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Feminism, Nationalism, And War: The ‘Yugoslav Case’ In Feminist Texts, Jelena Batinic

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

This paper presents a study of feminist representations of the situation in the former Yugoslavia. I have decided to look at feminist textsvthat were generated in response to the wars in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina, which appeared in both the feminist popular press and scholarly publications in English. By focusing on the ideological plane, seen in terms of narrative structures available for speaking and perceiving one’s experience, I seek to examine the feminist representation of the conflict of Yugoslav nationalisms and within Yugoslav feminism itself. Narratives are produced in the space where various discourses transpire, compete, …

Women And Poverty: The South African Experience, Johanna Kehler

Journal of International Women's Studies

Introduction:

A lot has been said, done and published on the topic of women and poverty. This article will first provide a short introductory outline of poverty and the feminisation thereof. Secondly, the article will explore the problems regarding women and poverty in the South African context. Emphasis will be given to rural women and women on farms, as two of the most marginalised groups of women in South Africa.

South Africa, in the midst of transformation, is struggling to overcome the burden of race, class and gender-based inequality inherited during the periods of colonialism and Apartheid. The main goals …

Actions Speak Louder: Women In Caribbean Documentaries Of Everyday Life, Ian Craig

Journal of International Women's Studies

Introduction:

This paper focuses particularly on two recent documentaries of everyday life featuring Haitian women, Claudette Coulanges’s Chercher la vie and Rigoberto López’s Puerto Príncipe mío. The contribution of these works to the existing corpus of documentaries on Haiti is assessed. Gender differences in patterns of discourse and activity are analysed in order to clarify the social situation of women in contemporary Port-au-Prince. The films corroborate other cited evidence that women are the backbone of Haitian daily life, sustaining activity in market places, the factory floor and the home. However, their discourse and activities suggest that their constant struggle …

Empowering Women In Rural Bangladesh: Impact Of Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee’S (Brac’S) Programme, Dilruba Banu, Fehmin Farashuddin, Altaf Hossain, Shahnuj Akter

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

Literally, ‘empowerment’ is seen to relate to the user’s power. It involves undoing negative social constructions, so that the people affected can perceive themselves as having the capacity and the right to act and have influence (Rowlands, 1995:102). Rao and Kelleher (1995:70) define women’s empowerment as “the capacity of women to be economically self-sufficient and self-reliant with control over decisions affecting their life options and freedom from violence”. In the existing socio-cultural milieu of Bangladesh, embodied within the phrase of ‘empowerment’ is the concept of change. The development activities of Non-Government Organisations (NGOs) in Bangladesh lead empowerment …

Literacy, Womanism And Struggle: Reflections On The Practices Of An African Woman, Nombuso Dlamini

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Essay:

As I begin writing about the importance of, and interconnections among literacy, womanism and struggle, I feel myself drawn enthusiastically to treasured memories of my mother’s life and the influence she has had in shaping my theoretical and professional undertakings. Going back into my childhood, I can surely categorize my mother then as having been a literacy worker as she taught at an elementary school, a womanist because of her concern for and actions about issues of women equity, and a political activist because of her struggles against apartheid. My interest here is in tracing a …

Book Review: Emerging Voices – South Asian American Women Redefine Self, Family And Community, G. Asha

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Emerging Voices – South Asian American Women Redefine Self, Family and Community, edited by Sangeeta R. Gupta

Migration And Cultural Change: A Role For Gender And Social Networks?, Sara R. Curran, Abigail C. Saguy

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

To incorporate the insights from the literature on gender and migration, we focus upon three key concepts that have emerged regarding the role of social networks, households, and communities for affecting migration processes. The three key concepts we interrogate are: “social embeddedness” (Portes and Sensenbrenner 1993), “circular and cumulative causation” (Massey 1990), and “relative deprivation” (Stark 1991). We propose considering these three concepts through the lens of a third area of research, the sociology of culture, and we draw upon ideas about identity formation, trust, and normative expectations. Our empirical examples come primarily from Thailand where we …

Russian Women: Living In History’S Shadow, Angela Brintlinger, Steven Conn

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Essay:

There has never been one “woman question” in Russia, but rather many. During an extended stay in St. Petersburg in the summer of 1999, we attended a conference on women’s issues and interviewed a number of women from all over Russia, trying to ascertain for ourselves the state of the “woman question” in post-Soviet Russia. In our conversations with women, it became clear that as some test the new economic and political waters, as others see their future in the traditions of the Orthodox church, and still others feel ill-positioned to succeed in the new Russia, the …

The Geopolitics Of Race: Women From Palestine, Israel, Northern Ireland And The Republic Of Ireland Meet, Elise G. Young

Journal of International Women's Studies

There are six sections to this paper. I begin by introducing the history and goals of The Global Women’s History Project and the Inaugural Conference reviewed in this paper. Second, I introduce the central theme of the paper, the geo-politics of race, and discuss the relevance of this theme to the outcome of the conference. Third, I explain my use of the term race. In the fourth section I introduce excerpts from delegates’ talks expanding on the areas of challenge to coalition building- race, class, and taking responsibility for history- as well as documenting the successes of coalition building. Section …

Book Review: A Natural History Of Rape: Biological Bases Of Sexual Coercion, Susan Hansen

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of A Natural History of Rape: Biological Bases of Sexual Coercion by Randy Thornhill and Craig T. Palmer

Lies, Damn Lies And Public Protection: Corporate Responsibility And Breast Cancer Activism, Laura Potts

Journal of International Women's Studies

Introduction:

The first world conference on breast cancer, held in Kingston, Ontario, in July 1997, provided a unique opportunity for activists, concerned about the possible links between breast cancer and the environment, to share their concerns in an international forum, with oncologists, radiologists, epidemiologists, survivors and alternative therapists. It also clearly exposed the fracture lines between competing discourses of risk and responsibility, between groups charged with a duty to protect and to care - health professionals, epidemiologists, statutory bodies, and those taking on those duties - generally activists, from environmental, feminist and survivor groups. These lines were even more clearly …

Creating An Activist Voice: Re-Storying The Self In The Light Of Contemporary Feminist Understandings Of Power And Subjectivity, Lekkie Hopkins

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

From 1992-1995 Sandy Newby was enrolled as a mature aged undergraduate student in a course in human services and applied women’s studies at an Australian University. In this paper, in an attempt to uncover the complex processes of re-storying the self in the light of contemporary feminist understandings of subjectivity and power, I explore some dimensions of Sandy’s encounter with such knowledges during her time at university. The narrative focus of this paper is both on Sandy’s engagement with the learning process and on my own experience as a feminist teacher and researcher/biographer. I draw particularly on …

International Conference: “Societies In Transition – Challenges To Women’S And Gender Studies”

Journal of International Women's Studies

Call for participation and tentative program for the “Societies in Transition – Challenges to Women’s and Gender Studies” conference (June 28 – July 1, 2001), Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg, Oldenburg i.O./ Lower Saxony, Germany.

Rethinking The Women’S Studies Ph.D. In Canadian Universities, Katherine Side

Journal of International Women's Studies

Introduction:

This paper considers the future of the Ph.D. in women’s studies in Canada. It argues that it is important to continue to develop and to offer the existing doctorate in women’s studies in Canada because it contributes in significant ways to the scholarly environment for students and faculty in universities. However, it cautions against developing and offering additional Ph.D. programmes in women’s studies without simultaneously considering and challenging the current, lean fiscal climate, for post-secondary education and the implications of this context for women’s studies. After briefly mapping out this climate, this paper offers, for the explicit purpose of …

Facing The Medusa: Confronting The Ongoing Impossibility Of Women’S Studies, Stacey M. Floyd-Thomas, Laura Gillman

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

When feminism is defined in such a way that it calls attention to the diversity of women’s social and political reality, it centralizes the experiences of all women, especially the women whose social conditions have been least written about, studied, or changed by political movements. When we cease to focus on this simplistic stance “men are the enemy,” we are compelled to examine systems of domination and our role in their maintenance and perpetuation. Lack of adequate definition made it easy for bourgeois women, whether liberal or radical in perspective, to maintain their dominance over the leadership …

Beyond The Campus: Some Initial Findings On Women’S Studies, Careers And Employers, Maryanne Dever, Liz Day

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

(I)nstitutions of higher learning are being transformed by the discourses of economic rationalism and the marketplace so that many practitioners are discovering first-hand how readily Women’s Studies programs become vulnerable to arguments made against maintaining allegedly “useless” and “non-vocational” areas of study (see Griffin 1998, Kessler-Harris and Swerdlow 1996). The reconfiguration of higher education within a broadly consumerist logic and growing rates of unemployment and underemployment among university graduates in many western societies also mean that not just administrators, but students (and their families) are now inquiring into the vocational relevance and the long-term “rewards” of specific …

‘A Hybrid In All Sorts Of Ways’: Teaching Women’S Studies In The Academy, Sue Jackson

Journal of International Women's Studies

Introduction:

There has been much discussion of late of the decline in women’s studies in the British academy. Discussion has ranged around the institutional closing down of women’s studies departments and programmes, and around the experiences of students on women’s studies degrees. What is it like, though, to be a lecturer in women’s studies in an academy, which often feels like an alien and unwelcoming place to be. What brought lecturers in women’s studies to their discipline, and how do they see their future? What constrains do they face on their current work? Can women’s studies challenge traditional academic structures? …

Weaving Women’S Studies Into The Institutional Web: A Case Study, Frances Kraljic, Inez Martinez

Journal of International Women's Studies

Kingsborough Community College [KCC], one of six in the City University of New York [CUNY], a University containing eleven senior colleges, a medical and a law school, and a Graduate Center, is the first and only community college in CUNY to have a Women’s Studies [WS] Program. It took a long, long time to obtain this Program, and it has taken multi-faceted efforts to weave it into Kingsborough’s life in such a way as to (thus far) keep it. Because we believe that WS are particularly important at the community college level, we are sharing the story of the development …

Feminist Science Studies At German Universities - A First Account, Smilla Ebeling, Helene Götschel

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

Feminist science studies, which do not have a unified term so far in the German debate, regard mathematics, science and technology within their historical and social context (Heike Kahlert 1996, Heike Wiesner 1994). This critical contextualization of math-natural scientific thinking and acting is not regarded as a task of the corresponding disciplines but is linked to other disciplines like the history and philosophy of science, didactics or science and technology studies. Therefore, feminist science studies cannot be worked out within mathematics, science and engineering at all because they do not make sense within the scientific self-understanding (Margarete …

‘First In The Nation Since 1970’: Thirty Years Of Women’S Studies At San Diego State University: Lessons And Strategies, Susan E. Cayleff

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

Hitting And Missing The Mark: Feminist Inquiry And Pedagogy In United States Women’S Studies Graduate Programs, Phyllis Baker, Siqin Yang

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

This essay looks specifically at reflection in these areas undertaken in one sector of women’s studies: the master’s degree in women’s studies in the United States. That graduate education in women’s studies is the focal point of this essay is especially timely because graduate programs in women’s studies are experiencing substantial growth. This essay addresses one aspect of graduate education: the correspondence between feminist intellectual inquiry and pedagogy in master’s programs in women’s studies. In particular, the essay aims to assess women’s studies at the graduate level by asking graduate students what they think about the attention …

Book Review: Gender Policies In The European Union, Carmel L. Rosal

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of Gender Policies in the European Union, edited by Mariagrazia Rossilli

Duty, Honor, Rape: Sexual Assault Against Women During War, Kevin Gerard Neill

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the Introduction:

In contrast to dutifully killing the enemy, a soldier is not supposed to rape a woman, at least in theory. But rapes occur in war. They always have, and often in settings and upon a scale that is difficult to comprehend. Accordingly, rape in times of war has a direct effect upon the society where the conflict takes place. More specifically, it affects women, and this violence against them can have the added, profoundly negative effect of eroding their particular social and environmental conditions. As difficult and emotional this issue may be, though, rape in war is …

Red Ink In The Silence, Olga Barrios

Journal of International Women's Studies

A play in three acts

How I Learned That My Gods Had Come Back To Me, Dianne Hunter

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

Could We Be Any More Feminist? Make Me Barf: Responses To Art At A Women’S University, Rhoda Zuk, Patricia Baker

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

Seeking Transformative Justice For Women: Views From Canada, Karlene Faith

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the article:

My purpose here is to situate gender as a key factor in a historical movement toward prison abolition. A shift toward restorative or transformative justice, theoretically, is reintegrative in that it benefits the offender, the victim and the community. The first offenders to be diverted from prison to any new program are generally those with the least serious offences and/or those who pose no risk of committing violence; women commonly fall into this category, but, as discussed, very few community alternatives exist for them. The last section addresses some of the key issues facing women in prison, …

A Feminist Genealogy Of The Woman’S Christian Temperance Union: Re-Membering Our Selves, Dorothy A. Lander

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the article:

The purpose of my memory work project and this article is to begin to create a “history of the present” (Dean, 1994) through collective remembering in Lipsitz’s (1988) sense of “shared experiences and perceptions about the past that legitimate action in the present” (p. 288). I adapt Nasstrom’s (1999) analysis of memory and narrative and women’s activism to the memory work with my WCTU family, friends and neighbours in the farming community in Ontario where I grew up. We “become historical actors who intervene between the past and the present, continually reframing the movement” (p. 134).

Her Mistress’S Voice: Gynophonocentrism In Feminist Discourses, Mikko Keskinen

Journal of International Women's Studies

From the article:

I will trace the metaphors of voice in the discourses of feminisms as articulated by Judith Fetterley, Kaja Silverman, Julia Kristeva, and Hélène Cixous. I will analyze the presuppositions of their vocal or sound imagery, paying special attention to the implications of the essentialism/constructivism opposition. It is not my intention to provide a comprehensive account of voice in feminisms, nor to make sweeping generalizations on the basis of a very limited corpus. Moreover, in spite of their differences in cultural background, period, and main area of study, the four theorists to be read are, as it were, …

Book Review: The Business Of Charity: The Woman’S Exchange Movement, 1832-1900, Carolyn J. Lawes

Journal of International Women's Studies

Review of The Business of Charity: The Woman’s Exchange Movement, 1832-1900 by Kathleen Waters Sander