfortunately, PCATDFJB are more reminiscent of Willie Nelson’s attempt at reggae, which (needles to say) was both bumbling and strange.

On the track “Summer Love,” PCATDFJB get creepy again, for along come the sultry sounds of what can only be a mom singing about making whoopie in a corn field: “The corn’s silky tassels are luring me in [...] come on, baby, roll me in the grass.” Ohmygodohmygodohmygod. The teenager in me just threw up a little in my mouth. This is a family band! What are you doing, hippie parents? This song feels a bit like Maeby Fünke and Michael Bluth singing “Afternoon Delight” together. That moment on Arrested Development was funny because it was unintentionally creepy. This is just creepy.

It’s great that these folks enjoy making music together and seem to love each other so much. I just think you may need to be a part of their family in order to really get it.

Written by: Emily S. Dunster, April 20th 2011

Draupadi – Will My Spirit Live On?

mandy — Tue, 19 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Indo-American Arts Council

On the heels of International Women’s Day, the Indo-American Arts Council in New York City hosted the North American premiere of a unique and thought-provoking Indian play called Draupadi – Will My Spirit Live On? Produced and conceptualized by Shivani Wazir Pasrich, and co-directed by Pasrich and Tina Johnson, Draupadi weaves a tale from the Hindu epic Mahabharata with an intense contemporary story of a woman battling her experience with sexual abuse. The play sheds light on the plight of many women suffering such abuse, connecting a mythological tale with a modern parallel, and delivers a mostly engaging experience.

The play extends the story of Draupadi (played by Pasrich), from her travails that were supposed to have triggered a great war, crossing centuries to meet Maaya (Charu Shankar) in modern day India. Draupadi is stuck between heaven and earth, pondering her fate and choices, and being guided by her confidant Lord Krishna. Maaya is a young housewife who is taken advantage of by her husband Arjun’s brother Kaurav, and is too afraid of societal taboos to fight for justice. Added into the mix is Krishna, who flits in and out of situations donning various avatars to help guide the two women in distress towards finding peace with their own respective scenarios.

One of the play’s greatest strengths is in its talented and accomplished cast. Pasrich as Draupadi exudes confidence and power in her quest for salvation and also helping Maaya out of her predicament. She does, however, remain angry throughout, thus affecting the depth of the character. Shankar plays Maaya with a dignified innocence and is quick to gain audience sympathy.

The most spirited performance comes from Dilip Shankar as Krishna, portraying a deity with an edge. He provides the comic relief in many tense scenes and dishes out ample doses of tough love that would come from any respected mentor, heavenly or human. Among the rest of the cast, Arjun Fauzdar as Maaya’s husband Arjun and Ashish Paliwal as Sukarna are both competent in their roles.

When asked about the genesis of the play, Pasrich explained, “It’s just essentially that, as women, we judge ourselves very harshly and we expect ourselves to perform so many different roles. And we do it happily with a smile. But at the end of the day we realize everybody’s going through the same kind of situation, our issues are similar, and there’s a great strength that you get out of that. So that was the reason to bring [Draupadi] into the current times because, if anyone’s had a difficult life, it’s Draupadi. So whoever today is having a tough time, it couldn’t be tougher than Draupadi’s life and if she moved on, so can everyone else.”

Draupadi – Will My Spirit Live On? is an important work of theatre for confronting through the arts an issue that plagues Indian society today. It is a show to be watched and lauded – such artistic confrontations of social plagues need only be encouraged.

Read the full review at The NRI

Written by: Pulkit Datta, April 19th 2011

Certified Copy

mandy — Mon, 18 Apr 2011 20:00:00 +0000

Directed by Abbas Kiarostami

MK2 Productions

The latest film from Iranian filmmaker Abbas Kiarostami, Certified Copy begins with the same joke twice. While waiting for author James Miller (William Shimell) to give a lecture, his translator (Angelo Barbagallo) apologizes for James’ lateness and says, “He can’t blame the traffic; he is walking from upstairs.” The restless crowd responds with no audible laughter. Moments later James walks into the room and, unknowing that it has just been said, re-uses the same joke. This time several members of the crowd emit soft laughter. Within the first few minutes of the film, Kiarostami has already laid out his brilliant thesis: that when it comes to art, history, or even comedy the copy can have meaning in a way that makes it as valuable the original.

This sets up the audience nicely for the existential journey that is to follow in Certified Copy, a rich examination of art, love, and the authenticity of life. Kiarostami’s first film away from his home country hits every note just right and creates an environment that encompasses the viewer. With beautiful cinematography, pitch-perfect pacing, and fantastic performances from both leads Certified Copy is a certified hit.

Comparable to the films of Richard Linklater or David Mamet, Certified Copy is not about where the characters go, but the discussions they have along the way. At a small café, a barista mistakes James and Elle for a married couple and is never corrected. Then, without provocation, the two characters begin to play-act as if they were a married couple, immediately challenging the direction the narrative had been leading. Have these two characters known each other before? Are they so committed to proving the value of a copy over the original that they are going to continue this “copy” of marriage? Or are they a real married couple looking for some excitement?

Juliette Binoche is brilliant as the bubbly and enthusiastic leading lady, who seems to be leading the direction of the conversation for most of the film. The story moves along like a long-form improvised scene with each character continually providing a “yes, and…” to continue the flow of the story. Just like in any improvised stage scene, even the best performers are apt to occasionally break character, and Kiarostami seems to emphasize this by having the characters look directly at the camera, breaking the fourth wall. Just like Bertolt Brecht, Kiarostami never wants the viewer to forget that they are watching a piece of art, not a piece of life, so he often has the actors look straight into the camera to distract any audience members from moments of escapism they might be experiencing.

At the conclusion of Certified Copy, the audience will be left with far more questions than answers and the discussions that will be inspired are undoubtedly one of the greatest values of the film. Unlike author James Miller’s thesis that artistic copies can have equal value to their original, it is unlikely that Kiarostami’s film will be successfully imitated anytime soon.

Read the full review at Film Misery

Written by: Alex Carlson, April 18th 2011

Black on Earth: African American Ecoliterary Traditions

annette — Sun, 17 Apr 2011 20:00:00 +0000

By Kimberly N. Ruffin

University of Georgia Press

African American literary contribution to the national conception of nature, in all of its symbolic ambiguity and historical twists and turns, is a subject that has been little studied. In fact, African American writers have contributed profoundly to our popular understanding of nature and to our ecological concern. Kimberly Ruffin’s book must confront the notion that modern ecological movements have been the exclusive province of privileged white people—that African American people have had little to do with the natural world as writers or advocates. To challenge this assumption, she redefines nature and ecological thought as it has applied to the experience of African American people throughout American history, as articulated by artists both well known and obscure.

This transformation in our understanding begins with a recent anecdote concerning the “Jena Six” incident in Louisiana in 2006. When high school students sought shade under what had been designated “the white tree,” they were subsequently threatened with nooses hanging from it. A tree is, indeed, a source of comfort, a sign of natural beauty with practical value. But it is also—sorry, Joyce Kilmer—emblematic of lynching and a history of terror aimed at African American people. The author points out that rather than preserving the tree as a “troubled relic,” school officials cut it down, presumably in an effort to prevent further trouble and to erase this living monument to racial injustice.

If many African Americans have felt estranged from mainstream environmentalism, Ruffin argues, it is because people themselves—“the most precious of natural resources”—seem to have been excluded from the discourse. The author cites Wangari Maathai’s Green Belt Movement as a model for a new way of thinking about environmentalism, a “human-sensitive” activism that advocates simultaneously for people and the land. She argues that people of African descent have had both the burden and the blessing of being themselves seen as natural; whereas too often people of European descent have viewed themselves as radically separate from nature, a realm to be tamed and controlled or, later, to be visited for leisure.

Another critical point that she makes is that pre-twentieth-century Americans knew nature through work. The connection to the land was forged through labor, with both the body and the landscape part of the same “bioregion.” Similarly, nature has been inextricably involved in human efforts to achieve social justice and to escape from enslavement. She demonstrates that environmental degradation has disproportionately harmed the disenfranchised, but a detailed knowledge of the environment was instrumental, for example, in helping enslaved people establish routes to freedom. African American writing also reveals the extent to which the natural world provided sources of healing—the “wild-growing medicines” that are so much a part of cultural tradition and folklore.

Ruffin revisits the contributions of George Washington Carver, whose intense scrutiny of the natural world led to a unified view of science and religion, a balance between practical knowledge of the natural world and human spirituality. This balance is displayed in the myths written into the African American ecoliterary traditions about food and medicine and many different aspects of life, and they still are made manifest in community urban gardens, for example. The ultimate aim is an environmentalism that fully incorporates social justice as its aim, a natural world that includes humanity.

Written by: Rick Taylor, April 17th 2011

Paris Was Ours

mandy — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 20:00:00 +0000

By Penelope Rowlands

Algonquin Books

“Paris lives in its details,” observes one contributor to this collection of essays. But equally true is the idea of Paris that thrives through clichés. You’ll find spare references to the Eiffel Tower, berets, cheese, and wine in Paris Was Ours, although the apparently ineluctable forms of French snobbery are discussed. What this anthology delivers instead are a wide breadth of creative and nuanced meditations on the culture, history, and inhabitants of the City of Light, confirming that all our romantic associations with Paris, despite the city’s faults, are quite justified.

Paris Was Ours offers a diversity of voices and topics, and in this regard, it is a superior resource among the proliferating anthologies on the city. (Adam Gopnik’s Paris to the Moon and Sarah Turnbull’s Almost French come to mind.) The contributors range from well-known writer David Sedaris and poet C.K. Williams, to a homeless woman, a chef, an Iranian revolution escapee, and various scholars. There are translations in the book from Arabic, Spanish, and French.

Paris Was Ours serves as a useful introduction to French culture, and even the most frequent travelers to France will find it illuminates what can oftentimes be perplexing Parisian mores, such as their disdain for discussing money matters, heavy-handed parenting style, chic fashion sense, tangled bureaucratic systems, insistence on a well-rounded and balanced quality of life, and greater acceptance of human shortcomings in their political leaders. Reading the book had the satisfying effect of gaining a greater appreciation for living in France, and perhaps by some comparison, the United States.

One discovery I made is that, for many of the writers, living in Paris afforded a certain liberation that led to greater self-knowledge and appreciation. “People just find themselves here,” says one Uighur journalist. Valerie Steiker, in “Fledgling Days,” whose sojourn was motivated by her desire to connect with her deceased mother by re-living similar Parisian experiences, learns about humility and self-reliance. In “Understanding Chic,” Natasha Fraser-Cavassoni discovers that “[t]he secret to acquiring chic… is to correct negative thinking.” In “Just Another American,” African American student Janet McDonald describes how Paris freed her from being perceived mainly through the confines of racial assumptions:

The French drew no such [racial] distinctions, which meant I no longer had to worry about making African Americans look good. Or bad. Whatever I did was attributed to Americanness, not blackness. What a switch – a black person with the power to make white people look bad.

No discussion of Paris is complete without mention of seduction and romance, and there is certainly plenty of that in this collection. One standout essay is “Love Without Reason,” where student of post-structural theory Caroline Weber draws comparisons between Lacan’s views on human desire and her foray into becoming “a one-woman band of seduction.” In “Ma Vie Bohème,” Karen Shur sensually describes the days and nights spent with her lover in their scant apartment. Brigid Dorsey, in “Litost,” tells the heartbreaking story of her failed romantic relationship with the father of her child.

Paris Was Ours will conjure nostalgic feelings for those who have lived in Paris, and wanderlust for those who have yet to visit. Many aspects of Parisian life are captured in such original and surprising ways that I found the book tough to put down and almost as good as walking down the Champs-Élysées.

Written by: Abigail Licad, April 16th 2011

Vag Magazine

mandy — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 10:00:00 +0000

Directed by Zach Neumeyer

Upright Citizens Brigade

I didn’t think it was even figuratively possible to shoot yourself in the foot while disappearing up your own behind, but the characters in Vag Magazine have proven otherwise. This eerily well-observed sketch show from the women of the Upright Citizens Brigade is watchable and rewatchable by third wave feminists and those who love them—or who love to laugh at them—especially since every episode is available on the web.

The six-episode, internet-based series of shorts shows what happens when a trendy, glossy women's magazine is taken over by a group of hardcore third wave feminists who revamp it by firing all but one staff person then change its name to Vag Magazine. The newly minted mag is a hipster-heavy haven of hypocritical hilarity that describes itself as such: "Not your grandma's feminist magazine, though we support her as a woman."

I have to admit that, as the editor of a comedic zine about menstruation, I was terrified Vag Magazine would have me crying instead of cracking up. And I'm relieved to report that the show is really very funny. The humor is devised from improvisation at its finest. The overall concept covered all my pet peeves about feminism, an ideology to which I subscribe, despite the kind of annoying behaviour on display in Vag Magazine. I offer the following dialogue as evidence.

Hierarchical Hypocrisy: "We don’t believe in hierarchies, but we also don’t have time to get our own coffee."

Capitalist Conundrum: "I feel like the idea of advertisers is really un-feminist." Swiftly followed by, "It's just that we need advertising dollars if we’re gonna be able to tell women what to do."

The biting observations are dead-on, down to the last detail: roller derby, cloth maxipads, ironic bunting. The writers leave no handmade, vegan, Zapatista-solidarity stone unturned. You’ve gotta be in that scene, or very near to it, to be able to poke so much fun in such glorious detail, and to my satisfied delight.

How did these awesome comedians have time to spy on self-righteous feminists and put together an outstanding sketch comedy show? Perhaps a future season of Vag Magazine will tell us.

Written by: Chella Quint, April 16th 2011

Last Train Home

mandy — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 17:00:00 +0000

Directed by Lixin Fan

Zeitgeist Films, Canada Council for the Arts

The establishing longshot of this documentary tilts down to show a few policemen in an open, paved space. Slowly the camera pans left, and the entire frame fills with thousands of people standing in a drizzle. Many hold bright, pastel-coloured umbrellas. It’s a beautiful image. The following shot, from ground level, shows that huge crowd rushing in pandemonium past the camera into a train station. These two shots are emblematic of the film: beauty and chaos inextricably interwoven.

Earth’s largest human migration occurs in China at their New Year. One hundred and thirty million people who work in cities scuffle for prized train tickets to return to villages where they were raised. Last Train Home fuses a macro view of this migration as a social and cultural phenomenon with a micro view of one family that makes this annual trek. In so doing, it underscores the high price in domestic turmoil many Chinese families pay for the country’s so-called economic miracle. It also vividly contrasts the lovely countryside with the polluted, teeming, ugliness of urban China.

Changhua Zang and Sugin Chen, husband and wife, work as sewing-machine operators in a factory in Guangzhou. They have two kids—Qin, a girl in her teens, and a boy, Yang, about ten—who live with their grandmother in Huilong Village where the parents were born. The film was shot over a couple of years, so we watch the kids grow up a bit. The parents labour at their dreary work to give their children a chance at prosperity. “You shouldn’t be like us,” they say. To this end, they constantly remind Qin and Yang to stay in school and get good grades. The parents also reveal decidedly mixed feelings about being wage slaves 2,000 kilometres away from their kids. They insist their destiny (etched in their faces) will be worth it if the kids acquire a higher education.

However, Qin, angry and bitter with her parents for their protracted absence, quits school and moves to a city, thus frustrating Changhua and Sugin’s hopes. She goes to work in a strobe-lit dance bar where the music is industrial technopop and employees’ training includes chanting capitalist slogans: “Customers are always right!” and “The boss is always right!” (Mao is turning over in his grave.) Yang, the son, stays in school and remains the light of his parents’ lives. If he quits, their sixteen-year devotion will have been for naught.

A great thing about Last Train Home is how it makes family a common human denominator: the daughter angry with her mother; the likable, hard-working, worried, exhausted, guilty, self-sacrificing parents; the wise grandmother; the young boy who is academically inclined and is his parents’ last, best hope. We know these people. They are us. When Changua finally breaks from his impossibly stoic reserve and slaps his daughter for disrespecting him by using fuck in his presence, we deeply empathize with them both.

A word about the production of this film. Lixin Fan, the director, is Chinese-Canadian. The film was produced mostly by government funds from Canada. It’s a tribute to the country and its art organizations that they have the acuity to fund a film that may seem at first to have nothing to do with Canada. But troubled families, Chinese, Canadian, or anywhere else are legion. And China itself is omnipresent. One need only look at the planet’s retail shelves to see that. This superb documentary allows us inside a Chinese phenomenon to see how similar and connected we all are now.

Finally: Be sure to stick around to hear the plaintive, chilling, gorgeous, acapella aria sung over the end credits.

Written by: Neil Flowers, April 15th 2011

Appetite for Reduction: 125 Fast and Filling Low-Fat Vegan Recipes

mandy — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

By Isa Chandra Moskowitz

Da Capo Press

My library copy of Vegan with a Vengeance shouldn’t have been returned. Not in the state it was in after it lived in my kitchen for five renewed status cycles (the maximum number I was allowed before I had to return it to my local library). The book shouldn’t have been returned because it smelled like food. A cookbook, naturally, absorbs the effort of its teachings: oils and buttered thumb prints, dried arrow root smudges, and one small berry stain on two of the pages when I tried to turn them with fruit juice-stained fingers. Luckily, I don’t have to return Isa Chandra Moskowitz’s newest book, Appetite for Reduction, which is doomed to the same fate as its predecessor: lovingly used with pages that are turned with excitement, torn at its edges and bearing of all kinds of quirky marks, compliments of the daring cook.

Moskowitz discloses her personal health reasons that resulted in her decision to find more recipes that are lighter in caloric intake. She also stresses her reluctance to contribute to the war on bigger bodied women. So what does Moskowitz do? She writes a cookbook for vegan stomachs searching lowfat, delicious recipes. For those in the vegan community who are also health conscious, Moskowitz has delivered the goods on a plate too irresistible to deny.

Isa Chandra Moskowitz is the best friend we’re all looking for: she writes in a way we understand, a language that is easily understood and humorous. She is also the cook we want for our healthy lives and families. She gets it. She gets that we don’t want to give up taste and satisfaction for healthy living. With this book, she dismantles the notion that vegan eating and cooking is not either extreme of the rumor spectrum. Veganhood is not bland rabbit food, nor is it substituting large amount of full fat in place of flavor.

From funky hummus creative ideas to “OMG Oven-Baked Onion Rings,” from sides to satisfying full entrée ideas, Moskowitz turns your vegan kitchen upside down, shakes out the fat, and replaces it with novel and tasty ideas to keep your mind interested and your tongue happy you tried something new. For this, I raise my spatula to Moskowitz with a need and heartfelt thank you. Vegan or omnivore, you will find something to rave about and savor in Appetite for Reduction.

Written by: Lisa Factora-Borchers, April 15th 2011

Birth Matters: A Midwife's Manifesta

mandy — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 20:00:00 +0000

By Ina May Gaskin

Seven Stories Press

When I saw Birth Matters by famed midwife Ina May Gaskin, I jumped at the opportunity to read and review it. Gaskin has contributed to the field of midwifery and childbirth education in vast and meaningful ways. She serves as an icon for many, and I, for one, was eager to learn what she had to say in this new book.

Having already read extensively on the subject of pregnancy, labor, and birth, I found that Gaskin’s book did not reveal anything completely new. However, where other authors have had to rely mostly on secondhand knowledge and data collected elsewhere, Gaskin was able to insert personal stories and years of experience into her writing. This obviously added quite a bit of authority to what she had to say.

Besides the strength in her convictions, Gaskin brought to her writing a powerful feminist stance and a tremendous feeling of sisterhood. She does not only claim to believe in women; she lives this message. Her unwavering trust in women’s bodies and capacities to make the right choices for them based on unbiased, accurate information felt every bit as empowering as I’m sure she meant it.

The issue at hand, however, is that women in the United States today are being fed a host of half-truths and even outright lies that directly affect their decision-making when it comes to pregnancy and childbirth. For instance, Caesarean sections are being promoted as easier, pain-free means of giving birth. But are they really? How come we rarely hear about the risk factors involved in this serious abdominal surgical procedure? Why is it that the United States has higher infant and maternal mortality rates than other developed countries?

According to Gaskin, Americans are relying too much on modern technologies and not enough on the wisdom passed down through generations or the innate knowledge that women’s bodies have about giving birth. Instead of fetoscopes, there is a higher reliance on electronic fetal monitors. Rather than allowing the baby to emerge in its own time, medical professionals are utilizing Cytotec to induce labor even though the drug is not FDA-approved for this purpose. Some feminists believe that reproductive technologies will help even the playing field, or even erase biological differences that could potentially hold them back in the fight for equality. For Gaskin, this perspective fails to see the beauty and strength that a birthing woman exudes, not to mention the natural mechanisms that are in place to assist a laboring woman during this life-changing time.

Besides the wealth of information that Gaskin provides, the parts of Birth Matters that touched me most were the birth stories that were interspersed throughout. Each account shares extensive detail about the mother’s sensations during the entire process of labor and delivery. I couldn't help but tear up as I read them because they captured so much warmth, power, and love. In the end, it is exactly this that Gaskin wants to share with the world.

Written by: Shana Mattson, April 14th 2011

The Skin Quilt Project

mandy — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 08:00:00 +0000

Directed by Lauren Cross

Mae’s House Productions

Without the preservation of historical text, artifact, and art, history can slowly fade from memory. Stories of survival can easily become short-lived memories as they are passed from one generation to the next before they are forgotten. For Black African American women, their history has been and continues to be woven together in quilting. The Skin Quilt Project is a documentary featuring various quilters, artists, academics, and historians discussing the necessity, purpose, benefits, and impact of Black African American women quilters and what their artistry does for their families and communities.

The film begins with the issue of skin color among African Americans and the discriminatory “trick down racism” that began with slavery and eventually bled into African American communities to set up its own caste system. Artists and quilters talk about the process and representation of creating images of Black women in their art and the significance or insignificance of the skin color of their subjects. As the documentary deepens, the topics become more complex and emotional.

There are two themes explored in the film: the process of quilting and the quilts themselves. The Skin Quilt Project goes beyond skin deep as it gains testimony about the relationship between the artist and community, artist and their work, artist and history, story and survivor. It’s more than just preserving cultural legacy; the quilts themselves are works of art, tangible testaments to the diverse life experience of Black women in the United States.

The process of making the quilts is binding experience, not just between the quilter and the quilt, but also between the artist and the community in which it is made. Many quilters find acceptance, camaraderie, confidence, and affirmation of their skill level by quilting together. It also provides challenge to take a project to the next level. This in-depth sharing of knowledge and craft is essential to many of the artists. The experience is not only for the artist’s physical artwork, but as many women attest, quilting feeds the soul and is part of the “visual, Negro spiritual” identity.

While the stories and commentary of The Skin Quilt Project are clearly important and interesting, the format of the documentary did not share the rich diversity of the quilts or the artists. No narrative voiceover to direct the film or text dividers to signal a new focus. The documentary relies heavily on the spoken word to engage the audience, but with a few audio kinks in the beginning, it’s difficult to phonetically understand what is being said. The ongoing and unbroken stride doesn’t offer much creative opportunity to appreciate the different insights of each interviewee.

For those interested in the role of African American women, quilters, and the critical role artists play in our social history, The Skin Quilt Project is a fine demonstration of the radical work that can be accomplished by needle and thread.

Written by: Lisa Factora-Borchers, April 14th 2011

Cosmologies of Credit: Transnational Mobility and the Politics of Destination in China

annette — Wed, 13 Apr 2011 20:00:00 +0000

By Julie Y. Chu

Duke University Press

Residents of Fujian Province on the southeastern coast of China burn spirit money designed to resemble U. S. currency. That stunning confluence of traditional religious practice and modern dreams of western emigration stands as a kind of symbolic center of this book. In her ethnographic study of the people of this region, famous-or infamous, perhaps—for their involvement in “human smuggling” to the West, Julie Y. Chu asks why so many people would honor the dead with images of western materialism. The answers her subjects gave seemed evasive, dismissive: “because so many have relatives in the United States” or “they’re just being superstitious.”

In fact, the spirit money, modeled after American greenbacks, represents a powerful longing that has defined and transformed this region. Nowhere is this desire more obviously monumentalized than in the comparatively luxurious homes, built by “Overseas Chinese” as “vacation homes” or investments, that are springing up throughout the province. For many, those who have miraculously managed all the bureaucratic obstacles and nightmarish dangers to settle in the West have achieved a heroic status that is both idealized and destabilizing for those “left behind.” The culture Chu describes is one that keeps one proverbial eye fixed westward, the other on a provincial life that seems meager and transient. Bags are kept packed.

The book is replete with tales of those still waiting for the call from the “snakehead” (human smuggler) who will expect them to be ready at a moment’s notice to abandon their current lives and embark on a life-threatening journey. Because this activity has so profoundly defined the region and its people, Chu argues that it is part of a “politics of destination,” a pragmatic and forward-looking ideology governed by the prospect of mobility—both geographic and economic.

Because of the frequency of arrests and loss of life in transit, the area is notorious world-wide as a jumping off point for “human smuggling.” Perhaps the worst incident was a tragedy in June of 2000: fifty-eight migrants from Fuzhou suffocated to death in the back of a truck hauling tomatoes from Belgium to Dover. Indeed, the horrifying details of human smuggling bring to mind the inhumanity of the Middle Passage, with the obvious mitigating difference being the migrants’ belief that a better life awaits those who survive. The author writes, “One cannot easily forget the stifling darkness and pervasive disorientation of being crammed into the hull of a ship or into a steel shipping container for anywhere from fourteen to ninety days." She calls it a kind of “entombment at sea,” too literally the fate of many who have attempted the passage.

The tales of horror have done little to dampen the desire, but have only made legal or illegal “visiting” that much more difficult and risky. Residents still fervently study well worn copies of Practical English for People Working in Chinese Restaurants and wait for the call to action. The new foreign-owned homes, left mostly empty by their overseas owners, seem to be proof of a prosperity that, in spite of all obstacles, is still within the grasp of the most resilient.

The book ends beautifully with the clacking of mahjong tiles that, like the spirit money, captures something essential about the Fuzhounese. The author comments on the popularity of the game: “Though winning always entailed personal reward and glory, losing did not necessarily spell individual failure and shame... Sooner or later... the pendulum of luck would swing back in one’s favor.”

Written by: Rick Taylor, April 13th 2011