College Feminists Connect!

New Liaisons!

Greetings fellow feminists! I am happy to announce we have happily secured two new liaisons from Augsburg College and Winona State! Welcome Marrta Wyatt from Augsburg and Kara Eggers from Winona! We want to send you a warm welcome to the team and look forward to hearing about all of the great things happening around your campus!! 

                                                         

Girl Power -- All Around the World

Recently, we've been receiving some awesome tweets from men and women throughout the nation with great articles attached on Women and Women's rights. These tweets sparked my enthusiasm to share some of these articles with all of you! Click on the 'Women in ___' titles below to be directed to the full articles! 

Women in Yemen

On October 26th, women in Yemeni women set their veils ablaze in protest at a Saleh crackdown.The women threw their full body veils in a pile and set the makramas ablaze as they chanted, "Who protects Yemeni women from the crimes of the thugs?" 

Women have taken a key role in the uprising against President Ali Abdullah Saleh's authoritarian rule. This month the Yemeni activist Tawakkul Karman was awarded the Nobel peace prize along with two Liberian women, for their struggle for women's rights. 

Women in Italy

On October 18th, Father Roy Bourgeois was detained in Rome after he and a dozen women marched on the Vatican. The marchers held a banner that said. "Ordain Catholic Women" And chanted, "What do we want? Women priests! When do we want them? Now" Two women were taken into a police car when the resisted to take down their banners.

Father Roy Bourgeois has supported women's ordination for years and was quoted saying, "I have come to Rome with a basic question for our church leaders at the Vatican,” Bourgeois said. “How can we, as men, say that our call from God is authentic, but God’s call of women is not?

Women in Africa

For women in Senegal there lies a family tradition considered essential to the womans sutibility to marry. The clitoris is sliced off with nothing to dull the pain. When Ms. Kande approached her wedding day she vowed to protect her own daughters from the same ancient custom. 10 days later her village declared it would end female geneital cutting for good. An estimated 92 million girls and women have undergone this horrific procedure. The change has not yet reached Ms. Kandes new village but has stated that if she is getting pressured to cut the baby girl she is taking into marriage she said she would resist them. 

Women like Sare Harouna, a women that lives in West Africa, are joining together in a movement to end the practice. The movement to end the cutting is spreading in Senegal at a qickening pace though the ties of family and ethniciry that used to entrench it. 

Women In Jerusalem

Over recent months, womens faces have disappeared from billboards across the city amid mounting pressure applied by the powerful ultra orthodox lobby who find the female image offensive. Several advertisers have erased female models from their posters in Jerusalem. Femals figures faces on billboards have been blacked out with spray paint, or vandalised with graffiti branding the image illegal. Other posters are just torn down. 

Activists claim the battle over Jerusalems billboards is only one manifestation of an alarming trend towrads gender segregation across Israel driven by the religious right. Activist Hila Benyovich-Hoffman organized a seres of demonstrations in which hundreds of women gathered for 'sing a longs' to demand their right to a public presence. 

.. and these are just a few articles of the amazing things women all around the world are standing up for! Share your thoughts on these issues below and if you have an article you would like to share, please do! Abroad, home, and on your campus we would love to hear your thoughts!  Follow us on twitter: CollegeFeminists and Facebook Facebook CollegeFeministsConnect

That Feminist Thing - Reflections on the Midwest Feminist Conference

Last weekend (November 4-5) I was fortunate enough to have the opportunity to attend the Midwest Feminist Conference in Iowa City, Iowa. After a five hour drive on Friday afternoon, I and two other lovely Hamline students arrived just in time to hear the keynote speaker - Feministing.com's very own Courtney Martin.

The talk was based on Martin's latest book: Do it Anyway: The New Generation of Activists. I have to say, after this semester - in which I feel as though I have literally discussed every social problem on Earth - it was extraordinarily refreshing to have someone tell me that saving the world is an overwhelming and unrealistic goal. Martin profiled several activists who do fabulous, beneficial work close to home and built upon their own lived experiences. The take home message seemed to be: do what you love, and do what benefits others and yourself. The talk was most inspiring and I cannot wait to read the book it was based upon.

On Saturday I was psyched - empowered with the knowledge that I was not a bad person if I failed to find a solution to all the world's problems - I prepared to attend a series of workshops on various topics. While all the workshops were beneficial, two in particular stuck out to me. So, instead of boring you with summaries of all (even if I did think they were awesome), I shall discuss my two of choice.

First, Moving through Issues between Trans and Feminist Communities (presented by stef shuster) lead to one of the most intense, and headache inducing discussions I have ever been a part of. It was not headache inducing in a bad way, but in a "how are we ever going to get through this?" way. While posed as dealing with specifically feminist and trans communities, this workshop lead to a discussion about gender pronouns, micro-aggressions, and assumptions about gender. A handful of individuals carried the discussion and I did not contribute at all, but rather chose to listen. I was definitely out of my depth in this workshop - primarily because of my lack of knowledge about the culture of the Trans community. How would I have contributed to a discussion about Trans issues when all I know is what I have learned in a sociology class? Another problem was I did not particularly agree with one ideology, which was a theme throughout the discussion - the idea that you should never assume a person is a certain gender. Essentially, what people were saying is because some people do not identify as a man or woman,  it is micro-aggressive to make assumptions about someone's gender.

Now, to be clear, everyone has the right to identify as any gender they please, and I will gladly respect and support anyone's choice to do so. But, I think it is important to note that never assuming someone is a man or woman requires a complete tear down of the current gender system. THAT IS A REALLY BIG PROJECT. I do not know how to approach this issue - do I want the current gender system to stay? Do I want it to go? Am a prepared to take sides? How can I be an ally to people who do not identify within the current gender system if there is no language for a new system? See the headache? It's coming back just thinking about it! And the thing that really got me was even the people who so adamantly carried the discussion had no solutions, or potential solutions, or starting points. Was this discussion illuminating and valuable? Absolutely. But I wish I knew where to go from there.

The second workshop that stuck out to me was The Year of the Uterus. Fabulous name, yes? This workshop focused on all recently passed and currently proposed legislation in regards to reproductive rights. Overall, it was a good, informative presentation. But the part that stuck out to me most happened while information on later term abortion (often referred to as "partial birth") was being presented. I was unfamiliar with the procedure for later term abortion, having only received any information about it in a pro-life religion class, so I raised my hand and asked what the procedure entailed. The response was totally alarming. No one knew. Not one of the presenters had an answer until an audience member offered, "It’s similar to dilation and extraction." That was the extent of the answer I was given.

This concerns me because the presenters were promoting later term abortion and they could not even explain what it was. That is a definite problem. As feminists, we are responsible for fighting for gender equality, but we need to be informed. We cannot just pick issues and promote them without deciding if we agree with the argument on a personal level. Feminists as a group are constantly fighting backlash and being uninformed just adds credence to ridiculous claims. We should not be afraid to refuse to support issues we do not agree with - what we need is informed, thoughtful participation is this wonderful movement we call feminism, not blind followers.

Overall, the conference was a valuable experience. Joining feminists my own age and watching other students present was awesome. There are times when I forget how many other feminists are out there and I began to despair, but gathering in Iowa City reminded me that there is a whole Midwest full of feminists! And, after seeing just the tip of what they have to offer I can tell we - us Midwest Feminists - are going to do awesome things. -Jen Kaltveit

What the hell is a male feminist?

                                 

    So what exactly is a male feminist? What does he look like and what are his beliefs? Mark Anthony Neal, a professor of black popular culture in the department of African studies at Duke University can answer all of those questions! On Thursday, Novemer 3rd at 11 am in the Hoversten chapel at Augsburg college he will be speaking on the topic, "What the Hell is a Male Feminist?" 

Mark Anthony Neal uses interdisciplinary scholarly work in the fields of African-American, cultural, and gender studies and examines fields of work such as literary theory, urban sociology, social history, postmodern philosophy, Queer theory, and most notably popular culture. It is his belief that popular culture represents an arena of knowledge that has a profound impact on societal and cultural norms in the United States and globally, but one that has been largely underscrutinized as a "serious" site of scholarly and theoretical study. He also believes that commercial popular culture represents a distinct site of ideological production; thus, his work aims to engage the ideological undercurrents within commercial popular culture particularly within the context of race, gender, sexuality, class, and ethnicity.

This event is free and open to the public! Find out more here: http://newblackman.blogspot.com/ 

Thursday, November 3, 2011
11 a.m
Hoversten Chapel, Foss Center
Augsburg College
625 22nd Ave. South, Minneapolis  

Our Future, Our Choice, Our Fight

 

We have some very exciting news! On Thursday November 3rd you are all welcome and encouraged to join St. Cloud State's Women's Center, College Feminists Connect, Minnesota Women's Consortium, Women'sAction, Planned Parenthood Minnesota, and others for a discussion about women's reproductive health, sex education, and whats at stake in Minnesota! Along with the discussion about women's reproductive health in MN there will also be discussion about what's at stake during the upcoming legislative session and elections.  The discussion takes place on November 3, 2011 at 11-12:15pm in Miller Center, Room 122 and 2-3:15pm in Glacier South, Atwood Memorial Center at St. Cloud State University.  College Feminists Connect will be tabling in between sessions. Drop by our table to learn more about this great program! We hope to see you there!