Women & Language

Arabic Twitter Stars Come Face-to-Face in Cairo

admin — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 20:31:44 +0000

By Courtney C. Radsch

WeNews correspondent

Thursday, January 26, 2012

After a year of courageous digital leadership, female activists from the Middle East and North Africa–some of them Twitter superstars–met in Cairo last week. It was a chance to meet face-to-face, savor revolutionary success and weigh setbacks. Click here for the complete article

Seeking chapters for Performing Motherhood

admin — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 20:27:02 +0000

Amber Kinser of East Tennessee State University has issued a call for chapters in Performing Motherhood to be published by Demeter Press. The following link provides details:

http://www.amberkinser.com/perf-mhood-cfp.html

Chapters sought for book on modern mythology

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 22:01:48 +0000

John Perlich sends a call for chapters in a book, Modern Mythology in Popular Culture, with a deadline of March 1, 2012. In 2010 McFarland Publishing issued a follow-up volume to Sith, Slayers, Stargates, and Cyborgs by Perlich and Whitt titled Millennial Mythmaking. This third collection seeks to bring together scholars and cultural critics from a variety of fields to examine various texts from mythic and rhetorical perspectives, including but not limited to feminist, ideological, metaphoric, narrative, and generative. Science fiction and fantasy texts are logical subjects, but editors encourage a broad range of mythic applications such as sport, religion, history, reality television, music, toys, games, nature. Obvious issues for analysis include ethnicity, sex and gender.
Proposals should include (1) title page with contact information for authors, (2) biographical page (a brief biographical statement for all authors), (3) a proposal (maximum of 5 pages excluding references) following the current APA Publication Manual. Final chapters will be limited to 30 pages. First drafts of chapters selected for inclusion must be submitted by June 15, 2012.

Direct questions and proposals to either co-editors: David Whitt, Nebraska Wesleyan University at dfw@nebrwesleyan.edu or John Perlich at jperlich@hastings.edu

Interdisciplinary conference seeks paper proposals

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:57:35 +0000

Intersections: An Interdisciplinary Conference on Gender and Sexuality is a Georgia Gwinnett College conference on Saturday, April 7 featuring student, faculty, and student/faculty collaborative projects relating to gender and sexuality across all disciplines and historical periods. The conference will include concurrent panels throughout the day and a dinner reception. We invite submissions for individual 20 minute-presentations or pre-constituted panels. All work (i.e. creative, academic, professional) touching upon on the subject of gender is welcome.

Suggested topics include, but are not limited to, gender/sexuality in relation to: Campus Life, Sexuality and Relationships, Film/Drama; Literature; Popular Culture; The Arts; Health/Medicine; Politics and Activism; Religion/Spirituality; Cross(ing) Cultures; Regional Issues; Topical Issues; Current Events

250 word abstracts should be submitted by Friday, February 24, 2012. Abstracts should be submitted simultaneously to both Organizing Chairs. Abstracts may be in Word, WordPerfect, PDF or RTF formats with the following information, in this order: a) author(s), b) email address, c) title of abstract, d) body of abstract. E-mails should use the following as subject line: Intersections Conference Submission. We will acknowledge receipt of all proposals submitted for review. Please email proposals to rflynn1@ggc.edu and rbowser@ggc.edu

Special thanks to Pride Alliance and Science and History Club for contributions and support.

Reminder on Gender Matters conference registration deadline

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:51:41 +0000

The early registration deadline for Gender Matters: Gendered Borders is Thursday, February 2, 2012. The conference will be held April 13-14, 2012 at Governors State University in University Park, IL (south of Chicago). Gender Matters is an academic conference highlighting research on gender, women, and sexuality across all disciplines and historical periods.

A detailed program will be available on the conference website in March. At this point, we are happy to announce the program will include a keynote address by Richard Rodriguez (University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign); a featured performance by Laila Farah (DePaul University); and approximately 25 panels including presentations by Sonja Foss (University of Colorado, Denver), Karen Foss (University of New Mexico), Julia Johnson (University of Wisconsin, La Crosse), and Dustin Goltz (DePaul University).

In order to receive the discounted registration rate, please send your registration form and payment by Thursday, February 2, 2012. Registration fees include continental breakfasts, lunch, and a wine reception. Discounted Early Registration: $20 students/$40 regular. The registration form can be found at http://www.govst.edu/gendermatters/default.aspx?id=40176&libID=44778

For those making travel arrangements, the conference will run from 9:00 am – 6:00 pm on Friday, April 13th and 8:30 am – 1:00 pm on Saturday, April 14th. More information on transportation and lodging can be found on the conference website www.govst.edu/gendermatters<http://www.govst.edu/gendermatters.
Please direct questions to gendermatters@govst.edu

French town acts to set aside indiscreet, gender-biased titles

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 21:47:53 +0000

From now on, the women of Cesson-Sévigné, population 16,000, will be addressed as “madame” regardless of age or marital status.

“Mademoiselle,” the Gallic form of “miss,” is normally used for young, unmarried women, thus, feminists say, openly declaring them either available or unwanted in a way that men, always referred to as “monsieur,” are not. A French form of “ms.” would solve the problem, but there you go. . . .

Exactly when a woman reaches the age when she becomes a “madame,” married or otherwise, is not only a matter of debate but a social minefield; women of a certain age will often ask themselves whether the waiter who calls them “mademoiselle” is being gallant or sarcastic. . . .

French movie stars Catherine Deneuve, 68, once married, and Jeanne Moreau, 84 this month and three times married, prefer to be addressed as “mademoiselle” and, as a quirky exception to the rule, are allowed, as actresses, to claim that right.

“It’s about eliminating all terms that could be discriminatory or indiscreet,” the town hall at Cesson-Sévigné, a suburb of the western town of Rennes, in Brittany, said in a statement explaining that the title “mademoiselle” had been banished from all official forms since the beginning of the year.

See the complete article at

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/world/la-fg-france-mademoiselle-20120115,0,6274250.story

N. B. : Of the phrase chiennes de garde the standard translation is “women’s libbers” – lit. “female watch-dogs, bitches on the lookout”

TRANSLATION -
“The term ‘Mademoiselle’ was a courteous title, and during a certain period there was even a masculine equivalent – ‘Mon damoiseau’ – though it was rarely used, and later fell out of use completely.” (The word damoiseau may be translated as ‘squire’.)

Douglas Harper has -
[Eng. damsel, Fr. demoiselle] O.Fr. dameisele “woman of noble birth”, modified by association with dame from earlier donsele, from Gallo-Romance *domnicella, dim. of L. domina “lady”

Book chapters sought on media depictions of women

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:34:19 +0000

Alena Amato Ruggerio of South Oregon University has a call out for a book on media depictions of women as brides, wives, and in other roles. Papers already under consideration for this edited book include topics such as Desperate Housewives, Bridezillas, Sarah Palin, Dr. Laura Schlessinger, and A Baby Story. The goal is to complement these with more chapters on women in film, blogs/websites, and news coverage. The scholarship should be previously unpublished, and can use any rhetorical or critical/cultural approach. Pieces that productively complicate the topic categories are especially welcome.

Submitters are asked submit name, professional title, institutional affiliation, abridged curriculum vitae, and manuscript in Word or RTF format to Alena Ruggerio at Alena.Ruggerio@sou.edu by January 30, 2012. Ruggerio notes that January 30 involves a tight turnaround, but she has space to add chapters and hopes to interest scholars willing to revise an existing conference paper or to develop an idea quickly to contribute to an exciting prospective anthology.

Fight for gender equity continues in Higher Ed

admin — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 20:14:26 +0000

Women in Higher Education: The Fight for Equityby Marian Meyers with Diana Rios (Hampton Press, 2012). ISBN 978-1-61289-065-4 (paperbound). $28.95.

For the past 40 years, women in the academy have been working to achieve equality with their male colleagues in the areas of hiring, salary, promotion, tenure and allotted resources. Yet, research indicates that in many ways, academia has been resistant to change, instead maintaining policies, practices and procedures that preserve the privileges of White, male faculty while undermining those aimed at fostering equity.

Women in Higher Education: The Fight for Equity provides evidence of on-going discrimination in the work lives of women faculty and graduate students. The 13 chapters in this book draw on theory, research and personal narrative to illustrate, theorize and explore the “chilly climate” that academic women face, as well as to offer alternatives for creating a more inclusive, fair and just academy for everyone.

The book pays particular attention to the ways that gender intersects with ethnicity, race, class, sexuality and other aspects of self – including whether academic women are mothers and/or feminists – and the effects of this intersectionality on their experiences and careers in higher education.

Marian Meyers is an associate professor in the Department of Communication and the Women’s Studies Institute at Georgia State University. She previously has authored and edited books and written articles on the representation of women in the media, specifically exploring the ways that gender, race and class intersect in representation. She is a former chair of the Feminist Scholarship Division of the International Communication Association.

Diana Rios is an associate professor in the Department of Communication Sciences and the Institute for Puerto Rican and Latino Studies at the University of Connecticut.

Conference on Poverty, Coercion, and Human Rights April 13-15

admin — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 20:09:35 +0000

The 2012 Conference on Poverty, Coercion, and Human Rights will be April 13-15, 2012, at Loyola University, Chicago Water Tower Campus. Confirmed speakers include Amy Allen, Claudia Card, John Christman, Ann Cudd, Leslie P. Francis, Hille Haker, David Ingram, Alison Jaggar, Christine Koggel, Diana Tietjens Meyers, James Nickel, Thomas Pogge, Tisha Rajendra, and Alan Wertheimer.

Conference organizer is Diana Tietjens Meyers, Ignacio Ellacuría SJ Chair of Social Ethics and Professor of Philosophy at Loyola University, Chicago. For further information about registration and accommodations, contact Randall Newman, rnewman2@luc.edu, or 773-503-2373.

New digital repository on women’s suffrage

admin — Mon, 05 Dec 2011 19:15:42 +0000

Some of you may be interested in a new digital repository on the woman’s suffrage movement and, in particular, Abigail Scott Duniway (1834-1912), the foremost proponent of woman’s rights in the Pacific Northwest and a highly controversial figure in the national movement whose outspoken, even bellicose, opposition to Prohibition and Eastern interference in her “bailiwick” earned her the enmity of Anna Howard Shaw, Clara Bewick Colby, and other leading women. The heart of the archive consists of extensively edited and annotated versions of her speeches (53 so far) on these and other topics, most of which have never been published, or published only in corrupt form. PDFs of her original manuscripts also are available. Finally, the site includes an extended rhetorical biography of Scott Duniway and links to further resources concerning her personally and woman’s suffrage generally.The archive is available at http://asduniway.org. Comments, suggestions, corrections, and additions are welcomed.