Tag Archives: Feminism

A Year in Books/Day 216: Wild Irish Women

Posted on October 18, 2012 by maedez

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• Title: Wild Irish Women Extraordinary Lives from History
• Author: Marian Broderick
• Year Published: 2001/This Edition: 2002 (The O’Brien Press)
• Year Purchased: September 2012
• Source: My momma.
• About: Besides hailing from the fair island of Ireland (or, in some cases, having Irish parentage), all of the women profiled in this book have one thing in common: they are all dead. Just my cup of tea! I love historical ladies, whatever their professional or social province or claim to immortality, however slight. The more eccentric, the better. The 75 women included in this volume, for good or ill, do our complicated place in history justice. The stories of their often oppressive lives are stimulating, maddening, thought-provoking, and inspiring. They were artists, writers, intellectuals, wives, mothers, sisters, daughters, lovers, republicans, actresses, scientists, and activists. One thing they never were, was boring. Since my curiosity about the women who smoothed my path is unapologetically insatiable, I couldn’t flip the pages fast enough. It’s a wonderful tease into the fascinating subject of forgotten women. Distilling-or gutting-the essence of a life, human and flawed and fertile, into a few pages comprised of paper and ink could be, and often is, problematic. Lives aren’t edited, but history is; what is left out is as important as what remains. Take this book as a nice starting point, then go forth and learn more.
• Motivation: My love of feisty, original, gutsy women is well-known. Naturally, this book reminded my mom of me.
• Times Read: 1
• Random Excerpt/Page 49: “However, there was something that lifted the spirits of Peig (Sayers) and the other islanders on the long, dark winter nights: storytelling. This important form of entertainment was part of the old Irish oral tradition. A dail, or assembly, would meet at night in a house, and a comedy, mystery or tragedy would slowly unfold. Peig, with her pure Irish and her beautiful embellishments and turns of phrase, was an acknowledged master of the art. She kept hundreds of stories in her phenomenal memory, and she was able to memorize a story that would take a week in the telling after hearing it just once.”
• Happiness Scale: 9 1/2

A Year in Books/Day 190: Feminist Ryan Gosling

Posted on August 11, 2012 by maedez

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• Title: Feminist Ryan Gosling Feminist Theory As Imagined from Your Favorite Sensitive Movie Dude (Unauthorized)
• Author: Danielle Henderson
• Year Published: 2012 (Running Press)
• Year Purchased: 2012
• Source: This was a birthday gift from my mom.
• About: Based on the hilarious blog of the same name, this book is every bit as good as the original source. I do not have an opinion on Ryan Gosling. Is he a fine actor? Word-of-mouth and critical response indicates as much. Is he as good-looking as many people think? That’s a matter of opinion. Until a year ago, I never even gave him any thought. As soon as I saw the first blog post, I was in love. With this concept. Feminist theory coming out of the mouth* of an actor known for his positive sentiments about women? Next to photographs of him looking thoughtful and sensitive (really, is there any other kind?). The very idea cracks me up. Hey girl, indeed. *(Naturally, he never said any of the quotes attributed to him in the blog or book. Is that a detraction? Nope. In fact, it makes it even better.)
• Motivation: I’m a feminist with a sense of humor. There are lots of us, by the way, and this book is proof.
• Times Read: More than once, and I’ve only had it one week.
• Random Excerpt/Pages 62 & 99: “Hey girl. We’d be more successful at reclaiming public space for women if we were willing to address the patriarchal fixtures that made it unsafe in the first place.”/ “Hey girl. I literally have no idea how to react to someone who hasn’t read Judy Blume’s Forever.”
• Happiness Scale: 10+++

A Year in Books/Day 186: Votes for Women

Posted on August 3, 2012 by maedez

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• Title: Votes for Women The Struggle for Suffrage Revisited
• Editor: Jean H. Baker
• Year Published: 2002 (Oxford University Press, Inc.)
• Year Purchased: 2003/2004
• Source: Unknown
• About: Twelve of the fourteen contributors are professors, so this book has a decidedly academic quality. If that’s not your usual cup of tea, don’t be scared: the voices, although straightforward, are distinct and the chapters highly readable. Continue reading →

A Year in Books/Day 54: The Prospect Before Her

Posted on February 25, 2012 by maedez

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• Title: The Prospect Before Her A History of Women in Western Europe Volume One 1500-1800
• Author: Olwen Hufton
• Year Published: 1995 (Alfred A. Knopf, Inc.)
• Year Purchased: 2002-2004
• Source: Edward R. Hamilton Bookseller Company
• About: A lengthy, serious study of what girls could expect from their lives, from the cradle to the grave, between the years 1500-1800 in Western Europe. This isn’t the most well-made volume, and is falling apart at the binding, but the scholarship and writing are first-class.
• Motivation: I’m a feminist. I dig history and women’s studies.
• Times Read: 1
• Random Excerpt/Page 91: “The women involved were drawn not from the city of Lyons, unless they were the master’s daughters, but from the mountainous villages of the Forez, Besse and Bugey and parts of the Dauphine. They were known as silk-maker’s servants because they lived in (often sleeping under the looms) and like domestic servants they were paid on an annual basis or when they left the employment of the master. Like servants they started in their early teens and expected to work for about fifteen years before having saved enough to embark on matrimony.”
• Happiness Scale: 9

A Year in Books/Day 11: Born for Liberty

Posted on January 11, 2012 by maedez

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• Title: Born for Liberty A History of Women in America
• Author: Sara M. Evans
• Year Published: 1989 (The Free Press)
• Year Purchased: 2001/2002
• Source: Unknown
• About: An intelligent, critical study of the changing nature of women’s place in American society.
• Motivation: I’m a feminist who enjoys a good, solid read on the subject.
  

  Image via Wikipedia

   

• Times Read: 2
• Random Excerpt/Page 85: “By the 1830s the social worlds occupied by the genteel and by the working classes were distinct and rarely overlapped. A lack of familiarity with one another’s cultural patterns-and with the circumstances that explained them-quickly evolved into suspicion or contempt. Middle-class reformers often viewed the lower classes as a breed apart, and readily condemned their ideas of domestic comfort and standards of morals far below their own.”
• Happiness Scale: 9