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From Stephen Elliott
Plenty of people, from Christopher Hitchens to Adam Carolla, have made the assertion that women aren’t funny.
You can probably guess that we at the Rumpus disagree, since we have a whole feature devoted to Funny Women (plus we live in the real world, rather than Misogynist Fantasyland, where women have never, ever rejected Christopher Hitchens or Adam Carolla, and always laugh at their jokes).
...moreGirls rule, etcetera. But men are not afraid of girls. Girls never did and don’t now “run the world,” and if we believe Bey when she sings so, it’s only because she’s a woman.
For Vice, Sarah Nicole Prickett writes a provocative piece about the value of being a bitch in a world where women often slip into the infantilized, genteel roles of “girl” and “lady.”
Whether you agree with all her points or not, it’s an exhilarating read.
...moreThe fact that tattoos existed in a time before “punk” was a word to describe a movement is a hard notion to grasp.
The New Yorker has compiled a series of photographs of women in the early to mid 20th century baring their tattoos.
...moreThe authors of Inside This Place, Not of It: Narratives From Women’s Prisons compare stories gathered for the book with last month’s report by Rashida Manjoo, the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women. The bottom line: women in prisons face rape and abuse by guards, error-ridden medical care, and, in many states, shackling during labor.
...more“Although there has been no official confirmation of the ruling, Princess Amira al-Taweel, wife of the Saudi Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, tweeted: ‘Thank God, the lashing of [Shaima] is cancelled. Thanks to our beloved king. I am sure all Saudi women will be so happy, I know I am.’”
King Abdullah has revoked what would have been the first legal punishment of ten lashings to a woman for driving (announced Tuesday).
...moreRoxane Gay’s on HTML Giant talking about the covers of chick-lit novels and the stigma attached to their formulaic visual coding, though the feminization of book covers is taking over more than just the chick-lit genre. It’s unfortunate that women writers have to consciously avoid being pigeonholed into chick-lit genre or are marketed via book cover designs as such.
...more“‘How come women get flogged for driving while the maximum penalty for a traffic violation is a fine, not lashes?’ Zein el-Abydeen said. ‘Even the Prophet (Muhammad’s) wives were riding camels and horses because these were the only means of transportation.’”
Two days ago we posted an article on Saudi Arabian women gaining the right to vote, but today a Saudi woman has been “sentenced to 10 lashes for driving a car.”
...moreBookslut zeroes in on the seemingly perpetual obscurity of women’s work in the arts. Looking at artists like Lee Krasner, Leonor Fini, and Mina Loy,—the spaces and roles that they were pushed into, along with the often intangible forms of sexism confronted—the piece wonders how to “restore women to the historical record without getting out a glue stick and pasting some women into History of Art?”
“Greatness does need a little nurturing, a little structure and room to try and fail.
...moreThe Guardian researches why the female presence seems to be diminishing in science fiction writing. Though there isn’t necessarily a shortage of female authors (or women publishers), there is a serious lack of female presence in the Guardian’s list of favorite science fiction writing books, chosen by readers.
...more“I do not believe that apparent authoritative literary voices of validation would ever make such a grand claim about a novel written by a woman. I say this because I believe there are many novels by women that are about the same sort of world as presented in Freedom. Sadly, the culture usually calls these books domestic or family sagas. Are the novels of Anne Tyler, Marilynne Robinson and Mona Simpson any less white and middle “American” than Franzen”
At VIDA, author Percival Everett explores the big assumptions and unpsoken prejudices behind Great American Novels (like Freedom.) (Via)
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Bruce Machart’s debut novel channels Cormac McCarthy, while narrating a Southern gothic tale centered around women.
A new volume of stories by Mavis Gallant traces the writer’s development from early stories of bewilderment and disappointment to the sharp, incisive later work of a master.Gangland tours of LA, with one helluva waiver.
In New Orleans, what happens when sex workers are prosecuted as sex offenders.
A brilliantly written profile of a sniper.
“(M)y grandmother’s feet were bound in China, and there were people here in the U.S. who said, “This is horrific.” And there were people in China who said, “This is horrific.” I am so glad they said it was horrific.
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Pop Idol has been widely imitated throughout the world [American Idol here in the states] , but Afghanistan is possibly the only place where the mere existence of a televised, Western-style talent show amounts to a political statement.
“When everyone tells you that what you might be curious about, or even secretly like, is wrong, bad, sleazy, and shameful, you don’t have to cast a line very far to land a set of inhibitions.”
So writes author and sex educator Violet Blue in her recent article “Are More Women OK With Watching Porn?
...moreAnd I’m back! Thanks very much to Michael Berger for filling in for me while I was gone! He did a damn fine job.
Lots has happened over the last few weeks:
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“Excluding men and showing only women is a revolutionary gesture of affirmative action. But the museum is avant-garde. It’s part of the Centre Pompidou culture to do things differently. And we like a lot of drama. This is going to be dramatic in a big way.” The Pompidou is preparing for a year without men.
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What does it mean to draw outside the lines? Allison Benis White sketches it out in Self-Portrait with Crayon.
For Mary Miller’s characters, the world is anything but big. These are women trapped in little towns and little lives, but the emotional resonance is limitless.