Women's Studies Commons^™

Sr. Nicole: Being A Teacher, Sierra Rood

Ask a Sister: Interview Wisdom from Catholic Women Religious

I interviewed with Sr. Nicole who spoke about her life experiences as a woman religious. This paper includes a portion of the interview where she spoke about her journey of becoming a woman religious and being a teacher.

Women In Twentieth-Century Africa, Serena J. Rivera

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

“To See Where Her Strength Resides”, Jonathan Shirland

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

The Lives Of H-2b Workers In The Trump Era: An Anthropological Perspective On Immigration, Jade Kluver

Journal of International Women's Studies

The purpose of this ethnographic study is to describe the effects of the Trump Administration’s change in immigration policies on Romanian H-2B workers in South Florida. The effects of administration change on the H-2B program is generally defined within three themes that emerged from my research: The change in the concept of cultural space and how enforcement plays a role in the creation of boundaries; how policy change has an influence on migrant workers’ concept of identity and belonging; and lastly, how the program and outlying forces create a culture of uncertainty and fear. The article is based on three …

Their Stories, Their Voices: The Orphans Of The British Raj, Sayan Dey

Journal of International Women's Studies

The global evolution of the postcolonial era across diverse spatio-temporal zones generated a highly debatable paradigm: did postcoloniality generate a new epistemological and ontological framework that disentangled from the colonial patterns or did these patterns continue with the pre-existing colonial ideologies? With the end of colonization in India, the physically visible colonial empires of patriarchy were replaced by what we can refer to as “metaphysical empires”, which are physically invisible, but which operate ideologically in a very systematic and convincing manner, reproducing many of the hierarchies entrenched during the colonial period. The interpretation of postcolonial histories has been fractured with …

Re-Evaluating Gender Reforms In Non-Western Nations: A Case Study Of Women’S Empowerment In Japan, Maryam Alkubati

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper focuses on Japan, a socioeconomically advanced, developed democracy which has relatively low women’s representation within the national parliament. This case demonstrates the lack of systematic relationships between human development and women’s political participation. Prime Minister Shinzō Abe, since resuming office in 2012, has recognized the under-representation of women in the labor market and has subsequently promoted “Womenomics” as one of the three structural reform policies for reviving the Japanese economy. This study will examine the impact that the prime minister’s Womenomics strategies have had on the representation of women in the national parliament. The author collected and compared …

“All I See Is Through His Gaze!” Female Characters Through A Male Gaze In Modern Persian Fiction, Ronak Karami

Journal of International Women's Studies

Between the late 1960s and 1970s, Iran’s growing contact with the West aroused many contradictions, inner conflicts, and extravagancies. People could not stand the rapid transformations in the society and particularly in women’s situation that arose due to modernization. By this time, male novelists indicated all their inner tensions in the shape of a woman they created in their stories. This paper focuses on a notable modern Persian fiction, Prince Ehtejab by Houshang Golshiri that was first published in 1969. The author aims, at first, demonstrating how Golshiri uses the four female characters to, in effect, introduce the male narrator …

The Strides Of The Saudi Female Workforce: Overcoming Constraints And Contradictions In Transition, Deepanjana Varshney

Journal of International Women's Studies

For years Saudi Arabia has been engulfed by a widespread gender gap, discrimination and inequality; however, the new era has ushered a paradigm shift that has beckoned a rising women’s empowerment process. Today, Saudi women are better educated, more well-informed, and more financially independent as a result of a plethora of changes. Furthermore, their presence in various public spheres and social media is highly visible today. The government’s recent reforms have undisputedly catalyzed their foray into the workforce; however, effective integration is still a significant challenge. Nevertheless, Saudi women have consistently shown grit toward their employment and career amidst various …

Sustainable Women’S Entrepreneurship: A View From Two Brics Nations, Obianuju (Uju) E. Okeke-Uzodike

Journal of International Women's Studies

Women in Africa are poorer, less educated, and enjoy less access to jobs and opportunities than men. While that is true for women around the world, the situation in contemporary Africa appears deeper. Earlier neo-classical economists viewed women as irrational economic agents, but boosted by the intellectual activities of feminist economists that highlighted the gender bias of mainstream economics. The aid and development agencies such as the World Bank and UNDP have committed to poverty reduction by embracing and strengthening the idea of holistic human development to eliminate gender-related inequality. The concept is well spelt out in the national/regional policy …

Women, Metaphors And The Legitimisation Of Gender Bias In Spanish Proverbs, Benedicta Adokarley Lomotey

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper aims at analysing the role of proverbs in the sustenance of gender violence within the Spanish context. As demonstrated by feminist linguistic activities, one of the avenues through which the status quo of both men and women are enacted and sustained is through language. However, given the complex nature of the relationship between gender and language, speakers often overlook the role of discourse on gender relations. The author investigates this inter-connection using a multidimensional approach which includes insights from Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) theory of metaphor and Austin’s (1965) Speech Act theory. This study confirms that quite a …

Beauty Or The Beast? University Academics’ Perceptions Of Women’S Physical Appearance And Academic Achievements, Ladan Rahbari

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article explores perceptions of Iranian academics of the relationship between women’s physical appearance and academic achievements. The research is conducted using interviews with academics working in different universities in the field of social sciences. Results included individual and structural explanations of the relationship between women’s physical appearance and academic achievements. Data showed a significant emphasis by the participants on the importance of beauty for women. Gender differences were observed in participants’ responses as well as in emotional reactions to the interview questions. Most male participants viewed beauty as the primary resource and an asset for marriage marketing for women. …

Performance Of Controlling Rape In India: Efficiency Estimate Across States, Shrabanti Maity

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper addresses the performance of Indian states in controlling sexual assault or rape, on the basis of the data published by National Crime Record Bureau in India, the rape or sexual assault control performances of 28 major Indian states. The relative efficiencies of the states are evaluated by applying stochastic frontier analysis on a two decadal time period, namely, 2001 and 2011. Among the Indian states, although Kerala is recognised as the region where women are very progressive; unfortunately, our findings suggest that the performance of the state in controlling sexual assault is not impressive. On the contrary, Gujarat …

Towards A Politics Of Pain: Building Solidarities, Breaking Silences In Contemporary Chhattisgarh, India, Panchali Ray

Journal of International Women's Studies

This essay is based on a series of interviews with Soni Sori, an activist, educationist, and a political figure, who has become the face of adivasi (tribal) resistance to state-corporate acquisition of community land for industry, in Chhattisgarh, India. Soni Sori, who is a prominent figure in the resistance movement against State atrocities on poor adivasi farmers, was accused of Left extremism, and subsequently arrested and sexually tortured in police custody. In her own words, this was to shame her into silence and prevent her from participating in public life, again. In this essay, I ask how does pain enter …

Are “Blessers” A Refuge For Refugee Girls In Tshwane, The Capital City Of South Africa? A Phenomenographic Study, Azwihangwisi Helen Mavhandu-Mudzusi

Journal of International Women's Studies

This phenomenographic study reports on the engagement of refugee girls in sexual relationships with blessers in Tshwane, the capital city of South Africa. Data were collected from 20 refugee girls through open and intense individual interviews guided by a semi-structured interview schedule. The audio-recorded interviews were transcribed and analyzed thematically using Sjöström and Dahlgren’s approach to data analysis. Results indicate that girls engage in the “blesser blessee” relationship in order to escape from poverty, sex work and poor living conditions.

Blessers provide refuge for refugee girls through meeting their basic needs such as food, shelter, clothes and means of communication. …

Contemporary Temporary Marriage: A Blog-Analysis Of First-Hand Experiences, Sammy Z. Badran, Brian Turnbull

Journal of International Women's Studies

Within Islam, a temporary marriage generally implies a short-term marriage between a man and a woman that does not come with a long-term commitment and may or may not have an explicit, pre-established timeline or endpoint. The partial religious legitimation of temporary marriage via Islamic fatwas has recently revived the institution. Some suggest that the rising popularity is an attempt by individuals to fulfill sexual desires within the confines of a religiously-legitimized institution; while others argue that it can lead to exploitation and perhaps slavery of women and girls. Conclusions supporting both the positive and negative aspects of temporary marriage …

The Priming Of Arab-Israeli Stereotypes: How News Stories May Enhance Or Inhibit Audience Stereotypes, Erika Katherine Johnson

Journal of International Women's Studies

The goal of this study was to understand how news stories about Arab and Israeli women prime stereotypes in Americans, extending research on priming and ethnic media representation. A 2 (female target ethnicity: Arab and Israeli) x 3 (depiction type: prototypical, non-prototypical, and control) x 3 (multiple messages) mixed factorial design was conducted to examine how depiction and ethnicity in news story stimuli would interact with stereotype activation and accuracy (N = 107). Results showed that participants exhibited higher stereotyping after reading prototypical stories about Arab women and after they were not primed by stories. Also, participants who read non-prototypical …

Attitudes Toward Women In Palestine: A Quantitative Survey, Erni Gustafsson, Nabil Alawi, Per Normann Andersen

Journal of International Women's Studies

The survey’s aim is to address whether or not the practice placement of Norwegian social work students over six consecutive years in the Balata Refugee Camp in Nablus, Palestine, has had any impact on the attitudes toward women among the population in the Camp. To achieve this, two groups, one experimental and one control, of a total 261 respondents, have been exposed to the Attitudes Toward Women Scale (AWS) that is translated from English to Arabic for this purpose. Another research was to see if there are statistical differences between male and female respondents, and if there is an association …

A Contemporary Palestinian Reading Of Gender Politics In Margaret Cavendish’S The Unnatural Tragedy, Bilal Tawfiq Hamamra

Journal of International Women's Studies

Margaret Cavendish’s The Unnatural Tragedy (1650) is both tribute to and critique of Ford’s ’Tis Pity She’s a Whore (1633). I argue that The Unnatural Tragedy undermines the masculine ideology on female speech and silence, linking male figures’ voices with treachery and incest and female voice, conventionally sexualized, with truth and honesty. The main thrust of The Unnatural Tragedy is against the passive feminine virtues embodied by Madame Bonit and Soeur whose adherence to the feminine virtues of silence and obedience and the masculine ideology of honour lead to their loss of control over their lives. In contrast to silence, …

“Grey Chicken”: Female Students As Exploitation Victims In The Commercial Sex Industry, Bagong Suyanto

Journal of International Women's Studies

“Grey chicken” is a term used to describe female students involved in prostitution practices. The number and distribution of students who double as prostitutes are increasing in urban areas, thus requiring immediate attention. This study found a number of reasons why female students fall into prostitution. In addition to the pressures of poverty and dysfunctional families, other factors that encourage prostitution include the influence of destructive peer-groups and being date-rape victims by their romantic partners. Female student prostitutes are not only victims of economic exploitation, but also psychological exploitation in forms of inhumane treatment from their customers, as well as …

Gcc Labor Market, Education And Generation Y Females: A Match Or Mismatch?, Cameron Mirza, Magdalena Karolak

Journal of International Women's Studies

The aim of this paper is to analyze the convergence between the current state of education, labor markets’’ preparedness, and expectations of Generation Y females taking Bahrain as a case study. Generation Y is defined as the group of people aged 30 years and under. Although Generation Y is a worldwide phenomenon and members of this generational group share certain characteristics globally, in Gulf Cooperation Council countries [GCC] they display strong pressure to succeed, a need of gaining a high salary but also to acquire knowledge and expertise; and a preference for a strong work-life balance. In addition, in the …