Greetings from Amazon.com Delivers Women's Studies
This month, we celebrate new-school feminism with a collection of pieces from hip magazine BUST; Leora Tanenbaum's passionate assault on the sexual condemnation millions of young women face from their classmates, "Slut!"; and more. "The BUST Guide to the New Girl Order" by Marcelle Karp and Debbie Stoller http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140277749/entertainmentsit This funky, fabulous, neofeminist manifesto collects the best of BUST ("the magazine for women with something to get off their chests"), including thoughtful articles, personal essays, and racy rants about anything from abortion to the lameness of the Lifetime television network. Debbie Stoller and Marcelle Karp address "that shared set of female experiences that includes Barbies and blowjobs, sexism and shoplifting, Vogue and vaginas" with an in-your-face, grrrl power attitude that alternately taunts, encourages, and calls readers to battle. Contributors range from mysterious authors with names like Betty Boob and Scarlett Fever to such famous femmes as Courtney Love. Karp and Stoller organize the pieces into sections labeled "Sex and the Thinking Girl," "Men Are from Uranus," etc., offering introductions for each that provide humor, insight, and cultural context. And with selections like "Sex, Lies, and Tampax," "How to Be as Horny as a Guy," and "Bitch on Heels," this is not your mother's ladies' journal. As the editors warn, "Wake up and smell the lipgloss, ladies: the New Girl Order has arrived." "Slut! Growing Up Female with a Bad Reputation" by Leora Tanenbaum http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1888363940/entertainmentsit The statistics are daunting: "Two out of five girls nationwide have had sexual rumors spread about them," reports Leora Tanenbaum. "Three out of four girls have received sexual comments or looks, and one in five has had sexual messages written about her in public areas." The 50 women interviewed for this book differ greatly in ethnic background, age, and economic status, but they share one thing in common--each of them, along with Tanenbaum herself, was labeled a "slut" in junior high or high school. (And, as recent cases involving Anita Hill and Monica Lewinsky demonstrate, a woman can face such taunts no matter what her age or professional level.) As such, they became victims of a double standard that winks at sexual promiscuity among teenage boys but insists that young women remain virginal and pure. Even worse, the slut bashing is perpetuated in nearly every case by female classmates. In addition to insisting that schools get serious about combating sexual harassment, Tanenbaum urges the development of sex education programs that acknowledge responsible alternatives to abstinence, programs that would recognize the sexual desires of young women (and men) without condemnation. Her social critique is solid, but it's the personal accounts of emotional abuse--and, thankfully, perseverance--that will thoroughly convince you that the current tolerance of slut bashing is simply unacceptable. "After Silence" by Nancy Venable Raine http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0609804197/entertainmentsit "The words 'shut up' are the most terrible words I know," writes Nancy Venable Raine. "The man who raped me spat these words out over and over during the hours of my attack--when I screamed, when I tried to talk him out of what he was doing, when I protested." It took Raine seven years before she could start to remove the chains those words had wrapped around her spirit by writing about how the anonymous assailant had transformed her forever. "I have noted what has come into my view as I go about my life," she says, "seeing the world through the eyes of a woman who remembers rape." Raine brings a poet's attention to language and imagery to her account, infusing "After Silence" with powerful immediacy. The reader is made to understand why an event as seemingly innocuous as a landlord asking for a spare set of keys to one's apartment can strike dread into one's heart. As Raine takes us through her personal journey of recovery, she also explores the shifting cultural consciousness toward rape, from the acknowledgement of posttraumatic stress suffered by rape victims to the portrayal of rape in movies. It's this willingness to interrogate the world around her, combined with an emotional honesty that portrays intimate drama without resorting to sensationalism, that makes "After Silence" one of the most important memoirs of the 1990s. "Climbing High: A Woman's Account of Surviving the Everest Tragedy" by Lene Gammelgaard http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1580050239/entertainmentsit In May 1996, Lene Gammelgaard became the first Scandinavian woman to reach the peak of Mount Everest. The next day she made history again by surviving the mountain's deadliest disaster. The catastrophic blizzard that killed eight climbers, including Gammelgaard's friend and expedition leader Scott Fischer, spurred controversy over the commercialization of Everest, and has been exhaustively chronicled in accounts such as Jon Krakauer's "Into Thin Air." Fortunately, "Climbing High" offers an original, insightful view of the tragedy and steers clear of the need to explain what went wrong: "You cannot expect anyone to help you ... up there. Your fate is in your own hands, your own two feet." Gammelgaard kept journals throughout the expedition, and her account stays true to this form: short, intense, and subjective entries on the pressures of financing the climb, the fierce physical and psychological challenges women face in extreme sports, and the tricky cluster of personalities that can make or break a summit bid. Yes, there are gripping moments, such as the desperate night she and seven others spent exposed in the storm above 20,000 feet, but Gammelgaard is at her best when providing insights into what drives people to risk--and sometimes lose--their lives. "Eleanor Roosevelt: 1933-1938" by Blanche Wiesen Cook http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0670844985/entertainmentsit With its gripping tale of a privileged ugly duckling turned socially conscious swan with the help of strong female friends--many of whom were lesbians and one of whom was probably her lover--the first volume of Blanche Wiesen Cook's biography of Eleanor Roosevelt, following her life from her 1884 birth to FDR's 1933 inauguration, won awards and made headlines. Volume 2, which chronicles Roosevelt's first six years as America's most controversial first lady, maps her contributions to the New Deal, which Cook convincingly argues was primarily the fulfillment of a political agenda promoted by female reformers as early as 1912. Eleanor's turbulent relationship with journalist Lorena Hickok gets more space here than it probably deserves, and the story isn't as inherently exciting as the first volume's drama of a woman's coming of age. Nonetheless, Cook's subtle analyses of everything from Roosevelt's exceedingly complex marriage to her role as warm-up act for the New Deal's most radical programs are bracingly intelligent, her evocation of a remarkable personality rivetingly vivid. Eleanor emerges as neither the liberals' saint nor the conservatives' Satan, but an entirely human bundle of contradictions: warm-hearted, yet ice-cold when hurt; happiest in the public arena, yet needing the comfort of private relationships. Have you read "Eleanor Roosevelt: 1884-1933"? http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140094601/entertainmentsit ****** You'll find more great books, articles, and interviews in Amazon.com's Women's Studies section at Books Home Page
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