Women's Studies Commons^™

La Fille Publique: Depictions Of Sex Work In Fin-De-Siècle Literature, Nicole Araujo

All Student Scholarship

This thesis conducts a feminist analysis of depictions of sex work in fin-de-siècle, or turn of the19th-century, French literature. It draws connections between literature from this time period and the social and political forces that sought to eradicate female sexual autonomy. In the introduction, the political and social setting of fin-de-siècle France is explored, when sex work was widely prevalent and for many women offered a route to sexual and financial autonomy that was otherwise unattainable, much to the anxiety and irritation of the patriarchal forces in place.The first chapter analyzes Emile Zola’s Nana as a classic representation of the …

Assessing The Extent Of Domestic Violence Against Indian Women After The Implementation Of The Domestic Violence Act Of India, 2005, Archana Singh, Pushpendra Singh

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper aims to dissect and analyze the trends of domestic violence against women in India. It will explore the factors contributing to the risk and prevalence of violence against women following the implementation of the Domestic Violence Act of India in 2005. This study also assesses the magnitude of violence that makes women vulnerable. In addressing the above-mentioned objective, this study has used data from the National Family and Health Survey collected in 2005-06 and 2015-16. In the first stage of analysis, the magnitude of violence was estimated using socio-economic and demographic measures. In the second stage, the risk …

Patriarchy, 20th Century Bengal And The Naxalbari Movement (1965-1975): Tracing The Roots Through Lives Of Others, Pritha Sarkar

Journal of International Women's Studies

The objective in this paper is to identify the roots of patriarchy in the Naxalbari movement (1965-1975) through one of the texts in Indian English Literature. The Naxalbari movement is the first peasant revolution within twenty years of Indian Independence that initiated in a small village named Naxalbari situated in the Darjeeling district of West Bengal. Through Lives of Others (2014) by Neil Mukherjee the paper analyses the patriarchy of the 20^th century urban Bengal society and how it seeped into the movement. Therefore, it exposes the androcentric underpinning of a movement dedicated to creating an egalitarian society. While …

Patriarchal Limitations Imposed On African Women: A Deconstructive Reading Of Chinweizu’S Anatomy Of Female Power, Itang Ede Egbung

Journal of International Women's Studies

Patriarchy is one of the crippling limitations that women face in contemporary societies despite the effects of modernism. Patriarchy is a system that thrives on the domination of women and promotes the superiority of men. The system places so many limitations on women to the extent that the subversion of these limitations is considered a violation of social norms and values. This paper discovers that patriarchal limitations have confined unassertive women to be at the whims and caprices of men and their domination. Using deconstructive critical theory, this paper deconstructs Chinweizu’s Anatomy of Female Power which claims that women wield …

From Resistance To Leadership: The Role Of The Women In Cinema Collective (Wcc) In ‘Voicing The Women’ In The Malayalam Film Industry, Jimin S. Mathew, Alna Mariya Isac

Journal of International Women's Studies

On February 17, 2017 a popular film actress in the Malayalam film industry was sexually assaulted and harassed in a running vehicle as she was returning from work. A group of women came together as a collective to support the survivor and to address some of the problems plaguing women in the film industry. The heinous crime was a blow to the conscience of the state of Kerala which is considered the most educated and well governed state with better living conditions, when compared to all the other states in India. It revealed the long silenced and unquestioned reality of …

A Template For The Future: Resonant Leadership In The Song Of Deborah, Lyola Thomas

Journal of International Women's Studies

While leadership seems to come naturally for many great leaders, leadership is also a skill that can be learned. Some leaders gradually grow into successful leadership positions but, for others, leadership is a challenge that they suddenly find themselves rising to meet. In the heroic poem, The Song of Deborah, we come face to face with Deborah--a woman who suddenly becomes a leader--and she leads her community to victory and social transformation. This paper delves into her character and her leadership role within her patriarchal cultural history and attempts to investigate and understand if leadership skills are personality specific or …

Who Are You?, Luma Balaa

Journal of International Women's Studies

On August 4, 2020, Lebanon witnessed a second Hiroshima-like explosion of 2,750 tons of ammonium nitrate. It killed and injured thousands of people, destroying most of Beirut. Compounding Lebanon’s misery, the coronavirus has taken its toll, as in the rest of the world, with thousands of deaths. There are no more vacant hospital beds and not enough medical supplies. For the last two years, Lebanon has been experiencing economic and political instability. The country is badly in debt and the banks have gone bankrupt and confiscated people’s life savings. The Lebanese Lira is pegged to the dollar and two years …

Masculinity And Challenges For Women In Indian Culture, I. Sivakumar, K. Manimekalai

Journal of International Women's Studies

Construction of masculinity in India has been approached and studied from a variety of feminist perspectives. The feminist perspective focused on the discourse and gained much greater momentum during the pre-colonial and colonial periods. During the pre-independence era, the status of women in the areas of productive, reproductive, sexual health, mobility, and economic resources deteriorated to great extent owing to intense patriarchal oppression. Now in the post-colonial period sex-determination tests leading to the massacre of female fetuses, declining sex-ratio are unfavourable to women. Rapidly changing sex-ratios and increasing evidence of violence against women are the strong pointers that have justified …

Exploring Breast Cancer Patients’ Experiences Of Struggle Against Socio-Economic And Geographical Barriers In Rural Pakistan, Nadia Agha, Maliha Gull Tarar, Rahim Dad Rind

Journal of International Women's Studies

This study offers insights into the barriers experienced by Breast Cancer (BC) patients from less privileged rural areas of Pakistan. We conducted in-depth interviews with 42 BC survivors, from the northern Sindh in southern Pakistan, to explore and analyse knowledge, geographical and financial barriers and how these barriers intersect and complicate BC patients’ lives. Results indicate that most of the women in this study were poor and their families’ health seeking behaviour was influenced by their socio-economic background; their knowledge about the disease was limited and they were unable to appropriately assess the symptoms for months, which caused delay. Based …

Female Sexual Autonomy, Virginity, And Honour-Based Violence With Special Focus On The Uk, Mukaddes Gorar

Journal of International Women's Studies

In honour-based patriarchal societies, young girls and women are expected to remain virgins until marriage. If this expectation is not met, the consequences can be very harmful and may even lead to honour killing. Honour killing occurs when a victim (mainly female) is murdered by a relative, due to the perpetrator’s assumption that the victim has brought shame or dishonour upon the family. Having sexual freedom before marriage is considered to be shameful, and it attracts honour related punishment. Chastity of the female members of a family until the wedding night is perceived as a means of safeguarding the family’s …

The Poetics Of Pakistani Patriarchy: A Critical Analysis Of The Protest-Signs In Women’S March Pakistan 2019, Amer Akhtar, Selina Aziz, Neelum Almas

Journal of Feminist Scholarship

The Pakistani variant of Women’s March Aurat March celebrated its second year in March 2019. The current study focuses on the issues raised by the participants during Aurat March 2019 to define patriarchy from a Pakistani-out-on-the-street feminist struggle. It analyses the protest signs, slogans, messages, and concerns raised through banners in the march. The paper attempts to offer a unique perspective on Pakistani patriarchy by analyzing the voice of the women instead of any theorization or enactment of the voice. It employs visual and textual methods to understand the view of the participants and finds that the participants of the …

The Nana Yaa Asantewaa War: Analysis Of The Political Institutions Of The Asante During The War Of The Golden Stool And The Existing Narratives, Angela Danso Gyane

Senior Independent Study Theses

The War of the Golden Stool was the last in the Anglo-Asante Wars, where the Asante fought against the British colonial agenda. According to the Asante oral history, Nana Yaa Asantewaa was at the forefront of this war. She was the commander, but most of the literature to not reflect this oral history. Therefore, this study seeks to address two essential questions: how did gender dynamics in the Asante Kingdom's political system shape their Resistance against the British in 1900- 01? Moreover, how does the analysis of oral histories from the matrilineal culture of the Asante decenter Western narratives of …

“Fetch M’Dear”: Healers, Midwives, Witches, And Conjuring Women In Select Ya And Toni Morrison Novels, Diane Mallett-Birkitt

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Accusations and persecution of witchcraft have been embedded in global culture for centuries. For as long as these persecutions have occurred, women have found themselves accused most frequently. Older women with herbal knowledge were often called on to assist with childbirth or termination of pregnancies and this “secret knowledge” often led them to be suspected of supernatural abilities, often of a satanic nature. Intrigued by these wise women who appeared to have mysterious powers and a penchant for arousing the ire of men in the legal, medical, and religious communities, I began to notice their frequent appearance in novels. Does …

Antigone The Bride Of Death, Bailey Gomes

Conspectus Borealis

No abstract provided.

¿Cómo Traducimos "Ni Una Más" Al Inglés?: Latin American Manifestation Of The Phenomenology Of Femicide, And The United States’ Subsequent Internal Neglect, Suemi Mendez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This paper aims to tackle two components in analyzing the phenomenological concept of femicide, most simply known as the killing of women because they are women through structural violence and oppression. First, it will develop its deployment within the Latin American framework as it has been adapted to function within the regional lexicon, both socially and legislatively. This assessment will serve to address the successes and failures thus far in tackling femicide as the location with the highest statistics globally. Through this foregrounding, it will lead into how this revised deployment of femicide fits into the context of Global North …

“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 Darwinian Feminist Analysis Of Margaret Atwood's The Handmaid's Tale, Morgan N. Petersen

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale presents a dystopian world in which women have lost all individualism and have been reduced to breeding machines. This paper analyzes the patriarchal characteristics of The Handmaid’s Tale by using a Darwinian feminist theory to understand the evolutionary psychological root of male control of women in the narrative. Additionally, this in-depth reading relies on David Geary’s analysis of male and female mating dynamics and Barbara Smuts’ study of the evolution of patriarchy in humans to further give evidence to the evolutionary root of Gilead’s patriarchy. The men of Gilead control women through creating a fundamentalist …

Waking Up The Dissident: Transforming Lives (And Society) With Feminist Counseling, Donna F. Johnson

Journal of International Women's Studies

When I was a student in the 70’s I took a year off to travel the world with a friend. Despite taking every precaution, I was sexually assaulted twice. The incidents changed the course of my life. I completed my studies and began working in a refuge for battered women. There I bore witness, not only to unimaginable cruelty, but to widespread institutional indifference to women’s suffering. Decades later, police, judicial and child welfare responses remain inadequate in Canada (as everywhere), and mental health practitioners continue to routinely blame and pathologize women. As a counselor, first at the shelter, later …

Nancy Drew: A Feminist Icon Or A Problematic Figure Of The Patriarchy And White Privilege, Elizabeth J. Farren

WRIT: Journal of First-Year Writing

In the detective fiction genre, Nancy Drew is one of its most iconic sleuths, and is so cleverly named the “girl detective.” Originally created in 1930, Nancy Drew serves as an inspirational figure for young girls and women across generations, as her intelligence and resourcefulness allowed her to challenge traditional gender roles for women as well as solve complicated mysteries. With the rise of the women’s rights movement and in the 1960s, many aspired to attain Nancy Drew’s independence and subvert the patriarchy, breaking the glass ceiling that held them down in the role of the submissive housewife. The second …

“When A Mother Is Employed, Her Children Suffer”: A Quantitative Analysis Of Factors Influencing Attitudes Towards Women’S Employment And Gender Roles In Rwanda, Nadine Mumporeze

Journal of International Women's Studies

Socialist feminist theory has assumed that patriarchy and capitalism are the main sources of women's limited roles and related attitudes in society. Informed by this theory and using the data from the World Values Survey wave six, this study aimed at analysing the factors influencing individuals’ attitudes towards women’s employment and gender roles in Rwandan society. A hierarchical multiple regression modelling method was used to analyse data through R and SPSS statistics programs. The main findings yielded by three research models show that Rwandans express ambivalent attitudes toward women’s work and gender roles, comprising both traditional and non-traditional attitudes. Women, …

Saudi Runaway, John C. Lyden

Journal of Religion & Film

This is a film review of Saudi Runaway (2020) directed by Susanne Regina Meures.

Gender, Religion And Patriarchy: The Educational Discrimination Of Coastal Madurese Women, East Java, Sudarso Sudarso, Phillipus Edy Keban, Siti Mas’Udah

Journal of International Women's Studies

One of the educational development problems is the gap in the quality of education between regions and community groups, as well as gender. This article has examined gender, religion, patriarchy and the educational discrimination faced by coastal women who are a part of the Madura culture in East Java. This study employed a qualitative approach by interviewing 70 informants who consisted of school dropouts, the parents of daughters who had dropped out, teachers, and community leaders. This study found there to be several key findings. In the Madura culture, the concept of gender for women is always associated with the …

Contradictory Shakespeare: An Investigation Of Female Protagonists In Othello, Measure For Measure, And Pericles, Mingyue Xu

Student Theses and Dissertations

Unlike the stereotyped image of women in the Elizabethan era, in which women should submit to men’s control, Desdemona in Othello, Isabella in Measure for Measure, and Marina in Pericles present their powerful and brave characteristics when facing male dominance. More specifically, all three young women — Desdemona, Isabella and Marina — negotiate sexual and marital arrangements with their language intelligently, despite the fact that they sometimes lack self-determining power in the plays. That is to say, Shakespeare gives women rhetorical power while in certain circumstances, men cannot be persuaded. Such contradiction within how Shakespeare depicts his female …

"We Neither Are Of The Past Nor Of The Future" : Analyzing The Two Opposing Aspects Of A Female Character Through Four Modern Works Of Persian Fiction", Ronak Karami

Journal of International Women's Studies

Under Iran’s growing contact with the West from 1925 until 1979, which caused cultural changes, modern writers were stuck between two realities: the vanishing culture of the past with its unified view of women and the modern Western-oriented culture of the present with its doubting, ironic, and fast-changing view of women. Both labels, the ‘ethereal’ (or inaccessible paragon) and the ‘whore’ (or accessible temptress) for female characters emerged in a major literary work of the 20th century in Iran, The Blind Owl (1937), by Hedayat due to these cultural changes. Furthermore, the labels appeared within some later modern Persian fictional …

Show Her It's A Man's World: How The Femme Fatale Became A Vehicle For Propaganda, Leann Bishop

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

During World War II women joined the workforce in droves due to propaganda such as Rosie the Riveter. When Soldiers began returning from the war they wanted stability and normalcy. They wanted to return to the America they left where women ran the household and men went to work. Women, however, experienced a new sense of freedom from working and wanted to continue their liberation. It was during this time that femme fatales, the sultry women of film noir became popular. They represented the liberated women of the 1940s. The film industry saw an opportunity to use these women found …

Contact, Christine M. Stevralia

LSU New Orleans Theses and Dissertations

A year after Alyssa Milano’s tweet launched the #MeToo movement, survivors of sexual assault are being called ‘accusers’ in the media, and public opinion is swinging in favor of guilty men. #MeToo raised awareness but not understanding. What is rape? What is consent? As evidenced by the #MeToo movement and the backlash against it, clearly, as a society, we don’t know. Contact is a work of Creative Nonfiction that uses scenes and details from the narrator’s personal experiences to illuminate the micro-negotiations that occur in sex and seduction.

In a world where women are still expected to stay small and …

A Qualitative Case Study On The Domestic Violence Act, 2007 (732) And The Convention On The Elimination Of All Forms Of Discrimination Against Women, Victoria Hernandez

Master's Theses

On July 17, 1980, Ghana became a signatory to CEDAW (Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women) under the United Nations in order to combat all forms of violence, discrimination and human rights violations that harm the security, freedom, privacy, and dignity of every woman. The Domestic Violence Act (732) stemmed from CEDAW in order to add on more layers of legal protection for victims of domestic violence and to penalize all acts according the bill’s definition and the different forms of domestic violence. Although there are stricter laws to punish any acts of violence inflicted …

The Redemption Of Goethe’S Eternal Feminine: Discovering The Reality And Significance Of An Archetypal Phenomenon, Mariana Weisler

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

This thesis traces the phenomenological history and significance of the archetype of the Eternal Feminine, as well as her role in Goethe’s Faust. Although the Eternal Feminine (Goethe’s “das Ewig-Weibliche”) first appears in literary form in 1832 with the publication of Faust: Part II, she has an ancient archetypal history that reaches from the age of pre-patriarchal domination into the modern era. This thesis contends that the Eternal Feminine is a Jungian archetype—a “primordial image” or motif that exists unconsciously and evokes a universal experience within both the individual and the society. Five historical figures exemplify the archetype of the …

The ‘Stigma’ Of Paid Work: Capital, State, Patriarchy And Women Fish Workers In South India, P. Aswathy, K. Kalpana

Journal of International Women's Studies

This paper explores the changing dynamics of women’s labor in a Muslim fishing village in the South Indian state of Kerala in the back drop of two global processes viz., state-initiated capitalist modernization of the fisheries sector and state-sponsored livelihood promotion programs. It traces the shifting contexts in which Muslim fisherwomen, alternately, engaged in and disengaged from, paid work outside the household and shows how women experienced different kinds of paid work, as self-employed fish vendors and wage earners of employment guarantee schemes. Changes in women’s labor force participation were mediated by the social institutions of family and religion, community …

How To Be The Perfect Asian Wife!, Sophia Hill

Art and Art History Honors Projects

“How to be the Perfect Asian Wife” critiques exploitative power systems that assault female bodies of color in intersectional ways. This work explores strategies of healing and resistance through inserting one’s own narrative of flourishing rather than surviving, while reflecting violent realities. Three large drawings mimic pervasive advertisement language and presentation reflecting the oppressive strategies used to contain women of color. Created with charcoal, watercolor, and ink, these 'advertisements' contrast with an interactive rice bag filled with comics of my everyday experiences. These documentations compel viewers to reflect on their own participation in systems of power.