Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Rural Women In Kwara State (Nigeria) And Their Contributions To The Welfare Of Their Households, Abraham Falola, Segun B. Fakayode, Ajoke O. Kayode, Mujidat A. Amusa

Journal of International Women's Studies

The high incidence of poverty in the rural households calls for a concerted effort by all members of the household, including the women. Meanwhile, the discussion on the economic contribution of rural women in many developing countries has largely focused on national and regional levels with little or no concentration on their impact at their immediate household level. Therefore, this study examines the contribution of rural women to household welfare in Kwara State, Nigeria. Data were collected from 160 women in the rural area of the state using structured interview schedule. The data were analyzed with descriptive statistics, index ranking …

Gendered Narratives Relating To Women In The Information Technology Department Of A South African Organisation, Errolyn Long

Journal of International Women's Studies

In South Africa, there is an underrepresentation of women in senior management positions and industries requiring “masculine”-typed duties. The study aimed to explore the gendered narratives relating to women in the Information Technology (IT) Department of a South African organisation using a feminist interpretivist framework. A qualitative design informed by feminist methodology and narrative inquiry outlined by Gilligan et al. (2003) was used for this study. Two females and four male participants participated in the study and data collection involved in-depth semi-structured interviews. The Gillian et al. (2003) approach of data analysis was used (Listening Guide). The listening guide assisted …

Efforts To Eradicate Child Marriage Practices In Indonesia: Towards Sustainable Development Goals, Sonny D. Judiasih, Betty Rubiati, Deviana Yuanitasari, Elycia F. Salim, Levana Safira

Journal of International Women's Studies

Child marriage in Indonesia is a reality recurring within society. Religious and customary laws often become the basis to legitimize the practices of child marriage. According to UNICEF in 2016, Indonesia ranked the seventh in the world and the second in ASEAN for the highest rate of child marriage. Child marriage is a manifestation of gender inequality, especially for female. Indonesia, as one of the member countries of the United Nations (UN), has ratified the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) program issued by the UN to eradicate the practice of child marriage occurring within the society. One of …

Socioeconomic Status And Maternal Health-Seeking Behavior: A Comparative Study Between A Rural Site And An Urban Community In Bangladesh, Delwar Hossain

Journal of International Women's Studies

Maternal health-seeking behavior is not only a crucial public health issue but also a serious women’s health concern in Bangladesh. The present study examines the relationship between couples’ socioeconomic status and maternal health-seeking behavior in comparison of rural areas and urban communities in Bangladesh. Based on the research objectives, it included 95 rural and 95 urban couples (total 190 couples) randomly selected from purposively selected rural areas and urban communities in Thakurgaon District (north western area of Bangladesh). Results of the present study indicate that the rate of illiteracy was higher in rural sites than in the urban communities (rural: …

Impact Of The Legal Context On Protecting And Guaranteeing Women’S Rights At Work In The Mena Region, Chokri Kooli, Hend Al Muftah

Journal of International Women's Studies

This research explored whether the MENA region countries have adopted sufficient legal provisions that encouraged females to access the labor market. A documental collection, revision, and analysis were performed to enhance our understanding of statutory provisions that were adopted by 13 countries through the MENA region to encourage and facilitate access of women to the labor market. Findings showed that the governments of the different studied countries made considerable efforts to comply with the international legal norms and protect the female workers. Among other things, the findings suggest that the MENA countries need to offer more legal protections to guarantee …

Through The Eyes Of A Woman: Using Oral History To Explore The Enigmatic World Of Saudi Arabia’S Female Population, Carmen Winkel, Laura Strachan

Journal of International Women's Studies

The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) remains cloaked in mystery and stereotypes especially when it pertains to its female population. Oppression? Subjugation? Discontent? These typecasts reverberate around the world, but interestingly when one speaks to a Saudi woman her story offers diverging representations of Saudi life that often debunk those expressed elsewhere. But without scholars asking “real” people about their lives and analyzing their lived responses, these dominant narratives are reaffirmed over and over again. To move beyond these stereotypes, this paper attempts to address the lives of Saudi Arabian females by using firsthand accounts obtained for an undergraduate student …

Muslim Women’S Right To Divorce And Gender Equality Issues In Bangladesh: A Proposal For Review Of Current Laws, Shahnewaj Patwari, Abu N. M. A. Ali

Journal of International Women's Studies

In Bangladesh, sharia law goes hand in hand with the statutory laws of the land. These laws are both conjointly used to regulate and monitor the issues of divorce among Muslims of the country. Orthodox Islamic laws provide husbands with the authority of issuing divorce or talaq to their wives known as Talaq-e-Tawfiz (popularly known as tawfiz) in the kabinnama (the written document of the contract of marriage). Women’s power to exercise the tawfiz, however, depends solely on the will of their husbands. Although Muslim women are capable of repudiating their marriages by the process of khula or mubarat, these …

Shifting Feminist Activisms: Indian Feminism And Critical Events Of Rape, Geetanjali Gangoli, Aisha K. Gill, Martin Rew

Journal of International Women's Studies

Since the gang rape and murder of Jyoti Singh Pandey in 2012 India has generated an enormous amount of national and international media attention and a reputation for sexual violence, pointing to the country’s “endemic problem” (Washington Post, 2012). The rape led to widespread protests, by students and wider society, particularly in Delhi. Notwithstanding these recent events, rape has long been, in fact, a catalyst for feminist and social movement responses in India. This paper will focus on three cases of ‘stranger rape’ that have been valourized as pivotal moments for feminist activism on sexual violence within the country. Reformulating …

Learning From ‘The Outsider Within’: The Sociological Significance Of Dalit Women’S Life Narratives, Bhushan Sharma, Anurag Kumar

Journal of International Women's Studies

Dalit women have long occupied marginal positions and been excluded from two major Indian social movements: The Feminist Movement and the Dalit Movement. The researcher examines how Dalit women have made creative use of their marginality—their ‘outsider-within' status—and have represented their lived experiences. The study scrutinizes select life narratives of Dalit women writers: Bama's Sangati: Events (2005), Urmila Pawar’s The Weave of My Life (2015), and Baby Kamble’s The Prisons We Broke (2008) to discuss and explore the sociological significance of three characteristic themes in these narratives: (1) the interlocking nature of Dalit women’s oppression, (2) endurance and …

“Toward Antiracist And Transnational Feminist Solidarity”: Translator’S Note, Rintaro Kondo

Journal of International Women's Studies

This short essay presents an overview of the rationale for the translation into Japanese, of Rethinking Patriarchy, Culture and Masculinity: Transnational Narratives of Gender Violence and Human Rights Advocacy by Elora Halim Chowdhury (JIWS, vol.16, No.2, 2015). It includes a brief response by the author and the Japanese translation.

An Autoethnography Of Mothering In The Academy, Joanne Yoo

The Qualitative Report

Autoethnographies are an effective methodology for investigating mothering in the academy as they can allow researchers to explore their individual experiences of work/life balance struggles to shed light into wider social issues, such as academia’s accelerated time. This autoethnography includes five vignettes that describe the challenges of mothering in the academy. These vignettes depict some of the issues faced by mothers working on insecure academic contracts, the impact of accelerated academic time on mothering and the value of finding a supportive community of women to find new stories about motherhood in academia. Such windows into female academics struggles for work/life …

Mccormick, Dale, Wendy Chapkis

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

In this interview, Dale McCormick discusses her early life in New York City and in Iowa City. She describes a college era lesbian relationship that, when discovered by her mother, led to several years of failed psychiatric conversion therapy. McCormick describes the vibrant second-wave feminist community in Iowa City of the 1960s and 1970s and the role anti-(Vietnam)war activism played in her life. She discusses in detail the process of becoming a union carpenter apprentice and the harassment she faced as the only woman on construction crews. With the publication of her book “Against the Grain, a Carpentry Manual for …

Caulfield, Christine, Wendy Chapkis

Querying the Past: LGBTQ Maine Oral History Project Collection

Christine Caulfield, a 64 year old trans woman, discusses growing up in a military family. She discusses the challenges of moving multiple times during the first 13 years of her life as a military dependent and reports that military culture in the 1960s and 70s was not welcoming to LGBTQ people. She knew she was ‘different’ from age 8, but had no language to express it. She was seriously bullied as a child and also experienced sexual abuse during those years by an Assistant Boy Scout Master. She discusses a suicide attempt she made during her first year of high …

Gendered Processes And Women’S Stunted Career Growth: An Exploratory Study Of Female Software Engineers, Sucharita Maji, Shikha Dixit

The Qualitative Report

In the present qualitative study, we explored to what extent gender has been an integral part of workplace experience and career growth among female software engineers in Indian Information and Technology sector. Following a purposive sampling strategy, data were drawn from twenty-one female software engineers. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted. A hybrid of theoretical and inductive thematic analysis was done to answer the research questions. For analyzing the data through theoretical thematic analysis, Acker's (1990) “Hierarchies, Jobs, Bodies: A Theory of Gendered Organizations” was used as the theoretical lens. The result revealed that four features of gendered processes in the …

Law School News: Judge Rogeriee Thompson, Legal Pioneer Dorothy Crockett Among Influential "Women Of The Century" 08/19/2020, Eryn Dion, Roger Williams University School Of Law

Life of the Law School (1993- )

No abstract provided.

Impact Of Digitization On Women’S Empowerment: A Study Of Rural And Urban Regions In India, Dhanamalar M., Preethi S., Yuvashree S.

Journal of International Women's Studies

Women's empowerment plays a crucial role in the overall development of any society besides positively impacting the daily lives of women. The winds of radical change in the fields of employment and information technology have brought with them a wide range of opportunities for women in India and across the globe. The primary objective of this study is to find the usage of digitization in rural regions and urban regions by women. The study aims to perceive how basic internet centres and training should be provided for rural women to help them utilize the internet facilities. The “Internet Saathi” projects …

Women And Informal Employment: An Analysis Of Socio-Economic And Health Conditions Of Women Home-Based Workers In Chennai, India, Sivasubramanian K., Pushpa A., Raju V., Madhu Dhruva Kumar

Journal of International Women's Studies

This study seeks to analyse the socio-economic and health status of women workers in the informal sector in Chennai, India. Informal employment consists of various kinds of micro-enterprises offering commodities and services and home-based work. Of all these different types of work in the informal sector, home-based work is associated with women because of its nature and characteristic features. Home-based work is piecework for remuneration that is completed in the premises of the worker’s choice rather than the workplace of the employer. Women homeworkers face many issues such as long hours of work, low wages, meagre rates per piece, lack …

A Study Of The Awareness Of Electronic Banking Services Among Rural Women Of Nelamangala, Bangalore, India, Aneesha K. Shaji, Ajith P. Mathews

Journal of International Women's Studies

The revolution in electronic technology has taken the world by storm. The banking sector has not been immune to the impact of this digital revolution. In India, both private and public banks have changed their standard business practices and have now shifted entirely to electronic banking. The banking transactions that are executed through electronic devices and over the internet are termed electronic banking. One of the special features of urbanization is that urbanized society, irrespective of gender, is ready to accept the change and adjust to the new technologies quickly because of their extensive exposure to these innovations and their …

Overcoming The Widening Academic Research And Participation Gap: Indian Working Women’S Barriers In Undertaking Up- Skilling, Reenu Mohan, C. Nagadeepa, Aasha Sujit

Journal of International Women's Studies

The idea that women can be a powerful economic force needs to be universally accepted. Educated women have a better command over their lives and possess the capability to manage any situation. They get social recognition, which empowers them to achieve better social status and autonomy. Women face many impediments, and these hinder them from attaining higher work status. The observations till date show the numerous barriers women face in personal life, in academia, in the workplace, and in society.

The present study explores the personal, societal, and workplace challenges faced by working women in upgrading themselves through higher education. …

Enrolment Of Women In Higher Education: A Comparative Study On Women's Equity In Governance And Employment Status In India, Anita C., D. Ravindran

Journal of International Women's Studies

Many research studies, globally, suggest that a rise in the rates of higher education of women enhances their living standards and decision-making powers. Education has served as a powerful tool for empowering women. Having higher women’s representation in governance should enable the empowerment of women. The Gross Enrolment Ratio [GER] of Indian women has shown a steady rise in the past two decades. The GER of women has surpassed men in the age group of 18 to 23 in the year 2018-2019 (All India Survey of Higher Education [AISHE]Reports, 2019). In the year 2019, only 48.20 % of the Indian …

A Study On The Status Of Women’S Empowerment In Urban Bangalore, India, Sangeetha Menon, Ranjitha M, Shweta Sharma

Journal of International Women's Studies

The urge to empower is a human quality and a multidimensional phenomenon. It allows individuals or groups to participate and prosper in households, communities, and countries through political or development processes. Numerous studies have associated empowerment with many developmental outcomes. In the past decades, significant advances have been made among women in many fields like health, education, and employment. However, increasing incidence of violence against women, under-representation of women in decision-making, discriminatory laws governing marriage, land, property, and inheritance hinder women’s empowerment. It is further blocked by new challenges that have emerged over the last decade, such as tackling HIV/AIDS …

A Study On Women Consumers’ Attitudes Towards Green Marketing, Santhosh V, Raghavendra Babu

Journal of International Women's Studies

Green marketing is the marketing of products that are assumed to be environmentally friendly and environmentally safe. Green marketing incorporates a wide range of actions such as production process, product modification, packaging of products, and modifying advertisements. The green marketing movement is growing rapidly across the world. Consumer awareness and motivational campaigners are needed for the development of the green market. However, the mindset of women consumers has changed in recent times and they prefer green products. Compared to other countries, in India, awareness of green products like organic food and eco-friendly products is low. Indian women consumers have very …

Financial Distress And Healthcare: A Study Of Migrant Dalit Women Domestic Helpers In Bangalore, India, Nimble O. J., A. V. Chinnasamy

Journal of International Women's Studies

The Indian caste system originated in ancient India and gradually evolved concurrently with Indian history. Dalits in Indian history were considered as lower caste untouchables and were deprived of basic human rights. After the onset of modern economic development and the progressive initiatives taken by the government, the situation has improved considerably. The modern Indian state, since independence has been oriented towards providing reservations for Dalits in education and other public services. However, even with continuous efforts to eradicate the caste system and numerous measures to improve their lives, Dalits, specifically Dalit women, are still deprived of their basic needs. …

Women’S Empowerment Through The Silk Industry Of Assam, India, And Its Underlying Economy, Ranjit Singha, Surjit Singha

Journal of International Women's Studies

In the medieval era, the Royal families of Assam, India produced Muga silk fabrics. During the time of the Koch Dynasty (Historical Koch Country), Muga silk from ancient Pragjyotishpur and Koch Behar became an integral part of the trade with Bengal, Bhutan, Tibet, and the Mughals. Most households in Assam weave cloth and every girl child in the household acquires weaving skills at a very young age from her mother. In Sualkuchi, a town in Assam, there are approximately 6,872 female weavers. These weavers are very concerned about the preservation of traditional handloom weaving as they feel that over time …

Depression, Anxiety, Stress And Marital Adjustment Among Women, Rema M.K., Parneet Kaur

Journal of International Women's Studies

Marriage, especially for women in a patriarchal society involves a huge transition process. The struggle with new responsibilities and expectations is overwhelming in itself. But with the feelings of worthlessness and feeling trapped and bound in a loveless and thankless bond, come distress and adjustment issues. According to a recent Nielsen survey on “Women of Tomorrow”, out of 21 nations and 6500 women, India is a leading nation when it comes to stress in women. About 87% of women were stressed most of the time and 82% claimed that they did not find time to relax. Women in the age …

Introduction: Women As Enablers Of Change, Ranjitha M, Sangeetha Menon

Journal of International Women's Studies

No abstract provided.

Domestic Violence In Pakistan From 1990 – 2020: A Mixed Method Approach, Hamida Khatri

Dissertations and Theses

This study assessed domestic violence from the perspective of the victims who experienced trauma due to sexual, emotional, and psychological abuse in Pakistan.

From Case Study As Symptom To Case Study As Sinthome: Engaging Lacan And Irigaray On "Thinking In Cases" As Psychoanalytic Pedagogy, Erica Freeman

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation accomplishes two goals. First, this dissertation articulates a Lacanian account of the epistemological and historical presuppositions of the psychoanalytic case study genre, while engaging reflexively with extant Foucauldian scholarship on this genre as well as feminist psychoanalyst Luce Irigaray’s criticisms of Lacan. Irigaray’s critique is engaged in order to tarry with its implications for a Lacanian approach to the psychoanalytic case study genre. Second, this dissertation critically examines the significance of Lacan’s (re)reading, in Seminar V, of Joan Riviere’s (1929) “Womanliness as Masquerade” in the midst of his oral teachings on the psychoanalytic concepts of castration and …

“They Do Us The Honour Of Treating Us Like Gods, And We Respond By Treating Them Like Things”: The Problem With Fathers In William Shakespeare’S Titus Andronicus And J.M. Coetzee’S Disgrace, Colleen Walsh

Theses and Dissertations

Titus Andronicus’s obsession with honor eclipses his daughter's agency whereas David Lurie’s acceptance of his daughter's choices ultimately creates conditions of possibility. Coetzee represents Lurie as ultimately shedding patriarchal preoccupation with “dignity” and “honor.”

A Woman’S Portion: 5000 Years A Slave, Ann R. Glickman

Theses and Dissertations

Slavery has existed for all of recorded history. The evidence is conclusive that slave systems have almost always been majority female. I suggest that slavery originated as an attempt to control female reproductive capacity, and that this attempt to control was not limited to enslaved women.