Water has a complicated history in feminist thought. Women have been sometimes positively, sometimes negatively equated with water, with fluidity, with that which is not solid or tangible or rational and thus has the ability to flow, submerge, purify, gush … but also drown, pollute or erode. TV miniseries Top of the Lake builds on [...]
Last summer, Avital Norman Nathman wrote about feminist video blogger Anita Sarkeesian’s Kickstarter proposal for a web series, Tropes vs. Women, and briefly mentioned the alarming backlash aimed at Sarkeesian for venturing to dissect sexist trends in video games. After receiving vicious YouTube comments, including “I hope you get cancer” and just about every misogynistic slur in the book, [...]
The Independent Game Developers Association party at this year’s Game Developers Conference sent a clear message to its members–one that has members resigning leadership positions. At the party, held March 26, attendees found networking opportunities, drinks–and provocatively dressed female dancers. For an organization that champions inclusivity and diversity among professional game developers, the choice was [...]
While you prepare ingredients for an old-fashioned in anticipation of Mad Men‘s season premiere this Sunday, let’s take a quick look at how much the advertising industry has changed since the days of Mad Men. The CLIO Awards, arguably the world’s best-known advertising honors, will have its 54th annual ceremony on May 15. This year’s [...]
In celebration of Women’s History Month, esteemed journalists Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn have announced the release of the most recent addition to their Half the Sky Movement—on Facebook. Half the Sky Movement: The Game is based off real-world situations that affect women and girls in developing countries, and each challenge that players unlock will [...]
And the two best friends lived happily ever after. It’s not the typical ending for a romance story, but The Lizzie Bennet Diaries (LBD) isn’t typical in any way. The web video series that just aired its final episode is a modern adaptation of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, following fictional vlogger “Lizzie” Bennet, her [...]
I’m trying to lean in, Sheryl Sandberg, I swear, but this month–ironically, Women’s History Month–football players, military men, and popes have stricken me with patriarchy fatigue. March started out on a high. I got to attend the “best literary party ever invented,” as the Association of Writers and Writing Programs Vice President and 2013 conference [...]
Like many of us who have been following the show, I’ve had lukewarm feelings about Girls’ contribution to feminism. Though many commentators have raised valid criticisms about the show’s handling of race and class, it’s been refreshing to see a female lead with an “imperfect” body, and I’ve praised the show for focusing on young [...]
Without a doubt, food is an inherently feminist topic. Women are inundated on a daily basis regarding food—whether being told how to properly (and perfectly) prepare it, or how to control our intake of it for “ideal” weight purposes. While there is no shortage of both men and women who write about food online, what [...]
“I let him film us having sex, Lizzie. I let him do that. … He never made me do anything, so just tell me that I didn’t get what I had coming Lizzie, just try to tell me that!” A sobbing and self-abusive young woman named Lydia Bennet is speaking to her older sister Lizzie [...]
