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You're Trans-Mexi-Fying Right Before Our Eyes: Westernized Bodily Features And Beauty Practices In Ugly Betty, Luz-Maria Tato-Pazo Jan 2015

You're Trans-Mexi-Fying Right Before Our Eyes: Westernized Bodily Features And Beauty Practices In Ugly Betty, Luz-Maria Tato-Pazo

Journal of International Women's Studies

Makeover narratives are a form of discourse which relies on some type of transformation as a path to success. These narratives mainly target the bodies of white middle-class and middle-aged heterosexual women with the aim of creating more conventionally beautiful feminine subjects. This article explores the beauty practices and rituals present in the US dramedy Ugly Betty. We look in detail at makeover narratives and their close association with contemporary idealized versions of female attractiveness. Closely tied up with the makeover canon, the beauty industry entails processes of disciplining women’s bodies to meet the requirements of an ideal feminine …


Ecofeminism And Natural Disasters: Sri Lankan Women Post-Tsunami, Alyssa Banford, Cameron Kiely Froude Jan 2015

Ecofeminism And Natural Disasters: Sri Lankan Women Post-Tsunami, Alyssa Banford, Cameron Kiely Froude

Journal of International Women's Studies

Women experience a host of negative consequences during and after a natural disaster. A variety of feminist theories have been used to explore this phenomenon. The aim of this paper is to posit the need for an ecofeminist perspective on analyzing women’s vulnerabilities post-natural disaster. The authors will discuss the history and branches of ecofeminism, highlighting their utility in exploring the intersection of race, class, and gender in the aftermath of disaster. An ecofeminist analysis of Sri Lankan women’s vulnerability in the wake of the 2004 tsunami will be used to illustrate the utility of the theory. Implications of using …


You Are What You (M)Eat: Explorations Of Meat-Eating, Masculinity And Masquerade, Amy Calvert Oct 2014

You Are What You (M)Eat: Explorations Of Meat-Eating, Masculinity And Masquerade, Amy Calvert

Journal of International Women's Studies

Food consumption is frequently linked to identity and to who we are as individuals, which I explore through the analysis of the US reality television series Man V. Food. Through close readings of various scenes, I look at representations of hegemonic masculine performance, and the sexualisation of women and meat. In light of my analysis, I argue that the show is both post-feminist and part of a wider backlash against feminist action. Man V. Food is analysed in consideration of the wider phenomena of masculine crisis and backlash against various social movements, specifically recent feminist and vegetarian/vegan movements. This …


Introduction: "New Directions In Feminist Studies - Emotions, Activisms, Intersectionality", Trishima Mitra-Kahn, Katya Salmi Oct 2014

Introduction: "New Directions In Feminist Studies - Emotions, Activisms, Intersectionality", Trishima Mitra-Kahn, Katya Salmi

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.


Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun: A Historical Survey Of A Woman Artist In The Eighteenth Century, Evangelia Karvouni Aug 2014

Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun: A Historical Survey Of A Woman Artist In The Eighteenth Century, Evangelia Karvouni

Journal of International Women's Studies

Elisabeth Louise Vigee Le Brun may be considered one of the most celebrated women artists of eighteenth century France. The elegance of her style and her ability to produce idealized images of her noble sitters made her increasingly popular within royalist circles. She was particularly favoured by the Queen Marie Antoinette whom she painted in a manner that provoked controversy among the critics and the public. Vigee Le Brun’s approach to her royal subject was very sentimental as it can be seen from her statements in her autobiography, the “Memoirs”. After the outbreak of the Revolution, Vigee Le Brun fled …


Sensational Kin: Family, Normativity And Women's Weekly Magazines, Melanie Anne Stewart Dec 2013

Sensational Kin: Family, Normativity And Women's Weekly Magazines, Melanie Anne Stewart

Journal of International Women's Studies

This essay analyses a range of British women’s weekly magazines commonly referred to as ‘Women’s Weeklies’. Examples of these texts include Pick-Me-Up, Take-a-Break, Real People, and Closer. Unlike more widely researched magazines such as Cosmopolitan or Glamour, the women’s weeklies draw their readership based on the supposed autobiographical nature of the narratives, which in turn generates the ‘authenticity’ attributed to personal narratives. In this essay I analyse the personal narratives of the weeklies within the wider public sphere, arguing that such personal narratives render women’s weeklies relevant in political debate. The essay demonstrates how the individual …


Living In The Garden Of Perhaps: Ordinary Life As An Obstacle To Political Change In Israel, Katherine Natanel Dec 2013

Living In The Garden Of Perhaps: Ordinary Life As An Obstacle To Political Change In Israel, Katherine Natanel

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article explores how gender in part shapes the contours of small worlds or ‘elsewheres’ (Haraway 1992), constructed by Jewish Israelis as they pursue ‘ordinary lives’ in a context of conflict and sustained political violence. Situating as central the experiences, perceptions and behaviours of the dominant sector in Jewish Israeli society—middle-class Ashkenazi Jews living in Israel’s urban centres—the article appraises the work done by the production and maintenance of dual worlds, what lies at stake in their loss and their implications for political change. By building upon the work of feminist and queer theorists who consider the centrality of intimacy …


No Place Like Home: Re-Writing "Home" And Re-Locating Lesbianism In Emma Donoghue's Stir-Fry And Hood, Emma Young Dec 2013

No Place Like Home: Re-Writing "Home" And Re-Locating Lesbianism In Emma Donoghue's Stir-Fry And Hood, Emma Young

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article considers contemporary novelist Emma Donoghue’s early novels, Stir-Fry (1994) and Hood (1995), and argues that these works contribute to a re-defining of the home space in relation to lesbian sexuality. I draw on theoretical arguments from the social sciences, feminist, gender and sexuality studies, and literary criticism to reveal how an inter-disciplinary approach to Donoghue’s novels illuminates a more nuanced interpretation of their depiction of home space that ensures a ‘home’ for lesbianism is (re)located. At the same time, Donoghue’s novels are revealed to posit their own theorising on home and sexuality. By focusing on objects—including the infamous …


South Asian Fiction And Marital Agency Of Muslim Wives, Hafiza Nilofar Khan Aug 2013

South Asian Fiction And Marital Agency Of Muslim Wives, Hafiza Nilofar Khan

Journal of International Women's Studies

This essay deals with the treatment of wifely agency as delineated by three South Asian women writers: Ismat Chughtai, Tehmina Durrani and Selina Hossain. It tries to prove that the Muslim wives as projected in the fiction of these writers from the patriarchal societies of India, Pakistan and Bangladesh are not uniformly oppressed victims of socio-religious discourses. Though often their bodies are subjected to rigorous discipline, docility and even battery, these wives still demonstrate sufficient agential powers to resist the status quo and chalk out a fresh trope of identity for themselves. Their domestic agency, sexual agency and decision-making powers, …


Religion As A Factor Influencing Turkish Women's Decisions To Work, Mary Lou O’Neil, Mehmet Huseyin Bilgin Aug 2013

Religion As A Factor Influencing Turkish Women's Decisions To Work, Mary Lou O’Neil, Mehmet Huseyin Bilgin

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article uses survey data collected from more than 500 women in Istanbul to examine whether or not religion exerts an influence on women’s decisions to work or not. Our work revealed that religion does not appear to have a direct impact on whether or not Turkish women choose to work. Rather the expectation that women fulfill their traditional roles as caregivers proves a greater obstacle for women who wish to enter the labor market. Religion, in the case of Turkey, Islam, can only be seen as an influence on Turkish women’s work decisions to the extent that it supports …


Participation, Representation And Voice In The Fight Against Gender Violence: The Case Of The Women’S Movement In Spain, Adriana Sandu Feb 2013

Participation, Representation And Voice In The Fight Against Gender Violence: The Case Of The Women’S Movement In Spain, Adriana Sandu

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article provides a critical examination of ‘whiteness’ and notions of ‘sisterhood solidarity’ in the context of women’s fight against gender violence in Spain. Drawing on intersectionality theory this article focuses on how different women’s organisations deal with gender violence policy in Spain, how this debate is framed, who makes the claims, and what structural inequalities are being preserved in this process. Using qualitative interviews with women activists, observations and participation in meetings and debates of women’s organisations in Madrid and Barcelona during 2007-2008, this research explores the inter-relations between majority and minority women’s mobilization, organization, political influence and voice. …


International Dimensions Of Discrimination And Violence Against Girls: A Human Rights Perspective, Yvonne Rafferty Feb 2013

International Dimensions Of Discrimination And Violence Against Girls: A Human Rights Perspective, Yvonne Rafferty

Journal of International Women's Studies

In many cultures, being born female can consign the girl child to the peripheries of society where her safety is denied and her human rights are routinely violated. At each and every stage of development, girls are more likely than boys to confront a host of disadvantages associated with discrimination and violence, although the social norms and cultural rules that influence girls are most intensely felt as she struggles to develop into adulthood. At the onset of puberty, or even before, some girls are pulled out of school and forced into early marriage and high-risk pregnancy. Others become victims of …


Arab Women, Social Media, And The Arab Spring: Applying The Framework Of Digital Reflexivity To Analyze Gender And Online Activism, Victoria A. Newsom, Lara Lengel Oct 2012

Arab Women, Social Media, And The Arab Spring: Applying The Framework Of Digital Reflexivity To Analyze Gender And Online Activism, Victoria A. Newsom, Lara Lengel

Journal of International Women's Studies

This essay analyzes the engagement of Arab feminist activisms online, most notably during the citizen revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt, and, specifically, women’s use of online social networking to aid social change. Building on research examining how Arab activists and activist organizations, including feminist organizations, mobilize, produce knowledge, and develop and share resources online and, in particular, drawing from research on Arab activisms and social media this study aims to understand how online activist discourses function, both locally and globally. To do so, we utilize a schema of information production and consumption devised to analyze activist engagement and citizen journalism, …


‘For My Torturer’: An African Woman’S Transformative Art Of Truth, Justice And Peace-Making During Colonialism, Priya Narismulu Sep 2012

‘For My Torturer’: An African Woman’S Transformative Art Of Truth, Justice And Peace-Making During Colonialism, Priya Narismulu

Journal of International Women's Studies

Against a range of injustices African women have made powerful challenges to structural, gender and repressive violence through their interventions in questions of justice, dialogue, creativity and transformation. This article addresses an activist’s interventions against colonial oppression by examining gender as the central variable in the relationship between justice and activism in African women’s creative literature. The poem “For my Torturer, Lieutenant D…” was written in prison by the Algerian activist Leila Djabali who navigated the silences and challenges of gender, age and national identity (postcolonial). It challenges the violence of colonial and patriarchal silencing to expose torture and rape …


Healthy Choices And Heavy Burdens: Race, Citizenship And Gender In The ‘Obesity Epidemic’, Jeanne Firth Mar 2012

Healthy Choices And Heavy Burdens: Race, Citizenship And Gender In The ‘Obesity Epidemic’, Jeanne Firth

Journal of International Women's Studies

The ‘obesity epidemic’ is widely accepted as a major public health threat in the United States. This paper provides a critical examination of the White House Task Force on Childhood Obesity’s action plan that is foundational to First Lady Michelle Obama’s ‘Let’s Move!’ campaign. The report reveals ideological anxieties about race, American citizenship, changing gender roles and women’s bodies. The framing of obesity as a personal problem and individual failing reflects the merger of American individualism and neoliberalism. Self-regulation and responsibility (and the mother’s responsibility for her children) are key in prescriptions to manage obesity, reflecting biopolitical techniques of governance …


Intersectionality Queer Studies And Hybridity: Methodological Frameworks For Social Research, Aristea Fotopoulou Mar 2012

Intersectionality Queer Studies And Hybridity: Methodological Frameworks For Social Research, Aristea Fotopoulou

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article seeks to draw links between intersectionality and queer studies as epistemological strands by examining their common methodological tasks and by tracing some similar difficulties of translating theory into research methods. Intersectionality is the systematic study of the ways in which differences such as race, gender, sexuality, class, ethnicity and other sociopolitical and cultural identities interrelate. Queer theory, when applied as a distinct methodological approach to the study of gender and sexuality, has sought to denaturalise categories of analysis and make normativity visible. By examining existing research projects framed as ‘queer’ alongside ones that use intersectionality, I consider the …


Book Review: Women Of The Conquest Dynasties: Gender And Identity In Liao And Jin China, Elmé Vivier Mar 2012

Book Review: Women Of The Conquest Dynasties: Gender And Identity In Liao And Jin China, Elmé Vivier

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Women of the Conquest Dynasties: Gender and Identity in Liao and Jin China by Linda Cooke Johnson.


Re-Articulating The New Mestiza, Zalfa Feghali Mar 2011

Re-Articulating The New Mestiza, Zalfa Feghali

Journal of International Women's Studies

This essay provides an overview, critique, and the beginning of a refiguration of Gloria Anzaldúa’s theorization of the new mestiza as set out in her seminal 1987 book Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. By examining both Anzaldúa’s precursors and the articulations of hybrid identities of her contemporaries, this essay depicts the complex dynamic that characterizes the mestiza’s need to develop, beyond borders and attempts to fashion a more contemporary, transnational mestiza. Using the writing and criticism of Françoise Lionnet alongside Anzaldúa’s and other critics, and utilizing postcolonial and feminist theories, this essay hopes to provide an alternative articulation to …


The Tearful Gaze In Elizabeth Gaskell’S Ruth: Crying, Watching And Nursing, Rosemary Langridge Mar 2011

The Tearful Gaze In Elizabeth Gaskell’S Ruth: Crying, Watching And Nursing, Rosemary Langridge

Journal of International Women's Studies

Using the complex figure of Mary Magdalene, in her various guises as sexualised sinner, repentant weeper and observant watcher, this essay addresses the complexities and contradictions found in Elizabeth Gaskell’s 1853 novel Ruth. Although presenting a largely sympathetic view of the ‘fallen woman,’ the eventual catastrophic and puzzling demise of the protagonist casts a bleak picture of the likelihood of redemption for such women in nineteenth century British society. As several feminist critics have pointed out, the narrative is frequently disrupted by the unspoken presence female sexuality suggesting Gaskell’s uncertainty about the nature of her heroine’s fall; was Ruth’s sexual …


The Golden Cage: Western Women In The Compound In A Muslim Country, Roni Berger Jan 2011

The Golden Cage: Western Women In The Compound In A Muslim Country, Roni Berger

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article presents the results of a qualitative study, in which postings in virtual communities were content analyzed to capture the lived experience of western women residing in compounds in the Arab world. In spite of their growing number and unique characteristics, the life and struggles of these women has not been studied. Four major themes emerged: challenges, perceived benefits, available support systems and coping strategies. These themes are discussed and illustrated.


Book Review: Challenging Identities: Muslim Women In Australia, Peliwe P. Mnguni Jan 2011

Book Review: Challenging Identities: Muslim Women In Australia, Peliwe P. Mnguni

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Challenging Identities: Muslim Women in Australia, edited by Shahram Akbarzadeh.


Book Review: African Women & Icts: Investigating Technology, Gender And Empowerment, Karen Keifer-Boyd Jan 2011

Book Review: African Women & Icts: Investigating Technology, Gender And Empowerment, Karen Keifer-Boyd

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of African Women & ICTs: Investigating Technology, Gender and Empowerment, edited by Ineke Buskins & Anne Webb


Contradiction And The Role Of The ‘Floating Signifier’: Identity And The ‘New Woman’ In Italian Cartoons During Fascism, Efharis Mascha May 2010

Contradiction And The Role Of The ‘Floating Signifier’: Identity And The ‘New Woman’ In Italian Cartoons During Fascism, Efharis Mascha

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper addresses the issue of political cartooning during Italian fascism, with specific reference to the role of women, as it is symbolised in the cartoons (i.e.the woman-mother/care-taker/fascist/worker). The latter will be revealed through a careful study of the contradictions generated by fascism and the representation of this ‘New Woman’ in political satire. The caricatures I will examine belong strictly to the Left discourse. They received high circulation figures and characterised Italy’s popular culture during the 1920’s. Whilst fascism did not provide any space for women to join the high ranks of the PNF (Partito Nazionale Fascista), the Left similarly …


Book Review: Rethinking Global Sisterhood: Western Feminism And Iran, Melissa Autumn White May 2010

Book Review: Rethinking Global Sisterhood: Western Feminism And Iran, Melissa Autumn White

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Rethinking Global Sisterhood: Western Feminism and Iran by Nima Naghibi


South Asian Muslim American Girl Power: Structures And Symbols Of Control And Self-Expression, Marcia Hermansen, Mahruq F. Khan Nov 2009

South Asian Muslim American Girl Power: Structures And Symbols Of Control And Self-Expression, Marcia Hermansen, Mahruq F. Khan

Journal of International Women's Studies

South Asian Muslim American (SAMA) girls studied ethnographically in Chicago and more broadly in the United States negotiate these three components (South Asian, Muslim, and American) of identity across the spheres of home, Islamic institutions, and the public “American” realm. Drawing on interviews and fieldwork at an Islamic school and within South Asian families and mosques, the authors illustrate how nascent “girl” power is evidenced in these contexts drawing on media representations, academic sources, and data drawn from participant observation. Sources of SAMA girls’ expressions of confidence and power are selective use of identity markers, increased mastery of Islamic knowledge, …


Book Review: Liberating Shahrazad: Feminism, Postcolonialism, And Islam, Sanaa Benmessaoud Sep 2009

Book Review: Liberating Shahrazad: Feminism, Postcolonialism, And Islam, Sanaa Benmessaoud

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Liberating Shahrazad: Feminism, Postcolonialism, and Islam by Suzanne Gauch


Health Consequences Of Rural Women’S Productive Role In Agriculture In The Philippines And Other Developing Countries, Ma. Elena Chiong-Javier May 2009

Health Consequences Of Rural Women’S Productive Role In Agriculture In The Philippines And Other Developing Countries, Ma. Elena Chiong-Javier

Journal of International Women's Studies

Agriculture is central to developing countries like the Philippines and rural women contribute a substantial share of the labor that goes into this sector as food producers or agricultural workers. In the wake of numerous studies conducted worldwide about women since the United Nations’ Decade for Women (1976-1984), data appear sparse on the relationship between women’s work and women’s health in the agricultural setting to enable policy makers and program implementors to adequately address their health needs. Thus this study aimed to determine the nature of available information in the gender literature to enable us to understand the link between …


Fighting For Subjectivity: Articulations Of Physicality In Girlfight, Katharina Lindner Mar 2009

Fighting For Subjectivity: Articulations Of Physicality In Girlfight, Katharina Lindner

Journal of International Women's Studies

The analysis of Girlfight (Karyn Kusama, 2000) in this paper is framed by critical discourses surrounding physically active female characters in the action genre, the conventions of the boxing film ‘genre’, the relationship between bodily spectacle and narrative structure, as well as the more general significance of the female boxer’s challenge to normative and binary notions of bodily existence and subjectivity. With a particular focus on the interrelationship between narrative structure and boxing sequences (‘numbers’), this paper explores notions of the (gendered) subjectivity constructed around the film’s female boxing character, Diana (Michelle Rodriguez). I will argue that the boxing ‘numbers’ …


The Impact Of Sexual Harassment On Turnover Intentions, Absenteeism, And Job Satisfaction: Findings From Argentina, Brazil And Chile, Rebecca S. Merkin Nov 2008

The Impact Of Sexual Harassment On Turnover Intentions, Absenteeism, And Job Satisfaction: Findings From Argentina, Brazil And Chile, Rebecca S. Merkin

Journal of International Women's Studies

This study, which tested the effects of sexual harassment on consequences previously indicated in US studies, (i.e., overall turnover intentions, overall absenteeism and job dissatisfaction), was conducted with 8108 employees chosen by the International Labour Organization (ILO) in three Latin American countries – Argentina, Brazil, and Chile. Multivariate and logistic regression were employed while controlling for age, education, gender, marital status, and race to analyze ILO’s database. Significant results revealed that Latin American employees who were sexually harassed were likely to have more turnover intentions and to engage in more absenteeism; yet they did not experience a significant decrease in …


Negotiating And Navigating The Rough Terrain Of Transnational Feminist Research, Tanya Bahkru Nov 2008

Negotiating And Navigating The Rough Terrain Of Transnational Feminist Research, Tanya Bahkru

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article examines aspects of feminist methodology pertinent to carrying out transnational research within an era of globalization. I explore the use of self-reflexivity, engagement with conceptualizations of insider/outsider, and the employment of feminist critiques of notions of objectivity within the research process as feminist methodological tools relevant to transnational feminist research. I argue that in an age of globalization, such methodological frameworks and tools are necessary in research committed to feminist contestations of globalization in that the nature of transnational research sustains an ever dynamic and shifting landscape of personal, political, and geographical relationships. This article draws upon my …