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Articles 1 - 30 of 81

Full-Text Articles in Women's Studies

Inequities In Agency And Post-Surrogacy Impact On Surrogate Mothers In India, Sheela Suryanarayanan Dr., Sudarshan Saravanan Mr. Nov 2026

Inequities In Agency And Post-Surrogacy Impact On Surrogate Mothers In India, Sheela Suryanarayanan Dr., Sudarshan Saravanan Mr.

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

India became a global hub for commercial surrogacy because surrogate mothers had fewer rights over their own bodies and the child born, and had no agency in medical interventions during surrogacy, until the Surrogacy (Regulation) Act, 2021 prohibited transnational and commercial surrogacy in India. Studies have found detrimental physical and emotional health impacts of surrogacy on surrogate mothers in several developing countries. Economic coercion limits the agency and bargaining capacity of surrogate mothers, leading to unjust surrogacy contracts. Mandatory retention at surrogate homes, separation from family, surveillance, social stigma, secrecy, and a disconnect from the intended parents and surrogacy children …


Bad Mothers In Translation: Early Motherhood In Contemporary Turkish Editions, Merve Sevtap Süren Jun 2026

Bad Mothers In Translation: Early Motherhood In Contemporary Turkish Editions, Merve Sevtap Süren

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

This article examines how three recent Anglophone novels of early motherhood, namely, Szilvia Molnar’s The Nursery (as Süt Lekesi), Rachel Yoder’s Nightbitch (as Gece Kancığı), and Claire Kilroy’s Soldier Sailor (as Asker ile Denizci), circulate in Turkish translation in a context shaped by pronatalist moral economies. Pairing peritextual analysis (covers, back-cover copy, blurbs, and bio notes) with close readings of selected key scenes of postpartum crisis, feral transformation, and toddler-year burnout, I show how Turkish editions both render and manage maternal negativity: translation choices modulate voice, affect, and register, while peritexts frame these mothers for local readability …


Prostitution In Video Games: Stigma, Violence And Male Pleasure, Laura Aguilera-Ávila, Lara Escobar Hernández Dec 2025

Prostitution In Video Games: Stigma, Violence And Male Pleasure, Laura Aguilera-Ávila, Lara Escobar Hernández

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Prostitution has traditionally been framed in society as a space significantly determined by patriarchal hierarchies, in addition to being affected on many occasions by stigmatisation and violence. The representation of prostitution and of those who practice it in the media is a topic of special interest, since the discourses and messages disseminated by the media play a fundamental role in socialisation. Video games are not exempt from this debate: with millions of players worldwide and a special reach among young people, they are among the most influential media outlets today. This qualitative research analyses a series of titles, both AAA …


Film Review: Motherhood And Mathematics: Hegemonic Femininity And Deviance In Shakuntala Devi (2020), Bharat Dhiman Aug 2025

Film Review: Motherhood And Mathematics: Hegemonic Femininity And Deviance In Shakuntala Devi (2020), Bharat Dhiman

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


Why Are Men So Obsessed With Pornography? Andrea Dworkin Was Right, Robert Jensen Jul 2025

Why Are Men So Obsessed With Pornography? Andrea Dworkin Was Right, Robert Jensen

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


The Bones: A Novel-In-Progress, Chris Stark May 2025

The Bones: A Novel-In-Progress, Chris Stark

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


“I Saw Death With My Own Eyes”: Recent Women’S Protests And Punishments In Iran, Antonia Felix Mar 2025

“I Saw Death With My Own Eyes”: Recent Women’S Protests And Punishments In Iran, Antonia Felix

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The Islamic Republic of Iran’s brutal response to nonviolent protests exposes its tenuous hold on power over a youthful nation well familiar with 21st-century freedoms. Despite systemic discrimination and oppressive laws controlling and degrading the lives of women, ethnic and religious minorities, and the LGBTQ+ community, the Iranian government cannot halt public dissent that has continued to erupt since the 1979 Revolution. This article offers a brief overview of four major protests in the past 25 years as a context for discussing the two most recent movements focused on women’s rejection of the compulsory hijab and prisoners’ and activists’ fight …


Struggles Around Transgenderism In Hungarian Feminism: An Autoethnographic Account, Dalma Feró Feb 2025

Struggles Around Transgenderism In Hungarian Feminism: An Autoethnographic Account, Dalma Feró

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

In this autoethnography, I am using my personal experiences as data to examine the inextricable personal, political, social, and cultural aspects of one of the most decisive ruptures in Hungarian “progressive” activism of the second half of the 2010s. In the mid-2010s, I was part of an informal collective of women that started to outline a feminist approach critical of mainstream individualistic renditions of women’s rights as social progress, thereby diverging fundamentally from the country’s institutionalised feminism. As I and the circle of women I worked with focused on women’s reproductive autonomy, we encountered central feminist questions about sex and …


Between Sangate Aika And Bhumika: Finding Hansa Wadkar, Aarti Wani Jan 2025

Between Sangate Aika And Bhumika: Finding Hansa Wadkar, Aarti Wani

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

Hansa Wadkar was a popular film star of Marathi cinema, who had established herself as an actress with considerable histrionic skills, essaying a range of roles in films belonging to a variety of genres during a career spanning several decades, before and after Indian Independence. Despite the success, Wadkar’s unconventional personal life was troubled and difficult. In the early seventies her autobiography, Sangate Aika (1970), was published. Subsequently, Shyam Benegal, a stalwart of the Indian New Wave, made Bhumika (1977) broadly based on Wadkar’s autobiography. The film’s realist framework underscored by its critique of patriarchy, succeeded in bringing Wadkar’s journey …


Challenging Motherhood And Analysing Cultural Differences: A Review Of The Film Mrs. Chatterjee Vs Norway (2023), Sana Hashmi Jan 2025

Challenging Motherhood And Analysing Cultural Differences: A Review Of The Film Mrs. Chatterjee Vs Norway (2023), Sana Hashmi

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


Why Nigeria Needs A Femicide Law, Jessica Ojiugo Chinonye Sep 2024

Why Nigeria Needs A Femicide Law, Jessica Ojiugo Chinonye

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The Federal Republic of Nigeria does not have a law against femicide or comprehensive global femicide data. The numbers currently reported at the national level are questionable, especially with the prevalence of economic-motivated harvesting of female reproductive organs in the country. The lack of a legalized femicide law has exacerbated the underreporting of such activities in Nigeria and has made the severity of the crime less visible. This article aims to name the problem by defining and advocating for a femicide law encompassing the social realities of many Nigerian females.


Japan’S “Big Lie": The Negation Of Oral Testimony Of Sexual Violence, Robert O'Mochain, Yuki Ueno Aug 2024

Japan’S “Big Lie": The Negation Of Oral Testimony Of Sexual Violence, Robert O'Mochain, Yuki Ueno

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

In recent years, powerful actors in Japan’s political elite have consistently denied the oral testimony of so-called “comfort women.” The denial of this and related historical crimes is made in the service of a claim we denote here as the “big lie.” This is the erroneous assertion that the Asia-Pacific War was a straightforward war of liberation by the Japanese Imperial Army, inspired by a blameless Emperor and carried out by morally exemplary military forces. This denial of historical realities, especially those related to “comfort women,” has constituted a contributory factor for a pattern of denial regarding all historical crimes. …


Community Awareness Of Domestic Violence In Arumeru District, Arusha, Tanzania, Rehema John Magesa Jun 2024

Community Awareness Of Domestic Violence In Arumeru District, Arusha, Tanzania, Rehema John Magesa

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

Domestic violence continues to be prominent among many communities worldwide despite different efforts and strategies geared towards eradicating it. Women and girls are among the main victims of this violence. Lack of or limited awareness of the problem perpetuates the problem. However, much of the levels of awareness of the problem are lacking. This study aimed to establish community awareness of domestic violence and the levels of awareness and determine the association between respondents' characteristics and the level of awareness of gender-based violence. The study employed both probability and non-probability sampling techniques to acquire the respondents. One hundred women and …


Flamenco, Gender Roles, And Female Empowerment In Granada, Spain, Dana F. Giordano May 2024

Flamenco, Gender Roles, And Female Empowerment In Granada, Spain, Dana F. Giordano

Senior Honors Projects

During the 2023-2024 academic year, my academic pursuits led me to Granada, Spain. This city is nestled within the culturally rich region of Andalucia, renowned as the birthplace of flamenco. Immersed in the study of Spanish language and culture, but also cognizant of prevalent issues of sexism deeply rooted within its societal fabric, I decided to explore gender expression and dynamics in flamenco. For this project, I researched Laura Mulvey's notion of the “male gaze,” a feminist theory that argues that the depiction of women in art and media supports a patriarchal society. Women are often portrayed as objects for …


Translation As Consciousness-Building In The Portuguese Lesbian Press (1990–2002), Grace Holleran Jan 2024

Translation As Consciousness-Building In The Portuguese Lesbian Press (1990–2002), Grace Holleran

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

The following article examines the political potential of the intimate, affective translation practices of Portuguese lesbian feminist activists in the publications Organa (1990–1992) and Lilás (1993–2002). Both publications, which I analyze through the rubric of the countercultural genre of “zine” or “fanzine,” arose in response to the repression and invisibilization that Portuguese lesbians faced, from criminalization and censorship at the hands of the fascist Estado Novo [New State] dictatorship (1933–1974) to exclusion from post-1974 feminist groups. Disconnected from any notion of lesbian identity and isolated from each other, the first lesbian activists turned toward experiences and connections abroad to build …


Rivers Of Language Across Oceans: Review Essay Of River In An Ocean: Essays On Translation, Edited By Nuzhat Abbas, Luise Von Flotow Jan 2024

Rivers Of Language Across Oceans: Review Essay Of River In An Ocean: Essays On Translation, Edited By Nuzhat Abbas, Luise Von Flotow

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

This article presents an academic review of the collection of articles “on translation” and entitled river in an ocean. It engages with the foreword by Françoise Vergès and the introduction by editor Nuzhat Abbas, which set the tone of ‘decolonial feminism’ that permeates the essays. The reviews of the eleven essays—by women from southeast Asia, Africa, Palestine and Saudi Arabia—come from the perspective of feminist translation studies but pay careful attention to their very specific concerns around exile and life in diaspora.


Faux Feminism In A Capitalistic Fever Dream: A Review Of Greta Gerwig's Barbie (2023), Amy La Porte, Lena Cavusoglu Dec 2023

Faux Feminism In A Capitalistic Fever Dream: A Review Of Greta Gerwig's Barbie (2023), Amy La Porte, Lena Cavusoglu

Markets, Globalization & Development Review

Somewhere between meaningful discourse about female agency and the commercial interests of a problematic doll franchise lies Mattel's box office hit film Barbie, directed by Greta Gerwig. In a script-flipping interpretation of the real-world patriarchy, it catapults itself into overdue discussions about gender norms, objectification, and the pursuit of Westernized beauty ideals. While it may have introduced liberationist theories to a new generation of women, ultimately it is a film bound by cognitive dissonance. This paper will delve into the profit-making protagonist at the center of its story and argue the film's underlying incompatibility with diversity, feminism, and social …


Poverty And Commercial Surrogacy In India: An Intersectional Analytical Approach, Sheela Suryanarayanan Sep 2023

Poverty And Commercial Surrogacy In India: An Intersectional Analytical Approach, Sheela Suryanarayanan

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

The destination and source countries for commercial surrogacy match world patterns of inequality. India, Nepal, Thailand, Mexico, and Cambodia banned commercial surrogacy, moving the market to other less-developed countries in South Africa and South America. India had a commercial surrogacy boom until exploitative factors led to the passage of the Surrogacy (Regulation) Bill in 2019, which banned the practice. This paper examines surrogacy's monetary, health, and emotional effects on 45 surrogate mothers in Gujarat State, India. The study revealed that a majority (63%) of the very poor women remained very poor post-surgery. Surrogate mothers in poor households had to do …


Academic Women's Studies: An Institutional Failure For Scholarship On Violence Against Women, Donna M. Hughes Sep 2023

Academic Women's Studies: An Institutional Failure For Scholarship On Violence Against Women, Donna M. Hughes

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


The Happy Hooker Revisited: Trauma And Sexualized Memories, Carolyn Gage Aug 2023

The Happy Hooker Revisited: Trauma And Sexualized Memories, Carolyn Gage

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


’90s “It Girls”: Britpop At The Postfeminist Intermezzo, Benjamin Halligan Jan 2023

’90s “It Girls”: Britpop At The Postfeminist Intermezzo, Benjamin Halligan

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

In considering the Britpop genre of music and its moment of popularity in the mid/late-1990s, the few female-fronted Britpop groups created space for more compelling articulations of existential matters than were to be found in standard Britpop fare. This article argues these articulations are most appropriately read as arising from a moment of feminist thought in transition: a premature “victory,” under the sign of postfeminism, in which the struggles of Second Wave feminists could be seen to have delivered equality. This moment results in an encroaching and contested sense of entry into maturity, and a loss of youth. The groups …


From “A Room Of Your Own” To “A Room Of Her Own”: Women Rewriting Women And The Path To Feminist Practice, Vasiliki Misiou Jan 2023

From “A Room Of Your Own” To “A Room Of Her Own”: Women Rewriting Women And The Path To Feminist Practice, Vasiliki Misiou

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

Virginia Woolf’s A Room of One’s Own (1929) was first translated in Greek by Mina Dalamanga (Odysseus Editions) in 1980. Almost forty years later, in 2019, Vasia Tzanakari was assigned the translation of Woolf’s seminal text by Metaichmio Publications. And in 2021, a new translation by Sparti Gerodimou saw the light of day, published by Erato Publications (2021). Three different women translators have thus rendered Woolf’s text in Greek with all three publications coming out at times marked by significant changes in Greek society. Exploring the context in which the agents were situated and drawing on feminist translation practices and …


Swerf Necropolitics: Three Sites Of Feminist Mistranslation And The Politics Of Feminist Exclusion, Aaron Hammes Jan 2023

Swerf Necropolitics: Three Sites Of Feminist Mistranslation And The Politics Of Feminist Exclusion, Aaron Hammes

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

The acronym SWERF, or Sex Work(er) Exclusive Radical Feminism, and its attendant ideologies brings up a number of questions and potential schisms for the enterprise of feminist thought more broadly. This inquiry examines what it means for feminism to exclude, what the excluders believe is gained by protecting certain boundaries around which identities and practices are included, and the ideological foundations and consequences of this thinking. SWERF logics are understood as mistranslations of the radical potentialities of feminism, clustered around three sites: exclusion (against bodily autonomy) , equivocation (between sex work and labor trafficking), and misrepresentation (of the sex worker …


Not Beloved, Only Broken: Sex Dolls, Robots, And Woman Hating: The Case For Resistance By Caitlin Roper (Spinifex Press, 2022), Donovan Cleckley Jan 2023

Not Beloved, Only Broken: Sex Dolls, Robots, And Woman Hating: The Case For Resistance By Caitlin Roper (Spinifex Press, 2022), Donovan Cleckley

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

No abstract provided.


Testimony, Violence, And Silence: An Examination Of Agamben And His Critics, Yagmur Uygarkizi Jun 2022

Testimony, Violence, And Silence: An Examination Of Agamben And His Critics, Yagmur Uygarkizi

Dignity: A Journal of Analysis of Exploitation and Violence

This paper investigates the difficulties faced by survivors of atrocities in testifying. I work on the case of female victims of domestic torture as reported by Jeanne Sarson and Linda MacDonald. The starting point is Giorgio Agamben’s Remnants of Auschwitz with his discussion on Primo Levi’s paradox and the testis/superstes/auctor distinction. I build on his nuances while arguing that he has not looked enough into power dynamics that render one speechless. “Unspeakable violence” refers simultaneously to incapacity and not being allowed to speak. Pain renders the victim speechless; perpetrators distort language and speak over survivors. Victims are often not allowed …


Means Of Menstruation, Hannah Eddleston May 2022

Means Of Menstruation, Hannah Eddleston

Senior Honors Projects

No abstract provided.


The Digital Age: Giving Sex Work A New Meaning, Allison Garvey Jan 2022

The Digital Age: Giving Sex Work A New Meaning, Allison Garvey

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

No abstract provided.


Pedagogies Of The “Irresistible”: Imaginative Elsewheres Of Black Feminist Learning., Mecca Jamilah Sullivan Jan 2022

Pedagogies Of The “Irresistible”: Imaginative Elsewheres Of Black Feminist Learning., Mecca Jamilah Sullivan

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

In her foreword to the groundbreaking anthology, This Bridge Called My Back: Writings by Radical Women of Color, Toni Cade Bambara (1983) famously argues that the great work of feminist writing is “to make revolution irresistible.” This statement is often read as a founding call of women-of-color feminism, and of feminist literary expression in particular. Yet Bambara’s notion of the “irresistible” extends beyond the page; throughout her works, she also uses the term as a key descriptor of her pedagogy, and her vision of the classroom. Bambara joins Audre Lorde and other Black feminist writer/teachers in insisting on a …


Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery (Sewing) Society: Handcraft As A Metaphorical Tool For The Abolitionist Cause, Hinda Mandell Jan 2022

Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery (Sewing) Society: Handcraft As A Metaphorical Tool For The Abolitionist Cause, Hinda Mandell

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

In 1851, in Rochester, New York, a group of six women banded together as the founding members of an anti-slavery group in order to support the work of the abolitionist Frederick Douglass. They called themselves the Rochester Ladies’ Anti-Slavery (Sewing) Society, although they dropped “Sewing” from the group’s name in 1855. Yet the fact that “Sewing” was included in the original name of this reformist group indicates the foundational role of craft not only as a guiding activity but also central as an activist mechanism to abolish the institution of slavery. They were the benefactors of Frederick Douglass, himself regarded …


Gender Unfreedom: Gender Diverse Perspectives From Digital India, Sara Bardhan Jan 2022

Gender Unfreedom: Gender Diverse Perspectives From Digital India, Sara Bardhan

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

No abstract provided.