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News of Two Heroines

  Kelly Sue DeConnick has been garnering attention for her work as the writer of the series Captain Marvel, which now features Carol Danvers as the protagonist of the series.  Air Force Major Carol Danvers first appeared in Marvel comics in 1968.  In her non-powered form, Danvers was an accomplished spy, a pilot, and skilled […]

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Stop Telling Women to Smile

Most women—no, all women—have had the experience of receiving unsolicited feedback on their physical appearance. Such commentary comes in many forms, from lewd remarks or demands for a “smile” on the street, to irksome discussions with well-meaning relatives about how much “prettier” one might look with a different hairstyle.  Women have long fought against these […]

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“You Don’t Need The Money—You Have a Nice Engagement Ring”

Growing up I loved watching The Mary Tyler Moore Show on Nick-at-Nite.  Mary Richards, the show’s protagonist, was a single woman in her early 30s working as the associate producer of a nightly news show in Minneapolis in the early 1970s.  In one episode, she learns that she is making $50 less per week than […]

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#ShameOnGawker: The bravery of Jezebel and the cowardice of Gawker Media

A few hours ago, the staff at Jezebel – a site that self-describes as being “a general interest women’s website” – banded together and posted an essay entitled “We have a rape gif problem and Gawker Media won’t do anything about it.”  As the essay explains: for months, an individual or individuals has been using […]

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Maleficent Stages the Runway: Wear What You Want

Films in the past have overwhelmingly perpetuated two paradoxical perceptions of women: the Charlie’s Angels-style seductive and naïve-yet-smart female; or the infamous Miranda Priestly’s vicious bulldog persona (from The Devil Wears Prada). Sarah Palin underscored the pervasiveness of these two stereotypes when she married them, offering the public her own self-designed portrait as a “pitbull […]

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Kara Walker’s A Subtlety and The Double Wage Gap

This summer, an estimated 130,000 visitors descended upon an abandoned, soon-to-be-demolished sugar factory in Williamsburg, Brooklyn to take in the latest exhibit by renowned artist-slash-provocateur Kara Walker. Housed in the historic Domino Sugar Refinery, the exhibit was titled “A Subtlety, or the Marvelous Sugar Baby: an Homage to the unpaid and overworked Artisans who have refined […]

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“You and I” are #Flawless

Recently, there has been a surge of “feminist” videos and lyrics in pop culture.  This effort to incorporate messages surrounding the role of women in society into mass media has been received by an audience far broader than the traditional women’s studies set. These videos can also be viewed as a commentary on women’s lives […]

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Gendered Social Norms and Access to New Technologies

Google’s 2013 public release of the wearable technology Google Glass has added another dimension to the way we, as humans, use and integrate technology into our everyday lives.  “The Glass” is part of a new line of immersive technologies that seamlessly integrates with its wearers’ experiences of the world.  For example, instead of having to […]

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#likeagirl #likeaboss

The new Always commercial that’s garnered a lot of internet attention over the past week does an important thing—it successfully highlights how thoughtless gender stereotypes can be.  The ad and the Like a Girl campaign are part of an effort “to make sure that girls everywhere keep their confidence throughout puberty and beyond.”  (And yes, […]

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