Review essay: Disentangling feminisms from the cold war

Feminist thinkers have long argued for the centrality of sexuality, gender and women to the Cold War. They have critiqued the sexual language of ‘deep penetration’ and ‘orgasmic whumps’ used to describe nuclear arms race technology and argued that sexuality and gender were central to high‐level political decision‐making and everyday experiences of the conflict.1 Scholars have also begun to question the inverse relationship: they have used the politics of the Cold War as a lens into the history of feminist knowledge production itself. Kelly Coogan‐Gehr's 2011 monograph, for example, challenges conventional genealogies tracing feminist scholarship in the ‘West’ back to the ‘new social movements’ of the 1960s and to women's movements, in particular.2 She argues Cold War pressures have privileged certain ideologies (neoliberal capitalism) and knowledge producers (white women) at the expense of others (socialism, communism and black feminist thinkers) in the preeminent feminist journal, Signs, since its inception in 1975

Gender Equality and Customary Marriage: Bargaining in the Shadow of Post-Apartheid Legal Pluralism

This Report represents the culmination of a year-long project undertaken by the Crowley Program in International Human Rights at the Fordham Law School to study issues surrounding women and customary law marriages in South Africa in light of its international legal commitments. This Report presents the findings of this research effort. Following this introduction, Part I of this Report describes South Africa\u27s international and domestic legal obligations regarding culture and gender equality, particularly with respect to marriage, divorce, and family formation. Part I then sketches two distinct approaches to the tension between customary law and gender equality, both of which may be found in the domestic law regulating the family. Part II evaluates the effectiveness of the two approaches with reference to data collected in the course of several hundred interviews with South African men and women in May and June 2006. Part II also offers tentative conclusions and suggestions for reform

The search for the Jew's gene : science, spectacle, and the ethnic other

This paper considers the collision of spectacle, science, and racial-ethnic identifications in the contemporary scientific search for a "Jewish gene." It aims not so much to distinguish the "line between ‘real’ and ‘fabled’ aspects of the Jew" (as cited in the passage by Gilman above), but to consider the inextricability of both as composite elements, mutually constituting "difference" as racial-ethnic identification. Thus I am concerned with the specular economies of science as well as the knowledge capital of its mediatisation as they come together, troubled, over the Jew’s body. The essay takes as its case study the National Geographic (NOVA/PBS) television documentary, The Sons of Abraham, a film that follows the progress of anthropologist Tudor Parfitt through the Lemba communities of South Africa in a quest to obtain genetic evidence in order to authenticate (or falsify) their claims to Jewish identity

An Introduction to Korean Culture for Rehabilitation Service Providers

[Excerpt] The purpose of this monograph is to provide recommendations to busy rehabilitation service providers in the U.S. for effectively working with persons who hold traditional Korean values. The topics of Korean history, immigration, culture, language, religion, food, views on disabilities and rehabilitation services typically available in Korea are covered briefly to provide the reader with a quick overview and background. For those who seek more detailed information, the references cited in each section can be used as a starting point. For those with prior background knowledge of Korea, I suggest reading Part II first, in which I introduce Korean culture with case stories in the context of rehabilitation process

Sexual violence: Raising the conversations, a literature review

This literature review is intended to contribute to efforts to raise awareness and conversations around sexual violence. It is focused on men’s sexual violence against adolescent and adult women. We begin our review by briefly considering the definition of sexual violence, its prevalence, and its impact. In Section 2, following the lead of public health theorists, we use an ecological framework to discuss factors which contribute to – or are protective of – sexual violence. That is, we adopt a multi‐level approach, considering risk factors at societal, community, relationship and individual levels. Although we look at each of these levels in turn, as will become evident, it is also important to consider the interactions between levels. In Section 3, we review evaluations of various attempts to prevent sexual violence. Mostly, these evaluations have focused on individual level prevention efforts: prevention at community and societal levels seem to have received little attention from evaluators. Nevertheless, there are some useful lessons to be gained from the evaluation literature. In section 4, we attempt to integrate the material considered in sections 2 and 3 into a framework proposed by the (US) National Sexual Violence Resource Center (Davis, Parks, & Cohen, 2006). Consistent with a public health approach, the Spectrum of Prevention is a multi‐level model

Is Black Motherhood A Marker of Oppression or Empowerment? Hip-Hop and R&B Lessons about Mama

A qualitative content analysis was conducted on the lyrics of 59 songs (40 Hip Hop songs; 17 R&B songs; 2 songs that represented the Hip Hop and R&B genre) from 1961-2013 to identify the ways that Black male and Black female artists described motherhood. The songs were determined by Billboard Chart Research Services, and Black Feminist Theory provided the theoretical foundation on which the themes were identified. Qualitative analysis of the lyrics revealed Black motherhood in R&B and Hip Hop to be based on the following four typologies: (1) Motherhood as Source of Emotional Comfort and Support; (2) Motherhood as Source of Strength and Self-Confidence; (3) Motherhood as Superior to Fatherhood; (4) Motherhood as Teacher and Disciplinarian; and (5) Motherhood Instills Unconditional Endless Love. Supporting qualitative lyrics are provided to support each of the aforementioned themes

Emotional Harm in Housing Discrimination Cases: A New Look at a Lingering Problem

This Article explores relevant social science data and examines how it affects the analysis and understanding of evidence of emotional harm. Part I provides an overview of the current state of emotional harm cases. Part II discusses the issue of bias in the process of reviewing discrimination cases from the perspective of critical race theory and recent social science data. In Part III, this Article examines the cycles of ignorance that have contributed to an under-valuation of emotional harm in housing discrimination litigation. Finally, suggestions are made about how to gather relevant psychological and medical information on the effects of discrimination and how to incorporate that information into a case so that the full extent of emotional harm is more properly understood and the victim of discrimination is made whole

International Human Rights: Islam\u27s Friend or Foe? Algeria as an Example of the Compatibility of International Human Rights Regarding Women\u27s Equality and Islamic Law

Part I of this Note briefly discusses the development of International Human Rights Law as embodied in international covenants today. Part I also discusses Islamic law, the traditional role of women under Islamic law and culture, Algeria\u27s Constitution and Family Code, and other dynamics specific to Algeria that have hindered women\u27s obtainment of equal rights in the modern era. Part II presents the debate between conservative Islamists who argue that international principles of human rights law are incompatible with Islamic law and the scholars who assert that the two are compatible. Part III, by focusing on fundamental principles underlying the provisions in both the international human rights doctrine and Islamic law, argues that international human rights provisions granting women equal status with men comport with Islamic law principles as much as do legal documents that the Algerian Government has drafted. This Note concludes that the deprivation of women\u27s equal rights based on the claim of conflict with Islamic law is unjustified and that the example of Algeria proves that Islamic countries can and should protect human rights without regard to gender

Unsex Mothering: Toward a New Culture of Parenting

In this Article, I observe that “mothering” and “fathering” have been inappropriately tethered to biosex. “Mothering” should be unsexed as the primary parental relationship. “Fathering,” correspondingly, should be unsexed from its breadwinner status. In an ideal world, people now considered “mothers” and “fathers” would be “parents” first, a category that includes all forms of caretaking. One could even imagine an androgynous world in which parenting has no sexed subcategories, whether attached to biosex or not. I doubt our world is anywhere near that; I also wonder whether universal androgyny is a utopian ideal worth pursuing. I instead focus in this Article on unsexing the roles of “mother” and “father,” elevating them from biodeterminist brandings to chosen classifications or roles. Removing biosex from “mothering” and “fathering” may ultimately eliminate some of the meaning of these terms, but its elimination is less important than undoing the biosex link. Liberated from biosex roles, a parent could define herself as “parent,” “mother,” or “father” with some fluidity. In Pregnant Man?: A Conversation, I described my own experience as a differently sexed mother/parent and the impact of my gender on parenting. Here, I promote a conception of parenting that embraces the fluidity of contemporary understandings of gender and the need for balancing roles within the family. Part I elaborates the ways in which legal and social norms configure parenting as a sexed endeavor. Part II argues that the solution to this problem is to unsex mothering, fathering, and parenting. Unwinding parenting from biosex roles creates a construction of family that is liberating for traditionally sexed women and men and holds potential for the equality of LGBT parents. Women’s economic equality efforts have tended to fail in part because of childcare; accordingly, their economic success largely depends on shifting men into family responsibilities. Part III shifts the frame to international and comparative law. International law fosters a sexed vision of parenting but also suggests ways to shift toward an unsexed future. After examining the international framework for parenting roles, Part III examines one public policy example of unsexed parenting, parental leave, using a comparative law analysis contrasting the U.S. Family and Medical Leave Act (FMLA) with Sweden’s Parental Leave Act. Parental leave is the perfect position from which to examine unsexing because it sits in the middle of the triad of corporate law, family law, and public law. In that sense, it evokes the challenges of intermediating among the normative and regulatory forces of these three legal frames. The Conclusion asserts that parenting is becoming more unsexed and that legal regimes governing parenting should encourage this development to promote fluidity in parenting roles

Show Me How to Do Like You: Co-mentoring as Feminist Pedagogy

Three professors reflect on the experience of creating a learning community of 22 students by linking courses in Literature and Ethics. The project demonstrates practical strategies for incorporating feminist scholarship and pedagogy into the core curriculum and for integrating core courses from diverse disciplines