Representation, Community, Failure: Wildness & Utopia
At this year’s Scholar & Feminist Conference, “Utopia,” I looked forward to to seeing Wu Tsang and Roya Rastegar’s Wildness, a film that brings together my two interests, art and gender. The film, which I had first heard of in an art museum context (Tsang was involved in the New Museum Triennial and Whitney Biennial in 2012), chronicles the story of […]
Another World is Possible: Building the Ideal Community
The workshop “Another World is Possible: Creating Communities that Reinvent Ourselves as we Reinvent the World,” at The Scholar & Feminist 2013: Utopia, offered incredible insight into the process of creating a community based on ideas of equality and respect for diversity. Building utopia requires a complete transformation of the existing notions in society. The ultimate […]
Women in the Labor Movement: Campus Activism
With any history of activism, there is a history of oppression to go with it. In recent years, Columbia University has been the site of a series of ongoing labor disputes–disputes so outrageous, in fact, that the situation called for some old- fashioned grassroots organizing. Last fall, I helped start a student activist group, Student-Worker Solidarity (SWS), […]
CATCALLED NYC
CATCALLED logo (sketch of letters on top on buildings at street level) Street harassment is the biggest unlegislated form of violence against women in the world. There is almost no legal recourse against street harassment in public places—a type of harassment that 98 percent of women will face at least once, according to the Harvard Law Review. […]
Gender Amplified: A Project by Alumnae Fellow Ebonie Smith ’07
BCRW is thrilled to announce our second annual Alumnae Fellow, Ebonie Smith ’07. Ebonie will spend this year on her Gender Amplified Project to support women’s participation in music production and to encourage girls towards STEM fields through experience with music technology, leading up to an all day music festival in the Fall of 2013. The Gender […]
Bodies Without Humanity: Remembering Trayvon Martin
I first heard of Trayvon Martin’s murder in a tweeted video clip. I followed the story, admittedly neglecting a few of my classes to pursue my interests in the case, through news articles, discussion panels, and more online video clips. I remember thinking as I made my way through the news coverage, why aren’t we […]
Domestic Workers Rights Are Women’s Rights
This post originally appeared on the Ms. Magazine blog, and is re-posted here with the author’s permission. Gov. Jerry Brown (D-Calif.) has a big decision to make for the cause of women’s rights. On his desk at the moment is a Domestic Workers Bill of Rights that recently passed both houses of the California legislature. The […]
Paradise on Earth: Shulamith Firestone and the Legacy of Reproductive Technologies
Last week, feminist visionary Shulamith Firestone, author of The Dialectic of Sex: The Case for Feminist Revolution, died at the age of 67. As Sarah Franklin discussed in her essay “Transbiology: A Feminist Cultural Account of Being After IVF”: Firestone is of course famous, or infamous, for her advocacy of new reproductive technologies as a means […]
What We’re Reading: Biased Science, Foster Families, and Paul Ryan Gosling
A quick look at what caught the attention of BCRW Staff this week… The Medieval Roots of Todd Akin’s Theories, Jennifer Tucker Wesleyan University Professor of History and Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Jennifer Tucker provides a historical overview of theories which promoted the idea that pregnancy “could stand for a woman’s consent to an alleged rape.” […]
Mark of Aggression: Disability Activists Arrested
Over at Waging Nonviolence, BCRW collaborator and speaker Ynestra King writes about the arrests of protestors at Gracie Mansion earlier this month. Sponsored by Occupy’s Disability Caucus, activists gathered to protest the Bloomberg administration’s opposition to making NYC taxis more wheelchair-accessible. Initially, non-disabled protestors were targeted for arrest while disabled activists, who were the principal organizers of the […]
What We’re Reading: Reminders of War, Home Health Workers, What Makes a Family, and Culture as a Toolbox
A quick look at what caught the attention of BCRW Staff last week… We’re Still at War, Mother Jones Magazine The Mother Jones‘ “Photo of the Day” offers a daily visual reminder that the United States is effectively still at war – no words necessary. This article was picked out by Hope, our New Media Manager. […]
You Are Human, So Am I: The Right To Work Free of Harassment and Abuse
Sexual harassment in the workplace remains a problem for many U.S. women, but some are particularly vulnerable to employer exploitation. Last month, DiMare Ruskin, one of Florida’s largest tomato growers, settled a suit brought by the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission stemming from the complaints of several women who experienced repeated sexual harassment in the fields. As the Coalition […]
What We’re Reading: On Girl Doctors, Genealogy, and Genius
A quick look at the articles that caught the attention of BCRW Staff this week… Disney Finds a Cure for the Common Stereotype With ‘Doc McStuffins’ by Brooks Barnes Brooks Barnes reports for The New York Times on the newest Disney TV star, a six-year-old African American girl and aspiring doctor who opens a clinic for her stuffed animals. […]
Supporting the Sex Workers’ Freedom Festival
Last week, Kolkata, India, was home to one of the largest gatherings of sex workers from around the world. The alternative International AIDS Conference, better known as the Sex Workers’ Freedom Festival was held in Kolkata from July 22-27, 2012. This alternative conference was held at the same time as the International AIDS Conferencein Washington, D.C., in reaction to […]
Policing Femininity: Olympic Regulations & Expectations
In terms of the numbers, the 2012 Olympic is a hallmark year for female athleticism, with women consituting over 40% of the approximately 10,500 athletes set to compete at the London Games. The USA has sent more women than men to compete, a testament to the impact of the 40th anniversary of Title IX. And for a first in Olympic history, every participating country […]
Paid Sick Leave: A Feminist Issue
Ai-jen Poo, Executive Director of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, and Shelby Knox, activist and organizer, have an opinion piece in The New York Daily News today calling for the NYC City Council to support paid sick days. From their article: Nearly a million working people in New York lack paid sick days. Most are women in low-wage, service sector […]
Smart Girls Have More Fun
This month, actress, writer, and comedian Amy Poehler continues to explore the intersection of new media and feminism with Season Two of her tween-oriented digital series, Smart Girls at the Party. Poehler uses a traditional talk show format to interview pre-teen girls “who are changing the world by being themselves,” featuring “bite-sized and positive” episodes that highlight passionate young ladies discussing […]
Home-Care Workers Aren’t Just ‘Companions’
On July 1, The New York Times published an Op-Ed by Barnard Alumna and BCRW contributor Jennifer Klein about domestic workers’ rights in America. Klein and her co-author Eileen Boris historicize the legislative marginalization of in-home work and address President Obama’s proposal to revise Labor Department regulations on home attendants and aides by placing domestic help under the Fair Labor Standards Act: Establishing the legitimacy of care […]
Feminist Zines at the Barnard Zine Library
Did you know that Barnard has a Zine library? BCRW Advisory Board Member Jenna Freedman, the Director of Reference and Instruction Services at Barnard, posted a few months ago about new zines the library picked up at the Feminist Zine Fest. One new acquisition from 2008 includes a definition of feminism from Kathleen Hanna: “…I think of feminism as a radical […]
KPFA Interview with Amber Hollibaugh & Kenyon Farrow
On June 21, Amber Hollibaugh and Kenyon Farrow, Scholar & Feminist Online Guest Editors from Queers for Economic Justice, discussed A New Queer Agenda, why sex matters, and asking a different set of questions about gay liberation on 94.1 KPFA “Behind the News” with Doug Henwood. Audio of the interview is available starting at 26:43 on the June 21st podcast. The disucssion began […]
New Sex Testing Policies Significantly Flawed
BCRW Advisory Board member Rebecca Jordan-Young has co-authored a new report on sex testing policies of the International Olympic Committee, “Out of Bounds? A Critique of the New Policies on Hyperandrogenism in Elite Female Athletes.” From the abstract: In May 2011, more than a decade after the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) and the International Olympic […]
The Bishops, the Sisters, and Religious Freedom
BCRW Acting Director and Chair of the Barnard Religion Department Elizabeth Castellioffers her take on the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops‘s published stance on the Affordable Care Act: Framing their opposition to the health care mandate in terms of religious freedom, it needs to be emphasized, is a strategic move that narrows the terrain significantly: to […]
Welcome to the BCRW Blog!
For over 40 years, the Barnard Center for Research on Women has served as a hub for feminist thought and action, providing a pivotal platform for activists and scholars to come to together and grapple with ideas pulled from local and global perspectives. To further this tradition of critical feminist dialogue, we are launching the BCRW Blog […]