Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Discipline And Surveillance: Adolescent Girls Talk About Body And Sexuality: A Case Study From Kolkata, India, Piyali Sur

Journal of International Women's Studies

Adolescent girls are inundated with contradictory messages on sexuality. Adolescence is socially constructed as being controlled by “raging hormones” but ‘good girls” are asexual, devoid of any desire or passion. Schools discipline students’ bodies to prohibit any spilling over of sexuality that may pollute the educational environment. At the same time girls are also exposed through the internet to ‘girl power’ culture speaking of freedom, autonomy and choice in matters of sexuality. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 25 adolescent girls aged 15 to 19 years belonging to the middle class, going to reputed English medium private schools in Kolkata, a …

Manifestations Of Power And Marginality In Marriage Practices: A Qualitative Analysis Of Sukuma Songs In Tanzania, Esther J. Masele, Venkatachalam Lakshmanan

Journal of International Women's Studies

This study examined manifestations of power and marginality in Sukuma marriage practices. The study was conducted in Kishapu District, Tanzania. It drew its materials from Sukuma marriage rituals, which include singing and performance of songs. The study adopted an ethnographic research design and used both primary and secondary data to analyse the construction of gender roles in songs and societal views. The songs were observed at live performances, and data related to their composition, interpretation, and impact were gathered through interviews with the singers. Thematic Code Analysis was used to analyze the data, which were then interpreted based on poststructuralist …

Reinforced Stereotypes: A Case Study On School Textbooks In Egypt, Dina Wafa

Journal of International Women's Studies

Gender equality in access to education may be increasing, yet several studies have indicated that school textbooks tend to be gender biased. These studies have also concluded that there is an associated influence of school textbooks on children’s beliefs and values within such textbooks, which has the capacity to reinforce stereotypical roles for women and place a glass ceiling on their empowerment. This paper focuses on the reinforced stereotypical gender roles depicted in primary school textbooks in Egypt, which subconsciously affects girls’ self-esteem and stifles their empowerment. It provides a mixed method of analysis of the Egyptian centralized state school …

Socioeconomic And Demographic Predictors Of Women's First Birth At An Early Age: Evidence From Bangladesh’S Demographic And Health Survey, 2004-2014, Akhtarul Islam, Sharlene Alauddin, Sutapa D. Barna

Journal of International Women's Studies

Women's health is highly influenced by early childbearing in 95% of developing countries such as Bangladesh. Women who have their first child at an early age receive fewer years of schooling, which also influences their employment life. Women's early age at first birth creates health complications, increases both maternal and child mortality, and prolongs the reproductive duration as well as a country's fertility rate. This is a major social and public health problem around the world. This study aims to investigate the existing situation in Bangladesh and to identify the triggering influencing factors of age at first birth. A cross-sectional …

The New And The Old: Responses To Change In The Kingdom Of Saudi Arabia, Maura A. E. Pilotti, Eman J. Y. Abdulhadi, Tahani A. Algouhi, Muamar H. Salameh

Journal of International Women's Studies

This qualitative study was primarily concerned with Saudi women’s reactions to social change in the political sphere. It focused on their responses to decrees allowing women to vote in municipal elections for the first time, become candidates in such elections, and be nominated in the Shura Council by the King. Structured interviews of urban dwellers illustrated that changes, seen as opportunities, had been noted, but their impact had yet to be processed thoroughly. Attitudes towards political participation were positive and largely optimistic, but rarely seen as applying to the self. Competence, rather than gender, was seen as relevant to voters’ …

Voices Of Thai Women Who Received Gender-Sensitive Empowerment Counseling, Somporn Rungreangkulkij, Netchanok Kaewjanta, Ingkata Kotnara, Kesorn Saithanu

Journal of International Women's Studies

In Thailand, as in most countries, mental health treatment is focused on a medical model. A new approach using Gender-Sensitive Empowerment Counseling as a form of intervention for women with depression was employed in this study. This qualitative study describes clients’ perspectives on receiving Gender-Sensitive Empowerment Counseling. Participants were fourteen women with depression who received empowerment counseling. In-depth interviews were used for data collection. Data analysis is content analysis. Five themes emerged: attitude change, feeling empowered, self-confidence, becoming more assertive, and greater self-love. Health care policy and service should integrate gender analysis and empowerment into the treatment modality. Supporting gender-sensitive …

Assessing The Association Between The Night Shift Schedule And Mental Health Symptoms Among Filipino Women Factory Workers: A Cross-Sectional Study, Sophia Francesca D. Lu, Jinky Leilanie D. Lu

Journal of International Women's Studies

Within the fields of mental and occupational health, the “night shift” is one of the major concerns the work-time schedule. The association between working at night and the occurrence of mental health symptoms among women workers has been a subject of considerable debate. This study explores the association between working at night and mental health symptoms, and the mediating factors to this association. This study examined a database of 500 factory workers, about 90% of whom were women who had originally been pat of a study of hazard exposures and the occupational health of workers in export processing zones in …

Analysis Of Growth And Identifications Of The Determinants Of Crime Against Women: Insight From India, Shrabanti Maity, Sucharita Roy

Journal of International Women's Studies

The pattern of growth of crime against women across 19 Indian states during the period 2001- 2015 reveals that states like West Bengal and Assam have the largest growth rate of crime against women, while Tamil Nadu shows negative growth, suggesting an efficient utilisation of crime control measures by the state. While exploring the role of different socioeconomic factors that largely influence crime against women, by using econometric analysis it has been identified that female education and the size of the female Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) population have strong positive roles in increasing crime against women but …

An Alternative Proposal Of Justice: Muslim Women Activists And Socio-Legal Realities In India, Qazi S. Rasheed, Arun K. Sharma

Journal of International Women's Studies

In India, with the change of political leadership at the center, the sanctity of religion- based Muslim family law has been contested. This has led to the development of a new socio-political discourse which is influenced and shaped by the basic feminist ideals of equal rights for women. In this discourse, Muslim women are portrayed as necessarily suffering from unjust family laws and needing immediate cover and protection from the secular state. In the light of the judicial reform which makes the practice of instant divorce through ‘triple talaq’ among Muslims a punishable offence, this article discusses that for Muslim …

Naima Zitane’S Revolutionary Play, Dialy: Using The Vagina Trope To “Talk Back” To The Islamist Party’S Calls For ‘Halal’ Art In Morocco, Maha Tazi

Journal of International Women's Studies

In 2012, at the outset of the “Moroccan Spring” and the election of the Islamist Justice and Development Party (PJD) to power, Naima Zitane, a Moroccan feminist playwright and founder of the Aquarium Theatre, directed and released her controversial play Dialy (“Mine” in English) inspired by Ensler’s text The Vagina Monologues and drawing on the real-life testimonies of 150 Moroccan women. In a context where the recently elected Islamist party was calling for ‘clean’ and ‘halal’ art, the play tackled the topic of female sexuality and one of the biggest taboos of the Moroccan society- the vagina. Combining a textual …

Domestic Violence Against Women In The Nigerian Rural Context, Chisaa O. Igbolekwu, Ogadimma Arusukwu, Joseph N. Nwogu, Bamidele Rasak, Festus Asamu, Ngozi O. Osueke

Journal of International Women's Studies

The problem of domestic violence is not new to African societies. This study focused on the remote causes and implications of domestic violence among rural women. The study adopted a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods of data collection. The respondents were selected using stratified and simple random sampling techniques. Findings revealed that 82.3% of the respondents agree that the economic dependence of women on men is among the major causes of domestic violence, while 52.3% of respondents believe that their communities encourage and tolerate some abusive behavior. A total of 61.5% of the respondents posit that religious and traditional …

Persistence Of The Glass Ceiling In Academia Globally With A Focus On Women Academics In Kenyan Universities, Bhoke Chacha

Journal of International Women's Studies

Despite the existence of elaborate legal frameworks in Kenya that guarantee gender equity in all spheres of life, women academics in Kenyan universities still encounter many roadblocks in their quest to become professors. One position that has dominated recent discourse regarding the promotion of women in Kenyan universities is that women have generally arrived late into academia. It is also argued that the conflict between women’s traditional roles at home and productive work interferes with academic leadership. This paper offers a rebuttal of these arguments, and gives empirical statistics on the number of women PhDs that have come through the …

Women And Evolution Of Cultural Practices Among The Igbo Of Nigeria, Christian C. Opata, Apex A. Apeh, Asogwa S. Odoja, Alaku Emmanuel

Journal of International Women's Studies

Studies on Igbo women have ignored the part played by either fear of women or respect for them in the evolution of festivals and some customary practices. Embedded in this neglect is the non-recognition of their contribution to the development of their societies. However, evidence that some cultural practices evolved out of fear of women and respect for them by the men abounds as manifest in the evolution of some spirit being institutions, memorialisation of women’s war exploits, and veneration of kola nut. Anchored on extensive field investigation, the application of historical narrative and qualitative research method, this study traced …

Women’S Cultural Attendance In Istanbul: Why So Low?, Sacit H. Akdede, Victoria Ateca-Amestoy

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper investigates the possible determinants of attendance at cultural and artistic events in Istanbul, Turkey, which was designated one of Europe’s cultural capitals in 2010. The unique data set used in this study was drawn from a representative sample of households in Istanbul by selecting one individual over the age of 18 from each household for interview. A professional research company in Istanbul used clustered random sampling to collect information from 100 main and 100 substitute clusters from the Istanbul area. Zero-inflated negative binomial methodology was used to analyze the determinants of attendance at different cultural events in Istanbul. …

Navigating The Minefield: Women's Experiences Of Abortion In A Country With A Conscience Clause—The Case Of Croatia, Dubravka I. G. Håkansson, Pernilla Ouis, Maria E. Ragnar

Journal of International Women's Studies

Many countries around the world have a conscience clause allowing physicians and health care providers to opt-out of performing abortions. This practice of conscientious objection to abortion care affects both healthcare providers and women's access to abortion care. In Croatia, a conscience clause was introduced in 2003. Nonetheless, women's experiences of abortion after the introduction have not been previously studied. The aim of our study was to explore women's experiences of abortion and conscientious objection in a country with a conscience clause. The study has a qualitative inductive and explorative design. We interviewed seven (7) women in Croatia with experience …

The Fault In Traditional And Formal Approaches To Domestic Violence: A Call For Reform In West Sumatra, Ratih Lestarini, Dianwidhi M. Pranoto, Tirtaweng Tirtawening

Journal of International Women's Studies

The number of domestic violence cases against women increases every year and is a constant occurrence in almost all of Indonesia’s provinces. Instead of being a ‘home sweet home’, the homes of domestically abused women become their realized nightmare. Domestic violence occurs not only in patrilineal societies, but also in societies that adopt a matrilineal system. This becomes a contradiction as it is expected that a matrilineal system would enable women to occupy a higher social and economic status than men, thus affording them more leverage in the domestic realm. In fact, data shows that domestic violence in West Sumatra, …

The Surrogacy Regulation (2019) Bill Of India: A Critique, Astha Srivastava

Journal of International Women's Studies

Assisted Reproductive technologies (ARTs) like In Vitro Fertilization (IVF) and surrogacy have made aspirations of parenthood come true for many. With quality medical services, low costs and an indifferent regulatory regime, the surrogacy industry, particularly of the commercial and trans-border variety, has boomed in India so much so that India had once been termed as the ‘baby factory’ of the world. Through successive administrative measures the government of India has tried to regulate surrogacy with a view to prevent exploitation of women. At least two comprehensive bills to regulate various aspects of surrogacy arrangements have been tabled in the Parliament, …

Exposure To Pornography Among Young Eritreans: An Exploratory Study, Fikresus Amahazion

Journal of International Women's Studies

The pornography industry is a multibillion-dollar global industry, and it has been normalized in many aspects of popular culture. Pornography use and exposure are increasingly becoming common and widespread, particularly with the rapid growth and spread of the Internet, smartphones, and social media. In many countries around the world, pornography is widely available, easily accessible, and consumed by large segments of the general population. While many studies have been conducted on the use and impacts of pornography, exploring the topic within various contexts around the world, empirical studies from developing countries, particularly in Africa, are sparse. The present study is …

Explaining The Lack Of Progress In Yemeni Women’S Empowerment: Are Women Leaders The Problem?, Nadia Al-Sakkaf

Journal of International Women's Studies

Despite the existence of women’s empowerment policies and the appointments of women leaders to oversee the implementation and sometimes design of those policies, the Republic of Yemen has repeatedly ranked last in the WEF Gender Gap Index since 2006. Is this a problem of capacity? Are the women leaders, who are driving the national women’s development agenda forward, lacking in this field? This article investigates this question through a mixed-method research by surveying and interviewing Yemeni women leaders who were involved in empowerment policies in health, education, economic participation and political empowerment between 2006 and 2014. Findings from this research …

Catalysts Of Women’S Success In Academic Stem: A Feminist Poststructural Discourse Analysis, Dianna R. Dekelaita-Mullet, Anne N. Rinn, Todd Kettler

Journal of International Women's Studies

This qualitative study seeks understand the phenomena that activate women’s success in STEM disciplines where women’s representation has not yet attained critical mass. A poststructuralist emphasis on complexity and changing nature of power relations offers a framework that illuminates the ways in which elite academic women navigate social inequalities, hierarchies of power, and non-democratic practices. Feminist poststructural discourse analysis (FPDA) draws from the women’s experiences to better understand their complex, shifting positions. Eight female tenured full professors of STEM at research-focused universities in the United States participated in the study. Data sources were in-depth semi-structured interviews, a demographic survey, and …

The Chronotope Of The House And Feminist Matrilinealism In Nada Awar Jarrar’S Somewhere, Home, Luma Balaa

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper studies feminist matrilinealism in Nada Awar Jarrar’s novel Somewhere Home. In this novel the author builds her stories around a house which was inhabited by several generations of female ancestors. Tess Cosslett claims that the Bakhtinian concept of the chronotope in matrilineal narratives influences the space and time structures of women’s writing whereby women communicate along two time frames simultaneously: a synchronic, horizontal plane and a diachronic, vertical axis. The synchronic plane refers to the way in which women from different generations unite and bond whereas the diachronic plane goes backward and forward in time. Employing Bakhtinian notion …

Pandemic, Lockdown And Modern Slavery Among Sri Lanka’S Global Assembly Line Workers, Sandya Hewamanne

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article explores how the COVID-19 pandemic and the lock down had increased global assembly line workers’ vulnerability to several forms of modern slavery. It focuses on two groups of women workers associated with global production in Sri Lanka. First, the daily-hired workers in the Katunayake and Biyagama Free Trade Zones (FTZ) and second the former global factory workers now settled in villages and operating as home subcontractors.

The COVID-19 forced lockdown caused factory shutdowns and curtailed production, leaving FTZ workers with no work and income. The global lockdown has clearly affected both groups, despite their differing work and life …

Emergency Contraceptives Are Our Saviors: Sri Lanka’S Global Factory Workers Negotiating Reproductive Health, Sandya Hewamanne

Journal of International Women's Studies

Government agencies, NGOs and medical personnel profess competing perceptions on Sri Lanka’s female Free trade Zone (FTZ) workers’ reproductive health needs. Varied statistical sources also present and interpret the overall reproductive health outcomes for FTZ workers in differing ways. In this extraordinarily saturated field of power, where different agents and agencies jostle for legitimacy to speak for female global factory workers, the overarching question is where the women workers themselves stand? How do they perceive and respond to discourses and practices within this field? What are their experiences of reproductive health and knowledge and how have their attitudes changed over …

A Bibliometric Analysis Of Journal Of International Women’S Studies For Period Of 2002-2019: Current Status, Development, And Future Research Directions, Rohail Hassan, Meghna Chhabra, Arfan Shahzad, Diana Fox, Sohail Hasan

Journal of International Women's Studies

This research paper aims to present a thorough overview of the Journal of International Women’s Studies (JIWS). The Scopus database has been used to study the most prolific writers and frequently cited papers of the JIWS. This article considered 907 papers, which offers a map of the knowledge produced and circulated by the JIWS. It offers insights into publication activities, prominent themes, citation trends, and the state of collaborations among the contributors to the JIWS and the journal’s aggregate contributions to the area of Women’s Studies. Moreover, by analyzing the correlation of keywords and how they are clustered together, the …

Including The ‘Invisible Middle’ Of Decoloniality, Su-Ming Khoo, Anique Vered

Journal of International Women's Studies

This article traces a conversation around how to theorise and approach the inclusion of experiences, concepts and bodies situated in the ‘invisible middle’ of decoloniality. If coloniality is an immense, lengthy process resulting in colonial/modern structures (Mignolo 2007) comprising the ‘colonial present’ (Gregory 2004), ‘decoloniality’ requires surfacing, baring and bringing to bear the invisibilities and erasures of bodies that exist and resist with, through and in spite of colonial extraction and appropriation.

We explore and connect different ideas of ‘being in the middle’ of decoloniality, paying particular attention to the notion of ‘the invisible middle’ in embodied practices of solidarity …

Mothers As The Middle-Ground Between The Mountain And The State, Hasret Cetinkaya

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper analyses how the ‘Peace Mothers’ in Turkey and Northern Kurdistan are structurally located in the middle-ground between familial relations and the state, as they strive to come to terms with their children’s interpretation of the politics of decolonisation through the project of Kurdish democratisation and ‘revolution’. Such a politics takes its dominant form in the vehicle of The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a movement who see themselves as a decolonial and left-wing militant group, and whose membership is both young and committed to radical political transformation. At stake for the mothers of these members who have become an …

Decolonizing The Womb: Agency Against Obstetric Violence In Tijuana, Mexico, Ester Espinoza-Reyes, Marlene Solís

Journal of International Women's Studies

Obstetric violence is a human rights violation that consists of actions or omissions of healthcare personnel that harms people during pregnancy, childbirth or puerperium. Some practices through which it is expressed are the mistreatment, unnecessary procedures, denying of medical attention or provoking damage either physically or mentally. In particular, we understand obstetric violence as the result of a colonization of the womb, that is, of the occupation of the concept of motherhood by the dictates of patriarchal ideology (Fineman, 1991; Ehrenreich, 1993) and of the Colonial/Modern Gender System, proposed by Lugones (2007). The objective of this paper is to analyze …

Analysing Contemporary Women’S Movements For Bodily Autonomy, Pluriversalizing The Feminist Scholarship On The Politics Of Respectability, Dyuti Chakravarty, Alice Feldman, Emma Penney

Journal of International Women's Studies

We began this project intending to theorise the respectability politics within the Irish Repeal (pro-choice) movement through the lenses of postcolonial and Black feminism, and through the experiences of members of Pinjra Tod, a movement seeking the right to mobility for Indian women students. Instead, we found ourselves excavating the inextricable links between respectability politics and the representational politics of academic knowledge production (Cruz in Collins-White et al 2015) in relation to Irish Women’s Studies and the racialised politics of representation in the Repeal campaign. Savita Halappanavar, an Indian woman living in Ireland with her husband on a work visa, …

Commoning Molecules: Decolonising Biological Patents By Gender Hacking Protocols, Maddalena Fragnito

Journal of International Women's Studies

By making reference to the political context of “molecular invasion” (Critical Art Ensemble 2002), this article will compare two practices of production and administration of hormones to highlight the consequences at stake when business property extends over bodies and cells of humans, animals and plants.

On the one hand, I will examine DIWO (Do It With Others) biohacking workshops that synthesise pharmaceutical hormones and share the know-how by using open-source protocols and participatory workshop methods. I will refer to these specific practices as exemplary of a growing approach to the topic which represents a new field combining biohacking, activism, art, …

“Valli” At The Border: Adivasi Women De-Link From Settler Colonialism Paving Re-Enchantment Of The Forest Commons, Deepa Kozhisseri

Journal of International Women's Studies

The forests of Attappady Hills part of the Western Ghats in Kerala homeland to Adivasi people is a frontier region where a settler population is now predominant. This paper aims to bring the concept of borders as a heuristic device to interpret gender-ecology-indigeneity in Attappady. The conversations among Adivasis, between Adivasis and settlers, between Adivasi women and their children become in media res dialogues of their border subjectivity. This was an empirical study in Attappady in which life experiences, oral history and myths were studied using narrative analysis. The paper discusses four findings: First how land dispossession disproportionately impacted Adivasi …