Feminism and feminist theory Books

Book SynopsisThe secret hurts her image of an âœideal wifeâ much to her husbandâs chagrin. Will Neetu realise her true potential and achieve her dream?

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Book SynopsisSea Statemarks the arrival of a gifted and exciting new voice' Jon McGregor, author of Reservoir 13SHORTLISTED FOR THE GORDON BURN PRIZESHORTLISTED FOR THE PORTICO PRIZEA GUARDIAN BEST BOOK OF 2021A candid examination of the life of North Sea oil riggers, and an explosive portrayal of masculinity, loneliness and female desire.In her mid-30s and sprung out of a terrible relationship, Tabitha quit her job at a women's magazine, left London and put her savings into a six-month lease on a flat in a dodgy neighbourhood in Aberdeen she was going to make good on a long-deferred idea for a book about oil rigs and the men who work on them. Why oil rigs? I wanted to see what men were like, with no women around.Sea State is, on the one hand, a portrait of an overlooked industry, and a fascinating subculture in its own right: offshore' is a way of life for generations of British workers, primarily working class men. Offshore is also a potent metaphor for a lot of things we might rather keep at baTrade Review'A breathtaking memoir … The prose is stunning: gimlet-eyed and brutal' Tomiwa Owolade, Sunday Times, Books of the Year ‘Contemporary writing at its finest, without any hint of effort, egoism or pretentiousness on Lasley’s part. She is an astoundingly good writer, and this is an astoundingly good book’ Irish Times 'These are powerful and moving stories of working lives in a dangerous and all-male environment, made all the more powerful by the way Lasley refuses to absent herself from the telling. The writing is carefully and unobtrusively polished, with hard edges and unflinching clarity … Sea State marks the arrival of a gifted and exciting new voice’ Jon McGregor, author of Reservoir 13 ‘It’s extraordinary. It takes you places so few books do … it gets inside the heads that are mostly ignored by publishing’ Observer ‘A startlingly original study of love, masculinity and the cost of a profession that few outside of it can truly understand’ Guardian ‘She has the skill, a Joan Didion kind of skill, of inflecting non-fiction material subjectively, a habit of assessing situations via her nervous system … Sea State has all the presentness of fiction, as well as the exactitude of the non-fiction novel and the gleam of confession’ Andrew O’Hagan, author of Mayflies, LRB ‘Acidic, addictive reporting with a fictional veneer. Sea State’s writing alone is worth the admission price’ Financial Times ‘A powerful blend of journalism and memoir … Beautifully written, disquieting, it reminds me of Lisa Taddeo’s Three Women’ David Nicholls, author of Sweet Sorrow 'Piercing, brutally candid, addictive. A memoir like no other … If you were gripped by Lisa Taddeo's Three Women, this is for you' Rachel Cooke, author of Her Brilliant Career ‘Incredibly compelling’ Sarah Hall, author of Burntcoat

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Book SynopsisRetracing my mother’s footsteps in search of women’s freedom 1974. A 22-year-old Jacqui French stands for a photograph in Omaha, Nebraska, thousands of miles from home. Trade Review‘Powerful… a brilliant storyteller.’ Laura Bates, founder of The Everyday Sexism Project ‘Interweaving the personal with the political, Wild Hope lyrical and rousing.’ i Culture “Blends personal and political insights to show why feminism matters more than ever.” Harper’s Bazaar ‘A book that leaves its reader with something priceless: a fresh, fierce determination to hope.’ Natasha Lunn ‘Marisa Bate is a richly talented writer and Wild Hope bursts with fury, passion and love. It's hard to put down and even harder to forget.’Will Storr ‘Bate takes us on an ambitious journey that captures the spirit of the 1970s, and reminds us that we still have much to fight and hope for.’Helena Lee

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Book SynopsisI adored this book. It's so Geena and so inspiring and such a wonderful read' Emma Thompson A Times Film and Theatre Book of the Year 2022From two-time Academy Award winner and screen icon Geena Davis, Dying of Politeness is the candid, surprising tale of her journey from her epically polite childhood to the roles that put her in the spotlight and gave her the strength to become a powerhouse in Hollywood.At three years old, Geena announced she was going to be in movies. Now, with a slew of iconic roles and awards under her belt, she has surpassed her childhood dream, but her journey has been one of fits and starts, with a pothole or two along the way.In this hilarious memoir, Geena regales us with tales of a career playing everything from an amnesiac assassin to the parent of a rodent in Stuart Little; a soap star in her underwear to a housewife turned road warrior in Thelma & Louise; a baseball phenomenon in A League of Their Own to the first female President of the United States in CTrade Review Praise for Dying of Politeness: ‘Candid, self-deprecating and vastly entertaining…. Davis’s frank appraisal of her psychological and physical merits, and demerits, is not only disarming, but likely to strike a chord with many of her readers’ The Times, Peter Sheridan ‘Her combination of humour and self-deprecation is immediately appealing’ The Observer, BOOK OF THE DAY ‘A marvellous memoir… an endearing and inspiring account of one “offbeat” woman finding her own voice… I’m often bored by the second half of celebrity memoirs, but Davis’s just keeps building momentum. It’s a real-life feel-good movie, in which the downtrodden heroine finds her power. She guards her privacy without ever getting pompous or dull. If you want to know about the pimples on Brad Pitt’s bum, then she’ll spill. If you want to know how she conceived her kids at 47? Back off, that’s her business… I closed her book with the firm conviction that she’s the celebrity I’d most like to hang out with’ Daily Telegraph ‘Entertaining… After decades of silently seething, Thelma & Louise star Geena Davis lifts the lid on Hollywood sexism’ Daily Express ‘The book’s a blast… it really is a supremely jolly read’ The Times, Polly Vernon 'Brilliant… read it cover to cover. Absolutely awesome'Chris Evans ‘Davis is truly inspiring, and her book is warm and relatable’ Woman’s Weekly

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Book SynopsisA collection of the groundbreaking feminist writer''s most famous works, with a thought-provoking introduction by bestselling author Kate Bolick.A Penguin Vitae EditionWonderfully sardonic and slyly humorous, the writings of landmark American feminist and socialist thinker Charlotte Perkins Gilman were penned in response to her frustrations with the gender-based double standard that prevailed in America as the twentieth century began. Perhaps best known for her chilling depiction of a woman''s mental breakdown in her unforgettable 1892 short story The Yellow Wall-Paper, Gilman also wrote Herland, a wry novel that imagines a peaceful, progressive country from which men have been absent for 2,000 years. Both are included in The Yellow Wall-Paper and Selected Writings, along with a selection of Gilman''s major short stories and her poems.New York Timesbestselling author Kate Bolick contributes an illuminating introduction that explores Gilman''s fascinating yet complicated life.Penguin Classics launches a new hardcover series with five American classics that are relevant and timeless in their power, and part of a dynamic and diverse landscape of classic fiction and nonfiction from almost seventy-five years of classics publishing. Penguin Vitae provides readers with beautifully designed classics that have shaped the course of their lives, and welcomes new readers to discover these literary gifts of personal inspiration, intellectual engagement, and creative originality.

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Book SynopsisTrade Review. . . What is clear is that the decidedly global, critical, self-reflexive and praxis-oriented model that Hemment offers here is made for such complex and dynamic interventions, and finally provides an avenue for anthropologists to handle them with the precision, attention and care they deserve. * Anthropological Quarterly *[W]ritten in a clear, accessible, and very engaging way, making it suitable for anyone within the development sector with an interest in gender issues in Russia and the former Soviet Union, or an interest in processes of democratisation . . . * Gender & Development *This is unquestionably an important book in our efforts to understand women in Russia and the evolution of post-Soviet Russian society. . . . It can be recommended to students and scholars of Russia as well as those specializing in women's issues. Vol. 44, No. 4 * Journal of Contemporary History *Despite the critiques of the NGO world and the collapse of the women's crisis centre,Hemment's collaborative research had fruitful results as many women felt empowered and benefited . . . .34.2 March-April 2011 * Women's Studies Intnl Form *. . . This thoughtful, intriguing analysis of a complex situation will be of interest to scholars in Russian studies, anthropology, women's studies, economics, and development studies. . . . Highly recommended. * Choice *Table of ContentsContentsPrefaceAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: Gendered Interventions1. Muddying the Waters: Participatory Action Research in Tver'2. Querying Democratization: Civil Society, International Aid, and the Riddle of the Third Sector3. Gender Mainstreaming and the Third-Sectorization of Russian Women's Activism4. Global Civil Society and the Local Costs of Belonging: Setting up a Crisis Center in Tver'5. A Tale of Two ProjectsConclusionNotesList of ReferencesIndex

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Book SynopsisTrailblazing representations of black womanhoodTrade ReviewWriting the Black Revolutionary Diva is a lovely book. Brown manages to reinvigorate common notions like wellness, healing, recovery, and pain with the kind of critical rigor that makes them useful in cultural studies but refuses to burden them with unnecessary complexity. . . . Writing the Black Revolutionary Diva and its ideas will be instructive for a very long time to come. * Tulsa Studies in Women's Literature *Brown's work is one of the most thorough studies and critiques of black women's writing to date. September, 2011 * H-1960s *Table of ContentsContentsAcknowledgmentsPrelude1. From Soul Cleavage to Soul Survival: Double-Consciousness and the Emergence of the Decolonized Text/Subject2. "Who Is the Black Woman?": Repositioning the Gaze and Reconstructing Images in The Black Woman: An Anthology and Essence Magazine3. Constructing Diva Citizenship: The Enigmatic Angela Davis as Case Study4. Return to the Flesh: The Revolutionary Ideology behind the Poetry of Jayne Cortez5. She Dreams a World: The Decolonized Text and the New World Order, Toni Cade Bambara's The Salt EatersCoda: This Is Not Just about "Inward Navel-Gazing": Decolonizing My Own Mind as a Critical StanceNotesBibliographyIndex

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Book SynopsisExplores the work of American artists since 1970 who have created an anti-rape, anti-incest counternarrative in opposition to the acceptance of sexual violence against women. Trade Review“In art communities that rarely discuss sexual trauma, even as it occurs within the communities, and in a cultural climate in which the #MeToo movement remains necessary, Fryd’s book provides survivors of sexual trauma and their allies with deserved acknowledgement and sometimes cathartic release.”—Jennifer Remenchik Hyperallergic“Highly recommended for academic libraries serving art history, women’s and gender studies, pan-African studies, or other units with an interest in intersectional feminism, racial justice, social justice, or art.”—Alex O’Keefe ARLIS/NA Reviews“Pairing trauma theory with detailed analysis of American art focused on sexual violence, Fryd’s study is a timely and compelling contribution to ongoing conversations about the intersections of images and actions, art as social and political catalyst, and the impact of feminist thought in contemporary American culture.”—Erika Doss,author of American Art of the 20th–21st Centuries“Reading [this book] now is simultaneously illuminating and painful, an acute reminder of how far we’ve come in the decades since, yet also of how mired in the same problems we remain. What stands out is the fearlessness of the early female performance artists and the extent to which their work shaped how we think about art today.”—Jillian Steinhauer The New Republic“Eminently worthy of serious reading by art historians, sexual trauma therapists, and anyone interested in the history of women’s struggle to combat rape culture. The depth of research and validity of arguments regarding works developed in the 1970s and by black artists are formidable, as is the thesis that repetition is a strategy of artists working with the subject of rape. For the first author to explore the uncharted territory of art on rape, where all research is new, Fryd’s accomplishment is laudable.”—Monika Fabijanska Woman's Art Journal“Fryd urges us to take seriously the impact of all forms of sexual violence on our society, while encouraging us to consider how art might serve as a source for constructive public dialogue and even a catalyst for change.”—Lesley Shipley Panorama“By naming her book after Susan Brownmiller’s history of rape from 1975, Fryd pays homage to this groundbreaking work and echoes the now widely accepted idea that rape is a crime about power.”—Rachel Middleman Burlington MagazineTable of ContentsContentsList of IllustrationsAcknowledgments Introduction Chapter 1 Suzanne Lacy and Leslie Labowitz: Performing the Anti-rape Cycle in the 1970s Chapter 2 Performing the Anti-incest Cycle in the Los Angeles Woman’s Building, 1977–1985 Chapter 3 Faith Ringgold: Quilting the Anti-rape and Anti-incest Cycle, 1972–1986 Chapter 4 Recirculating the Anti-rape and Anti-incest Cycle in Exhibitions, 1980–1993 Chapter 5 Judy Chicago and Donald Woodman: The Anti-rape and Anti-incest Cycle, 2001–2006 Chapter 6 Kara Walker: Creating a Third-Wave Anti-rape and Antiincest Cycle in Silhouettes, Videos, and Sculpture Since 1994 Chapter 7 Mapping and Chronicling the Anti-rape and Anti-incest Cycle into the Twenty-First Century Notes Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisThe first edition of this book immediately became a defining text for feminist television criticism, with an influence extending across television, media and screen studies â and the second edition will be similarly agenda-setting. Completely revised and updated throughout, it takes into account the changes in the television industry, the academic field of television studies and the culture and politics of feminist movements.With fifteen of the eighteen extracts being new to the second edition, the readings offer a detailed analysis of a wide range of case studies, topics and approaches, including genres, audiences, performers and programmes such as 'Sex and the City', âPrime Suspectâ, Oprah and Buffy.With a new introduction to the volume tracing developments in the field and introductions to each thematic section, the editors engage in a series of debates surrounding the main issues of feminist television scholarship. They explore how television represents feminism and considTable of ContentsIntroductionIntroduction to Part One: Programmes and Heroines1. The Search for Tomorrow in Today’s Soap Operas: Notes on a Feminine Narrative Form - Tania Modleski2. “Sex and the City” and Consumer Culture: Remediating Postfeminist Drama – Jane Arthurs3. Women with a Mission: Lynda La Plante, DCI Jane Tennison and the Reconfiguration of TV Crime Drama – Deborah Jermyn4.Divas, Evil Black Bitches, and Bitter Black Women: African-American Women in Postfeminist and Post-Civil Rights Popular Culture – Kimberly Springer5.“Ellen”, Television and the Politics of Gay and Lesbian Visibility – Bonnie J. Dow6.You’d Better Recognize: Oprah the Iconic and Television Talk – Beretta E. Smith-Shomade7.“Take Responsibility for Yourself” Judge Judy and the Neoliberal Citizen – Laurie Ouellette8.Feeling Like a Domestic Goddess: Postfeminism and Cooking – Joanne Hollows9.Feminism Without Men: Feminist Media Studies in a Post-Feminist Age – Karen Boyle10.Girls Rule! Gender, Feminism, and Nickelodeon – Sarah Banet-Weiser11.The (In)visible Lesbian: Anxieties of representation in the L word – Susan J. Wolfe and Lee Ann RoripaughIntroduction to Part Two: Audiences, Reception Contexts, and Spectatorship12.Women’s Genres: Melodrama, Soap Opera, and Theory – Annette Kuhn13. Melodromatic Identifications: Television Fiction and Women’s Fantasy – Ien Ang14.National Texts and Gendered Lives: An Ethnography of Television Viewers in a North Indian City – Purnima Mankekar15.Defining Asian Femininity: Chinese Viewers of Japanese TV Dramas in Singapore – Elizabeth MacLachlan and Geok-lian Chua16.The Globalization of Gender: Ally McBeal in Post-Socialist Slovenia – Ksenija Vidmar-Horvat17.The Performance and Reception of Televisual ‘Ugliness’ in “Yo soy Betty la Fea” – Yeidy M. Rivero18.Sob Stories, Merriment, and Surprises: The 1950s Audience Participation Show on Network Television and Women’s Daytime Reception – Marsha F. CassidyBibliography

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Book SynopsisDrawing on interviews with a breadth of different showgirls, from shows in Paris, Las Vegas, Berlin, and Los Angeles, as well as her own artworks and those by other contemporary and historical artists, this book examines the experiences of showgirls and those who watch them, to challenge the narrowness of representations and discussions around what has been termed sexualisation' and the gaze'. An account of the experience of being looked at', the book raises questions of how the showgirl is represented, the nature of the pleasure that she elicits and the suspicion that surrounds it, and what this means for feminism and the act of looking. An embodied articulation of a new politics of looking, Viewing Pleasure and Being a Showgirl engages with the idea (reinforced by feminist critique) that images of women are linked to selling and that women's bodies have been commodified in capitalist culture, raising the question of whether this enables particular bodies tTable of ContentsIntroduction1. How Do They Look?2. How Do I Look?: How Do I Feel as I Watch Showgirls?3. How Do I Look?: Doing ShowgirlConclusion: Showgirl ManifestoAppendix: Showgirl LexiconIndex

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Book Synopsis"Women Who Misbehave" is a collection of short stories portraying complex and contradictory women navigating various aspects of life. From dangerous secrets to mourning neighbors, the stories explore themes of agency, love, sacrifice, and crime through unforgettable characters.

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Book SynopsisThis book examines the relations among nostalgia, gender, and foundational philosophies through a critique of the lost mother as a ground for thinking about sexual difference. More specifically, the author critiques the nostalgic tendencies of feminist theory, arguing that an emancipatory system of thought must move beyond a maternally oriented structure.Through close readings of works by Maurice Blanchot, Luce Irigaray, Julia Kristeva, and Nicole Brossard, the book elucidates the many dimensions of nostalgic paradigmsliterary, psychoanalytic, epistemological, ontological, and sociopolitical. This critique ultimately confronts postmodernism, and especially the burgeoning field of performative theory, as an intellectual paradigm that claims to subvert systems of meaning. Analyzing the writings of J. L. Austin, Judith Butler, and Irigaray, the author argues that despite its antinostalgic structure, performative theory provides an inadequate model for understanding the connectioTable of ContentsIntroduction: maternal pasts Part I. Nostalgia: The Lost Mother: 1. Blanchot's mother 2. Lips in the mirror: Irigaray's specular mother Part II. Nostalgia and Ethics: Approaching the Other: 3. Imperialsit nostalgia: Kristeva's maternal Chora 4. Luce et veritas: toward an ethics of performance Part III. Toward Another Model: 5. From Lesbos to Montreal: Brossards's urban fictions Afterword: feminist futures Notes Bibliography Index.

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Book SynopsisThis book examines the proliferation of surveillance technologies—such as facial recognition software and digital fingerprinting—that have come to pervade our everyday lives. Often developed as methods to ensure "national security," these technologies are also routinely employed to regulate our personal information, our work lives, what we buy, and how we live.Trade Review“Taking her cue from science and technology studies' methods and theories, where definitions of ‘success’ in connection with technological developments are long-standing topics of interest . . ., Magnet focuses on its counterpart, the issue of technological failure. In view of the fact that their often substandard performance seldom seems to play a role in government decisions on whether to opt for the large-scale implementation of biometrics (eg, the US-Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology system, or Europe's use of biometric passports), exposing whole populations to the consequences of their failure, these are timely questions. . . . [F]or those interested in the technology, its social implications and use in a number of US contexts, the details of Magnet's investigations are very much worth reading.” - Irma van der Ploeg, Times Higher Education Supplement“When Biometrics Fail offers a damning analysis of the technical problems that dog biometric identification, many of which stem from the premises on which individual difference is defined. . . . [A] useful synthesis of the activities contemporary biometric industry, providing a compelling dissection of how the idea of a science of biometrics fails, and a timely critique of an industry and its claims which exploit a misconception about the human body and use technological fetishism to posit the solution as a high tech – and therefore ethically unproblematic -solution to a range of problems that have serious political and humanitarian consequences.” - Hannah Drayson, Leonardo Reviews“The book allows the reader to ponder what sorts of assumptions about people, science, and society are at play when biometrics continues to have ongoing success, in light of its failure…. These and other interdisciplinary questions pertaining to late capitalism, identity, resistance, and the violence of identification, make up the crux of this rather accessible book… [I]nsightful in terms of its crisscrossing empirical analysis…. [I]t will be of great interest to scholars and nonscholars alike who are interested in identity, gender, and race relations, as well as the impact of technology on strategies of political resistance and moral regulation.” - Bianca Baggiarini, Canadian Review of Sociology“Overall, Magnet’s critique of biometric discourse and technologies is penetrating, relentless and often devastating. This is an enlightening, exquisitely critical book that should be required reading as much for neo-liberal policy-makers considering quick-fix technological solutions to systemic social and crime control problems as for students and scholars of criminology.” - Randy K. Lippert, Theoretical Criminology“Magnet's When Biometrics Fail sounds some compelling notes of caution about placing too much reliance on unthinking machines to do human beings' work.” - Rick Docksai, World Future Review“When Biometrics Fail is overwhelmingly persuasive, exhaustively researched, eloquently written, and full of mordant humor and bitter truth. Shoshana Amielle Magnet explains the history, science, and ideology of our contemporary biometric moment with great skill and insight. Everyone needs to read this book. An outstanding study of the informationalization of race, gender, and immigration.”—Lisa Nakamura, author of Digitizing Race: Visual Cultures of the Internet“Impassioned, critical, and readable, When Biometrics Fail explores the underside of technologies that have been touted as a panacea for many of the discontents of post-9/11 society. Shoshana Amielle Magnet reveals the seldom-discussed impacts of these new technologies on people marginalized by race, ethnicity, gender, class, sexuality, and disability, and she challenges the commonplace assumption that human bodies can be reduced to a string of numbers.”—Simon A. Cole, author of Suspect Identities: A History of Fingerprinting and Criminal Identification“When Biometrics Fail offers a damning analysis of the technical problems that dog biometric identification, many of which stem from the premises on which individual difference is defined. . . . [A] useful synthesis of the activities contemporary biometric industry, providing a compelling dissection of how the idea of a science of biometrics fails, and a timely critique of an industry and its claims which exploit a misconception about the human body and use technological fetishism to posit the solution as a high tech – and therefore ethically unproblematic -solution to a range of problems that have serious political and humanitarian consequences.” -- Hannah Drayson * Leonardo Reviews *“Taking her cue from science and technology studies' methods and theories, where definitions of ‘success’ in connection with technological developments are long-standing topics of interest . . ., Magnet focuses on its counterpart, the issue of technological failure. In view of the fact that their often substandard performance seldom seems to play a role in government decisions on whether to opt for the large-scale implementation of biometrics (eg, the US-Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology system, or Europe's use of biometric passports), exposing whole populations to the consequences of their failure, these are timely questions. . . . [F]or those interested in the technology, its social implications and use in a number of US contexts, the details of Magnet's investigations are very much worth reading.” -- Irma van der Ploeg, * Times Higher Education *“The book allows the reader to ponder what sorts of assumptions about people, science, and society are at play when biometrics continues to have ongoing success, in light of its failure…. These and other interdisciplinary questions pertaining to late capitalism, identity, resistance, and the violence of identification, make up the crux of this rather accessible book… [I]nsightful in terms of its crisscrossing empirical analysis…. [I]t will be of great interest to scholars and nonscholars alike who are interested in identity, gender, and race relations, as well as the impact of technology on strategies of political resistance and moral regulation.” -- Bianca Baggiarini * Canadian Review of Sociology *“Overall, Magnet’s critique of biometric discourse and technologies is penetrating, relentless and often devastating. This is an enlightening, exquisitely critical book that should be required reading as much for neo-liberal policy-makers considering quick-fix technological solutions to systemic social and crime control problems as for students and scholars of criminology.” -- Randy K. Lippert * Theoretical Criminology *“Magnet's When Biometrics Fail sounds some compelling notes of caution about placing too much reliance on unthinking machines to do human beings' work.” -- Rick Docksai * World Future Review *“Magnet’s theoretical reliance on corporeal fetishism while attending to failures, leads her to significant conclusions: first, the technology falsely imagines bodies as stable entities, and second, it intensifies inequalities. Of particular interest to sociologists is her focus, especially in the welfare chapter, on the human costs of the technologies. . . . The book is well organized and the archival material clearly presented. The introduction sets up the interesting question of how biometric technology codifies inequality, and subsequent chapters provide a convincing argument.” -- Emily Fairchild * Contemporary Sociology *“Shoshana Amielle Magnet provides great insight into the rise of biometrics and offers a nuanced study of the complex social shaping of surveillance technologies at the intersection of the security industrial complex, cultural discourse, and code. This is a welcome addition to cultural studies and media studies scholarship as it examines representation and identity in a novel site.” -- Peter A. Chow White * International Journal of Communication *“When Biometrics Fail succeeds in informing the audience about what underlies this evolving technology and its role in assigning identities to human beings. The author, Shoshana Amielle Magnet, has delicately dealt with the issue of science encroaching upon the territory of human rights and classifying people on the basis of race, gender and ethnicity.” -- Subrata S Satapathy * International Journal of Gender, Science and Technology *“Throughout the book, Magnet ably shifts the reader's perception and understanding of biometric failures— wide-ranging and 'endemic to their technological functioning'. Stressing the limitations of non-scientific language to describe biometric failures, Magnet uses many examples to effectively question the objectivity of the technology. Most intriguing is how the three case studies point out the irony of privatisation of security and the over-reliance of these very same biometric companies on state governments for their profitability.” -- Angela Marianne Kuga Thas * Media International Australia *Table of ContentsAcknowledgments ix Introduction. Imagining Biometric Security 1 1. Biometric Failure 19 2. I-Tech and the Beginnings of Biometrics 51 3. Criminalizing Poverty: Adding Biometrics to Welfare 69 4. Biometrics at the Border 91 5. Representing Biometrics 127 Conclusion. Biometric Failure and Beyond 149 Appendix 159 Notes 165 Bibliography 171 Index 199

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Book SynopsisSixteen essays exemplify the progress of interdisciplinary research, collaboration, and publishing surrounding Canadian women's writing.Trade Review"Regenerations considers an extremely diverse range of media...in order to interrogate the exclusivity of our understanding of authorship and readership. This innovative and inspiring collection provides sensitive readings of current issues facing women writers in the digital age.... Regenerations considers the digital environment not only as a mode of communication, but also as a regenerative tool for drawing attention to past works that have been excluded or marginalized from literary histories. Original and insightful, this book demonstrates the exciting future of humanities scholarship and artistic production." -- Alicia Fahey * Canadian Literature *"...in their totality, [the essays] explore the worlds of Canadian women writers in both French and English, amplifying and enriching critical and literary traditions.... Carrière and Demers are to be applauded for making a significant contribution to the literary history of female writers, editors, and readers in Canada.... [T]he collection’s impressive breadth registers women writers’ sustained commitment to and active engagement in creating and nourishing literature in Canada." -- Linda M. Morra * English Studies in Canada *

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Book SynopsisA biography of one of New Zealands earliest feminists, Mary Ann Colclough, whose publicly voiced opinions saw her described in the nineteenth century as our own little stray strap of a modern female fanatic. English-born Mary Ann Barnes came to New Zealand in 1857, and soon gained notoriety for her outspokenness on issues relating to womens position in society. A teacher and also a journalist for the Daily Southern Cross and the Weekly News under the nom de plume Polly Plum, she also engaged in public debates through the letters to the editor columns, undeterred by becoming the best abused woman in New Zealand in the present day. In this fine biography, Jenny Coleman argues that Mary Ann Colcloughs contribution to the womens movement in nineteenth-century New Zealand is at least equal to that of Kate Sheppard. A good two decades ahead of the organised womens movement, Polly Plum began politicising women by writing about the realities of their daily lives, what needed to change and how.

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Book SynopsisThis book provides a unique introduction to the study of relationships between gender and biology, a core part of the feminist science research tradition which emerged nearly half a century ago. Lynn Hankinson Nelson presents an accessible and balanced discussion of research questions, background assumptions, methods, and hypotheses about biology and gender with which feminist scientists and science scholars critically and constructively engage. Writing from the perspective of contemporary philosophy of science, she examines the evidence for and ethical implications of biological hypotheses about gender, and discusses relevant philosophical issues including understandings of scientific objectivity, the nature of scientific reasoning, and relationships between biological research and the scientific and social contexts in which it is pursued. Clear and comprehensive, this volume addresses the engagements of feminist scientists and science scholars with a range of disciplines, including dTrade Review'The book is written and structured in a way that makes it accessible to both students and researchers looking to familiarize themselves with the philosophy and history of feminist engagement with biology. It is also a great read for any feminist scientists, philosophers of science, or science studies scholars who, although maybe familiar with this area of study, are nonetheless looking for an engaging refresher.' Sara Weaver, History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences'… offers an important outline of key philosophical issues threading through biology's concerns with gender, as well as feminist critiques.' Lynda Birke, A Journal of Feminist Philosophy'This text is suitable for classroom use because it gives a clear demonstration of the methods of philosophy of science, providing organized coverage of fundamental topics while vividly showing that legitimate critiques of logical reasoning in science are informed by social and political understanding.' Evelyn Brister, MetascienceTable of ContentsList of figures; Acknowledgements; Preface; 1. Conceptual preliminaries; 2. Sexual selection: Darwin; 3. Sexual selection: parental investment theory and human sociobiology; 4. Primatology; 5. Developmental biology; 6. Medicine; 7. Neurobiology; 8. Evolutionary psychology; 9. Socially responsible science and socially relevant philosophy of science; Bibliography; Index.

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Book SynopsisReproductive justice (RJ) is a pivotal movement that supplants the language and limitations of reproductive rights. RJ''s tenets are that women have the human rights to decide if or when they''ll become pregnant, whether to carry a pregnancy to term, and to parent the children they have in safe and healthy environments. Recognizing the importance of the rights at stake when the law addresses parenting and procreation, the authors in this book re-imagine judicial opinions that address the law''s treatment of pregnancy and parenting. The cases cover topics such as forced sterilization, pregnancy discrimination, criminal penalties for women who take illegal drugs while pregnant, and state funding for abortion. Though some of the re-imagined cases come to the same conclusions as the originals, each rewritten opinion analyzes how these cases impact the most vulnerable populations, including people with disabilities, poor women, and women of color.Table of ContentsPart I. Introduction Kimberly Mutcherson; Part II: The Feminist Judgments; 1. Buck v. Bell, 274 U.S. 200 (1927) Jasmine E. Harris and Kim Hai Pearson; 2. Skinner v. Oklahoma, 316 U.S. 535 (1942) Radhika Rao and Thomas Williams; 3. Wyman v. James, 400 U.S. 309 (1971) Michele Gilman and Priscilla Ocen; 4. Maher v. Roe, 432 US 464 (1977) Ederlina Co and Michele Goodwin; 5. In Re Madyun, 114 Daily wash. Law. Rptr. 2233 (D.C. Super Ct. 1986) Farah Diaz-Tello and Maya Manian; 6. Johnson v. Calvert, 5 Cal. 4th 84 (1993) Cathy Sakimura and Melanie Jacobs; 7. Ferguson v. City of Charleston, 532 U.S. 67 (2000) Lisa Crooms-Robinson and Margo Kaplan; 8. State v. Oakley, 245 Wis. 2d 447 (2001) Aziza Ahmed and Solangel Maldonado; 9. Sojourner A. v. N.J. Dep't of Human Servs., 177 N.J. 318 Ann Cammett and Cynthia Soohoo; 10. K.M. v. E.G., 37 Cal. 4th 130 (2005) Nancy Polikoff and Melissa Murray; 11. Reber v. Reiss, 42 A.3d 1131 (2012) Kevin Maillard and Dara Purvis; 12. Adoptive Couple v. Baby Girl, 570 U.S. – -, 133 S. Ct. 2552 (2013) Rose Cuison Villazor and Nancy Dowd; 13. Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Stores, Inc., 573 U.S. __ (2014) Suzanne A. Kim and Anthony Michael Kreis; 14. Young v. UPS, 575 U.S. __ (2015) Mary Ziegler and Meredith Harbach; 15. Whole Woman's Health v. Hellerstedt Myrisha Lewis and David Cohen; Index.

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Book SynopsisSri Lanka''s apparel sector holds an enviable place in the imaginary of its competitors for having a niche position amongst global retailers, given its claims of producing ''garments without guilt''. Exploitative labour conditions are not part of the industry''s portfolio ethicality, eco-friendly production and unblemished conditions of work are. Sri Lanka''s transition away from a protracted ethnic war has meant that the industry portrays itself as investing in the former war zone to create jobs without reflection on how its vaunted mantle, the deployment of ethical codes effectively, themselves may be under duress. This book uses an analytical framing informed by labour and feminist perspectives to explore how labour struggles in the post-1977 period in Sri Lanka provided important resistance to capitalist processes and continue to shape the industry both within and outside of the shop floor. It studies contextual moments in the country''s recent history to rupture the dominant narrative and record the centrality of labour in the success of the country''s apparel industry.Trade Review'In Garments without Guilt? Dr Ruwanpura unpacks the global clothing industry's complexities as they play out in her home country, shining a nuanced light on ethical clothing initiatives in practice. Drawing on over 10 years of fieldwork, she highlights how Sri Lanka's better track record complying with health and safety codes compared to its South Asian neighbors is rooted as much in workers' movements and agency as it is in industry-led initiatives. Dr Ruwanpura also makes a compelling case that freedom of association, living wages, and humane treatment on the shop floor are ethical codes that remain a site of ongoing struggle.' Annelies Goger, Brookings Institution, Washington DC'How could Sri Lanka become a renown ethical sourcing destination in the global garment industry? And how could such reputation coexist with enduring exploitation of the workers, particularly in terms of overtime and low wage? Kanchana Ruwanpura builds on years of field research in Sri Lanka to develop a provocative and convincing answer to such questions, highlighting the role that local labor and social institutions actually played in creating conditions for the apparent success of global ethical governance. The contribution of labor and social development policies goes unacknowledged and is even threatened by the voluntary ethical regime, Ruwanpura argues, a regime which remains highly uneven and unstable in the social gains made by workers on the shop floor. Her book offers a thorough, inspiring reading for scholars concerned with the local developmental outcomes of economic globalization.' Florence Palpacuer, Montpellier Management Institute'Garments without Guilt? is a scholarly tour de force. Ruwanpura has challenged prevailing analyses of voluntary ethical governance codes which foreground global and national level standards while ignoring the central role of the state in investing in human capital. Educated workers are central to the struggles for decent working conditions and wages, on which the Sri Lankan garments industry claims to be a world leading ethical producer. Using rich ethnographic data obtained over more than a decade talking to factory managers and garment workers Ruwanpura has produced a vivid picture of the agency of the workers and the limitations of voluntary industrial and national regulations, as well as the dangers posed by ethnic divisions and conflict which could undermine ethical standards.' Ruth Pearson, University of Leeds'This book comes at a critical moment in the history of global garment production, with the utility of ethical corporate codes under renewed scrutiny in a pandemic ravaged industry. Ruwanpura argues that ethical codes do not simply travel to places, to be either vernacularized or forcibly imposed. Instead, global lexicons of ethicality are given meaning through their interpellation into 'local' mores and social/ethnic hierarchies. Outcomes are contingent on always shifting and contentious political terrains, including militarization and ethnic pacification in this instance, and corresponding spaces for contestation. Through fine-grained ethnographic and historical analysis, Ruwanpura argues that Sri Lanka's 'success' in implementing global governance regimes arises from its strong history of labor mobilization – including labor's ability to negotiate with the state and push back against tropes of sacrificing for factory, family and nation. Garments without Guilt is a significant and valuable addition to the scholarship on the global garment industry.' Dina M. Siddiqi, New York University'This book is the antidote to the frustrating tendency for the garment industry to be treated as an amorphous mass of factories that exist in identical conditions and social frameworks … The years of factory research … are clear in Ruwanpura's authoritative account of the historical context and current conditions that lie behind "Made in Sri Lanka" clothing label. In deciphering the ethical claims … this book does a brilliant job of showing that successes are not due to benevolence … but vital social institutions …' Tansy Hoskins, Resurgence and Ecologist'Ruwanpura's Garments Without Guilt? is a fruit of over a decade-long grounded fieldwork with apparel workers which puts in conversation their everyday realities in manufacturing with the industry's ethical standards. This book makes a significant contribution to scholarship on human geography and labour governance for its focus on the workers and their struggles (and victories) in a system that otherwise obscures the labour's role in shaping industries and their ethical and economic success. One of its key contributions is towards how the local social, political and economic realities determine the efficacy of globally enacted ethical regimes and how this translates into local industry efforts in devising and implementing their own standards. It is also significant that this book neatly compiles the labour histories of Sri Lanka from scattered sources, filling a gap in literature, while presenting the story of the apparel industry as told by the workers.' Achalie Kumarage, Competition and ChangeTable of ContentsAcknowledgements; List of Published Works and Funders; List of Tables, Figures and Images; Abbreviations; 1. Introduction: Global Labour Justice via Ethical Codes; 2. Labouring for Apparels: Labour Geographies and Feminist Inflections; 3. Fieldwork: Prolonged Phases and Multiple Moments; 4. Clothing the World – Guilt Free? Sri Lanka's Apparel Landscape; 5. Neglected Labour Histories: the Sri Lankan State Responds to Labour; 6. Ethicality with a Blind Eye? Ethical Code Practices at Production Sites; 7. From War to Work: Ethicality Amidst Post-War Trauma? 8. Concluding Thoughts: Grounded Governance?; Appendix; References; Index.

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'We need this message more than ever' – Malala YousafzaiHard-hitting and uplifting true stories of the women around the world facing extreme gender inequality who, when the wider community supports them to challenge the status quo, improve life for the whole of society. A Sunday Times bestselling debut from Melinda Gates, The Moment of Lift is a timely and necessary call to action for women's empowerment.The right to: Spend your own money. Go to school. Earn an income. Access contraceptives. Work outside the home. Walk outside the home. Choose whom to marry. Get a loan. Start a business. Own property. Divorce a husband. See a doctor. Drive a car. All of these rights are denied to women in some parts of the world.'How can we summon a moment of lift for human beings – and especially for women? Because when you lift up women, you lift up humanity.'In this moving and compelling book, Melinda shares the stories of the inspiring people she’s met during her work and travels around the world and the lessons she’s learned from them. As she writes in the introduction, “That is why I had to write this book – to share the stories of people who have given focus and urgency to my life. I want all of us to see ways we can lift women up where we live.”Melinda’s unforgettable narrative is backed by startling data as she presents the issues that most need our attention – from child marriage to lack of access to contraceptives to gender inequity in the workplace. And, for the first time, she writes about her personal life and the road to equality in her own marriage. Throughout, she shows how there has never been more opportunity to change the world – and ourselves.When we lift others up, they lift us up, too.

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Book Synopsis*An Oprah Magazine Most Anticipated Book of 2021**A Woman & Home Top Four Literary Read**A lovereading.co.uk Star Book* And they lived happily ever after . . . didn't they?Cinderella married the man of her dreams - the perfect ending she deserved after diligently following all the fairy-tale rules. Yet now, two children and thirteen-and-a-half years later, things have gone badly wrong. One night, she sneaks out of the palace to get help from the Witch who, for a price, offers love potions to disgruntled housewives. But as the old hag flings the last ingredients into the cauldron, Cinderella doesn't ask for a love spell to win back her Prince Charming. Instead, she wants him dead. Endlessly surprising and wildly inventive, The Charmed Wife is a sophisticated literary fairy tale for the twenty-first century that weaves together time and place, fantasy and reality, to conjure a world unlike any other. Nothing in it is quite what it seems, and the twists and turns of its magical, dark, swiftly shifting paths take us deep into the heart of romance, marriage and the very nature of storytelling.'Dark and dreamy. Inside the plot, magic comes and goes. But inside the reader, it's all magic - all of us happily caught in Grushin's hypnotic spell.' - Karen Joy Fowler, author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves and The Jane Austen Book Club'Fall under its charms, I dare you' - Gregory Maguire, author of WickedA powerful, provocative and quite wonderful modern literary fairy tale. I danced through the deep dark magic of The Charmed Wife - long live the fairy tale that lives beyond "happily ever after".' - lovereading.co.uk'Surprising, darkly comedic and enchanting' - CNN'Genre-bending and darkly comic, Grushin's fourth novel is a weird and wonderful triumph.' - Oprah MagazineTrade ReviewDoes for fairy tales what Bridgerton has done for Regency England * Mail on Sunday *Pure escapism * Sun *The comedy is devastating in this autopsy of a marriage that dies of "happily ever after" syndrome. Seldom has such emotional realism been spied in the precincts of wild magic. This alumna of the Cinderella marriage is overwhelmed, over-enchanted, and so over it. Fall under its charms, I dare you. * Gregory Maguire, author of WICKED *Different and compelling * Daily Mail *Dark and dreamy. Inside the plot, magic comes and goes. But inside the reader, it's all magic - all of us happily caught in Grushin's hypnotic spell. * Karen Joy Fowler, author of We Are All Completely Beside Ourselves *Surprising, darkly comedic and enchanting * CNN *THE CHARMED WIFE is a thought-provoking, wickedly clever, and beautifully written fairy tale character study that enchants at every turn. Olga Grushin dissects fairy tales, marriage, and the messy human heart with a pen as sharp as any scalpel. * Melissa Bashardoust *Lush and powerful, The Charmed Wife is brimful of magic and the seething darkness that lies beneath the glittering surface of every good fairy tale. * Leife Shallcross, author of The Beast's Heart *In The Charmed Wife, Olga Grushin turns the fairy tale romance on its head, and then just keeps turning it, playfully, subversively, brilliantly: a feat of fierce imagination. * Jess Walter, author of Beautiful Ruins *A powerful, provocative and quite wonderful modern literary fairy tale, but if you enter expecting 'happily ever after' you'll be sorely disappointed. Rather than sugar and spice and all things nice, you'll instead find a novel brimming with exquisitely sharp and pointed attitude. Thirteen and a half years after Cinderella married the man of her dreams and she's had enough, she wants out. The prologue pierces love, and binds hate, firmly setting the tone, yet wicked humour and gentle observations also tickle the page. The echoes of well known fairy tales make themselves felt, adding to the enchantment. There is much to take delight in, yet beware, all magic is paid for and you'll need to be on the look out for hidden snares. I adore the tale that runs alongside the main story, of the two mice that accompanied Cinderella and live in a world circling through an entire civilisation. How easy it is to view what you want to see, rather than what is actually there. As the fairy tale splinters and a shimmer of reality breaks through, I found my thoughts tossed high in the air, and where they will land, I still don't know. So bright, so clever, and thought-provoking this just had to sit as a Liz Pick of the Month. I danced through the deep dark magic of The Charmed Wife, long live the fairy tale that lives beyond 'happily ever after'. * Lovereading.co.uk *

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Book Synopsis'An outpouring of truth, wit, and beautiful comedic wisdom.' Katherine Ryan'Such a funny and interesting book.' Sara Pascoe'Finally my vagina has a voice!' London Hughes'Powerful, bold, vulnerable, beautiful, hilarious, universal, unique.' Scarlett Curtis**********************************************For as long as she can remember, Grace Campbell has been told that she doesn't suit her name. But being graceful is no fun anyway.Growing up in a world of privilege and politics, she had a lot to feel confident about. But she was also a record-breaker when it came to feeling shame. Shame about sex, shame about rejection, shame about mental health.But over time, and with a 24 carat gold dose of female friendship, Grace has turned shame into a defiant sense of self. At only 27, Grace has got a lot to learn about being an adult, but she's already got a lot to share about being a disgrace, and how she came to be utterly, disgustingly, disgracefully proud of it.This is the book every young woman should read, and every young man should worry about.Trade ReviewIt wins my prize for "best cover art of the year"... -- Caitlin MoranThis book is hilarious, Grace is a bloody badass, finally my vagina has a voice! -- London HughesAn outpouring of truth, wit, and beautiful comedic wisdom from the hilarious and laudably liberated Grace Campbell. As I feel the echoes of my ancestors' shame, Amazing Disgrace assured me that this inspirational new generation of young women are so much more than their fathers' daughters and their husbands' wives. They're honestly fucking MERCILESS. It's about time. I loved it. -- Katherine RyanGrace has written such a funny and interesting book, partly because she has a unique perspective of the world, but mostly because of her own brilliant mind -- Sara PascoePart of me wishes I'd never met Grace, read this book and then dedicated my life to being her number 1 fan girl. This book is revolutionary. It's powerful, bold, vulnerable, beautiful, hilarious, universal, unique. It's going to change people's lives -- Scarlett CurtisFuriously funny, gloriously frank and surprisingly relatable. For a book about shame, Grace Campbell is unashamedly herself -- Amelia DimoldenbergAn absolute riot. Brash, candid and casually obscene, this part memoir, part manual is a high octane adventure * Evening Standard *Revealing and amusing memoir * Times Radio *Nothing's off-limits in Amazing Disgrace * Metro *

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Book Synopsis'Rebecca meets The Secret History. Gloriously dark, gloriously gothic' Sara Collins, Costa First Novel Award-winning author of The Confessions of Frannie Langton For 150 years, Caldonbrae Hall has loomed high above the Scottish cliffs as a beacon of excellence in the ancestral castle of Lord William Hope. A boarding school for girls, it promises that its pupils will emerge 'resilient and ready to serve society'. Into its illustrious midst steps Rose Christie, a 26-year-old Classics teacher and new head of department. Rose is overwhelmed by the institution: its arcane traditions, unrivalled prestige, and terrifyingly cool, vindictive students. Her classroom becomes her haven, where the stories of fearless women from ancient Greek and Roman history ignite the curiosity of the girls she teaches and, unknowingly, the suspicions of the powers that be. But as Rose uncovers the darkness that beats at the very heart of Caldonbrae, the lines between myth and reality grow ever more blurred. It will be up to Rose - and the fierce young women she has come to love - to find a way to escape the fate the school has in store for them, before it is too late. Perfect for fans of Margaret Atwood and Madeline Miller, Madam is a darkly feminist tale with an electrifying cast of heroines you won't soon forget.______________________'Imagine if Donna Tartt and Margaret Atwood got together to write a creepy, suspenseful novel . . . Brooding and unsettling, Wynne paints a gorgeous picture that only serves to camouflage the dark secrets she's hidden within' - Chandler Baker, author of Whisper Network'The simmering menace and mystery kept me absolutely gripped . . . This was a smouldering slow burn of a novel that I could not put down' - Jennifer Saint, author of Ariadne'Strange, dark, and utterly consuming . . . I loved it' - Katie Lowe, author of The Furies'Chilling, eerie and very clever. I devoured it' - Polly Crosby, author of The Illustrated Child'A thrilling debut, reminiscent of Du Maurier. The narrative, written in precise prose with beautifully crafted characters, barrels along at pace, leaving us breathless at each twist and turn. A truly wonderful read' - Nydia Hetherington, author of A Girl Made Of Air'I ripped through it and thoroughly enjoyed the ride . . . A highly entertaining and atmospheric read' - Kate Sawyer, author of The Stranding'Full of fire and light, written with a passionate intensity . . . Madam is a book that shimmers . . . It's an extraordinary achievement' - Now and Fen blogTrade ReviewRebecca meets The Secret History. Gloriously dark, gloriously gothic * Sara Collins, author of THE CONFESSIONS OF FRANNIE LANGTON *Imagine if Donna Tartt and Margaret Atwood got together to write a creepy, suspenseful novel about a school for young women in the Scottish Highlands. The result is Madam, a book I couldn't for the life of me put down. Brooding and unsettling, Wynne paints a gorgeous picture that only serves to camouflage the dark secrets she's hidden within * Chandler Baker, author of WHISPER NETWORK *The simmering menace and mystery kept me absolutely gripped. It gave me the same feeling as when I read The Secret History and put me in mind of The Furies. I loved the clever interweaving stories of the classical women of ancient myth and history with the tantalising reveal of the horrifying truth behind the impressive facade of the grand boarding school. This was a smouldering slow burn of a novel that I could not put down * Jennifer Saint, author of ARIADNE *Strange, dark, and utterly consuming... I loved it * Katie Lowe, author of THE FURIES *Chilling, eerie and very clever. I devoured it * Polly Crosby, author of THE ILLUSTRATED CHILD *A thrilling debut, reminiscent of Du Maurier. The narrative, written in precise prose with beautifully crafted characters, barrels along at pace, leaving us breathless at each twist and turn. A truly wonderful read * Nydia Hetherington, author of A GIRL MADE OF AIR *I ripped through it and thoroughly enjoyed the ride. It had real echoes of Jean Brodie and a flavour of one of my favourite films Heathers, too! A highly entertaining and atmospheric read * Kate Sawyer, author of THE STRANDING *Full of fire and light, written with a passionate intensity . . . Madam is a book that shimmers . . . This is a chilling and shocking read that shouts of the abuse of power. Yet the warmth of its writing and the spell it holds is more powerful than the words give way to. It's an extraordinary achievement * Now and Fen blog *Brooding, creepy and suspenseful... Perfect for fans of The Handmaid's Tale * Woman & Home *I was immersed in the bleak landscape and terrifying atmosphere...from beginning to end... A wonderful, refreshing, beautifully written novel, and I cannot wait to read Wynne's next * Louise Fein, author of PEOPLE LIKE US *Chilling, unsettling with strong messages about femininity, Madam shocks as it builds from subtle hits to its big satisfying crescendo . . . An interesting mix of modern gothic, the anticipation of a thriller and a strong female voice * My Weekly *Thick with Gothic intrigue and menace, this is also a novel with a feminist heart * Daily Mail *One of my favourite reads of 2021 so far and I found it thoroughly addictive, sickeningly disturbing at times and endlessly fascinating * Shemazing *Madam is a sinister and utterly compelling boarding school mystery * Mummy Pages *A dazzling slice of dark, Gothic feminism * Heat *A book that's truly hard to put down * Living North Magazine *A pitch-perfect debut with a feminist twist * 17 Degrees Magazine *Latin and Greek myths echo throughout, in a story that will not let you go * The Irish Times *

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Book SynopsisOur universities are the locus of ongoing debates over the politics of gender, of class, of disadvantage and disability—and over the issue of “political correctness.” In A Feminist I Christine Overall offers wide-ranging reflections from a first-person point of view on these issues, and on the politics of the modern university itself. In doing so she continually returns to underlying epistemological concerns. What are our assumptions about the ways in which knowledge is constructed? To what degree are our perceptions shaped by our social roles and identities? In the past generation feminists have led the way in recognising the importance of such questions, and recognising too the ways in which personal experience may be an invaluable reference point in academic theory and practice. But reliance on personal experience is fraught with problems; how is one to deal with tensions between the autobiographical and the analytic? This book points the way to resolving some of those tensions, and to fruitfully sustaining others. It is a book of considerable insight, warm humanity, and genuine importance.Trade Review“I am a feminist.’ So begins Christine Overall’s ‘theoretical autobiography.’ In the pages following this declaration, Professor Overall shares much of her personal history as a feminist academic, ‘come up’ from the working class and having gone through a seriously disabling illness. The result is stunning. Her story is relentlessly candid, absolutely engaging, and enormously rich. Her purpose here is ‘to exemplify the use[fulness] of personal histories within feminist philosophy.’ Through an always accessible and often deeply moving narrative, she succeeds completely, making important contributions to the theoretical discussions of philosophical methodology; societal and institutional cultures; pedagogy; and sexism, classism, ableism, ageism and their intersections. Although Professor Overall presumes to speak for no one but herself, her account of and reflections on her experiences (internal as well as external) will resonate with feminists inside and outside the academy, revealing, as they so ably do, the insights a deeply committed and well-practiced feminist consciousness brings to a life story. At the same time, her story and her reflections on that story generously illuminate a feminist soul for those who do not yet understand such souls. This is, then, a book no one should miss.” — Joan C. Callahan, University of Kentucky“ … intriguing and important … I imagine I shall be changing some of my own practices as a result of reading Overall’s descriptions of her experiences. … This is a very helpful book for anyone who seeks to understand better the situation of feminists in the academic world.” — Susan Sherwin, Dalhousie University“Overall speaks in the first person, using her own experience as the foundation of her political philosophical analysis … The narrative is candid and direct … Overall successfully uses her life to illuminate more general feminist political conflicts without over-generalizing or including awkward caveats or painful circumlocutions. … [T]his is a very well-crafted book, and a valuable and original addition to feminist literature.” — Philosophy in Review“Engaging and accessible … A Feminist I is philosophy set in vital motion in the real world; Overall is to be lauded for her courage.” — Quill and Quire“The role muddles of A Feminist I will be familiar to most academic women. Overall usefully reports … and is prepared to ‘reak the taboo’ of her philosophical training by writing personally and frankly.” — Elaine Showalter, in The Times Literary SupplementTable of ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: A Feminist Od(d)yssey Role Muddles Women and Men in Education A Tale of Two Classes Nowhere at Home Feeling Fraudulent Passing for Normal Personal Histories, Social Identities, and Feminist Philosophical Inquiry References

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Book SynopsisMary Astell's A Serious Proposal to the Ladies is one of the most important and neglected works advocating the establishment of women's academies. Its reception was so controversial that Astell responded with a lengthy sequel, also in this volume. The cause of great notoriety, Astell's Proposal was imitated by Defoe in his "An Academy for Women," parodied in the Tatler, satirized on the stage, plagiarized by Bishop Berkeley, and later mocked by Gilbert and Sullivan in Princess Ida.Trade Review“Patricia Springborg has given us a thoroughly contextualized edition of Mary Astell’s A Serious Proposal to the Ladies: Parts I and II. Her explanatory annotations as well as her knowledgeable exposition of Astell’s philosophical positions make available again these landmark texts…and the well-chosen supplementary materials demonstrate Astell’s immediate impact on the intellectual circles of late seventeenth-century London.” — Ruth Perry, MIT“This new edition of Astell’s A Serious Proposal offers readers welcome access to the eloquence, argumentative skill, and wit of Astell’s powerful defense of women’s education and of their intellectual abilities.” — Martine Watson Brownley, Emory University“Springborg’s introduction clearly places Astell’s work in the context of two important early eighteenth-century crosscurrents, the ‘woman’ question and the debate over empirical rationalism. She grounds Astell’s writings in the tradition of imagining intellectual communities of and for women but Springborg also usefully sets them in the context of the larger philosophical debates over Locke’s epistemology of environmental conditioning and psychological sensationalism. Thus, Astell takes her place again among the voices of the Cambridge Platonists and the supporters of the Port Royal School in this defining debate touching education and politics, both national and domestic. The inclusion of four appendices (Drake’s “Essay in Defence of the Female Sex,” Defoe’s “An Essay upon Projects,” and two essays from the Tatler commenting on Astell) make this a splendid package.” — Margaret J.M. Ezell, Texas A & M UniversityTable of ContentsAcknowledgementsIntroductionMary Astell: A Brief ChronologyA Note on the TextA Serious Proposal to the Ladies, Part IA Serious Proposal, Part IIAppendix A: Judith Drake, An Essay in Defence of the Female Sex (1696)Appendix B: Daniel Defoe, An Essay upon Projects (1697)Appendix C: From The Tatler, no. 32 (June 23, 1709)Appendix D: From The Tatler, no. 63 (September 3, 1709)Select Bibliography

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Book SynopsisPardon me; I must seem to you so stupid! Why is the property of the woman who commits Murder, and the property of the woman who commits Matrimony, dealt with alike by your law?"So ends the "little allegory" in conversational form with which Frances Power Cobbe opens the 1868 essay that gives this collection its title. Cobbe was a widely read essayist of remarkable lucidity and power; her pieces display incisive wit and remarkable focus as she returns repeatedly to "the woman question," but it was typical of the time that when Cobbe died she was described in the Wellesley Index to Victorian periodicals as a "miscellaneous writer."Cobbe was not alone; as much as 15 per cent of the essays in Victorian periodicals were written by women, yet even the best of these pieces were allowed by the male-dominated world of scholarship to disappear from print. This anthology makes available again some of the best Victorian writing by women. The second edition has been revised and updated; additions include a chronology and an essay by Frances Power Cobbe on the education of women.Trade ReviewThis is an indispensable collection for all readers of nineteenth-century women's writing and women's history. It brings together a range of key texts, many long out of print, around which so much contemporary debate and controversy raged. The second edition of this ground-breaking anthology will be welcomed by those interested in Victorian literature and culture and the nineteenth-century woman. It is one of the most imaginative and useful anthologies to be published in the last decade." - Joanne Shattock, University of Leicester"For the second edition, Hamilton's invaluable anthology has been attractively redesigned and includes fully updated lists of secondary sources, a helpful chronology of events and legislation related to the 'woman question,' and one more complete entry, Cobbe's 'The Education of Women, and How it Would be Affected by University Examinations.' This is an indispensable volume." - Rohan Maitzen, Dalhousie UniversityTable of ContentsACKNOWLEDGEMENTSINTRODUCTIONCHRONOLOGYA NOTE ON THE TEXTANNA BROWNELL JAMESON (1794-1860)“The Milliners”Biographical NoteHARRIET MARTINEAU (1802-1876)“Female Industry”Biographical NoteFRANCES POWER COBBE (1822-1904)“Celibacy v. Marriage”“‘What Shall We Do with Our Old Maids?’”“The Education of Women, and How it Would be Affected by UniversityExaminations”“‘Criminals, Idiots, Women, And Minors’”“Wife-torture in England”Biographical NoteELIZA LYNN LINTON (1822-1898)“The Girl of the Period”“The Modern Revolt”“The Wild Women: as Politicians”“The Wild Women: as Social Insurgents”Biographical NoteMARGARET OLIPHANT (1828-1897)“The Condition of Women”“The Grievances of Women”Biographical NoteHELEN TAYLOR (1831-1907)“Women and Criticism”Biographical NoteMILLICENT GARRETT FAWCETT (1847-1929)“The Emancipation of Women”Biographical NoteMONA CAIRD (1854-1932)“Marriage”“A Defence of the So-called ‘Wild Women’”Biographical NoteWorks Cited and Recommended Reading

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Book SynopsisIn this book, Wendy Lynne Lee sets out to demonstrate how feminist theorizing is relevant to issues that may seem less directly about the status and emancipation of women but that are vital, she argues, to forming connections with other important twenty-first century movements. Lee shows how a feminist approach to crafting these connections can shed light on the economic disparity and entrenched gender inequality of global markets; the role technology plays in our conception of reproductive rights, sexual identity, and gender; the rise of religious fanaticism; and the relationship between our conceptions of gender, nonhuman animals, and the environment. Timely, politically passionate, and forcefully argued, Contemporary Feminist Theory and Activism will reinvigorate feminist thought for the twenty-first century.Trade Review“With this wonderfully lucid and accessible book, Wendy Lee has done feminism a great public service. Moving gracefully from the politics of sex reassignment, to international surrogacy, to Sarah Palin’s religious and anti-environmental views, to women’s responses to terrorism, she shows how feminist politics vastly exceeds stereotypes to become a truly worldwide and interconnected political movement. Lee’s arguments are well-crafted and shrewd, but her tone never departs from the pragmatic. Rich with examples—from polar bears to microlending, cyborgs to McJobs—her book shows how feminism’s breadth of vision and potential for political action might be realised. Deftly articulated, highly topical, and written with a rare political passion, Contemporary Feminist Theory and Activism will speak to scholars, students, and the general reader alike. For those who think that we have seen the end of feminism, Lee’s book shows that we may be only at the very beginning.” — Cressida Heyes, Canada Research Chair in Philosophy of Gender and Sexuality, University of Alberta“Contemporary Feminist Theory and Activism: Six Global Issues is an exciting book combining feminist theorizing from within the academy and feminist activism on a range of international issues. Wendy Lee’s book brings together with clear and accessible prose issues that will engage student intellect and enthusiasm. The chapter on sexual identities is especially compelling, but so too is the chapter on ecological feminism. I am excited about the prospect of teaching from this book.” — Samantha Brennan, Professor of Philosophy, University of Western Ontario“In this brave, intelligent, and eminently readable book, Wendy Lee spins an intricate web of at-first-sight implausible connections through and among the ‘six global issues’ of her title. In readings that are often startling, yet consistently convincing, she gives new meaning to the slogan ‘the personal is political’— and deeply philosophical. Lee demonstrates how a feminist analysis that is both erudite and witty can yield new ways of understanding how racism, sexism, religious fundamentalism, environmentalism, terrorism, and institutionalized inequality are reciprocally constitutive and mutually reinforcing. This book has much to offer feminist scholars and activists: it is it once a stimulating classroom text and a book that will engage—and challenge—readers committed to practising ‘a thinking activism of the ordinary’.” — Lorraine Code, Distinguished Research Professor, Department of Philosophy, York UniversityTable of ContentsPrefaceAcknowledgementsI Introduction: The Future(s) of FeminismII Sexual Identities: Institutionalized Discrimination, Medical/Technological Possibility, and the (Slow) Death of Binary NatureIII Reproductive Technology and the Global Exploitation of Women’s SexualityIV Economic Disparity and the Global Market: Institutionalized InequalityV The Culture Industry, the Conceptual Economy of Difference, and the Allure of Religion: Feminist Discourses of ResistanceVI Religious Fundamentalism, Terrorism, and the “New” Anti-FeminismVII Ecological Feminism: A Critical Praxis for the Future as NowVIII Epilogue: Life as ActivismReferences

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Book SynopsisThis new edition of Women and Economics highlights the importance of Charlotte Perkins Gilman as a leading public intellectual of the Progressive Era. It contains Gilman's most influential economic analysis, including her signature idea that the relationship between men and women is at core 'sexuo-economic.' Gilman applies ideas and techniques from evolutionary science to the study of marriage and the family. Her highly original approach reveals that female dependency is not a natural but rather a cultivated phenomenon. Women and Economics proposes wide-reaching social and economic reforms that were radical at the time and, as numerous twenty-first-century feminist economists continue to argue, are yet to be achieved today.Related literary works by Gilman and historical documents allow readers to situate Gilman's ideas in relation to larger debates concerning labour relations, the family, and women's role in society.Trade Review“Anyone interested in women’s incisive—but still often overlooked—contributions to the history of economic and social thought will profit from this informative edition of Women and Economics. Well researched and reader-friendly, it situates Gilman’s classic within broader historical contexts, while demonstrating its astounding relevance for contemporary debates about gendered and economic inequality. Comprehensive additional material testifies to Gilman’s versatility and productivity as a writer and thinker, inviting modern readers to rediscover the value of literary texts for social analysis. This edition is not only an enlightening contribution to the growing corpus of works on women’s intellectual history, struggles, and defiance—it also provides inspiration for rethinking economic relations in the twenty-first century.” — Joanna Rostek, University of Giessen“This beautifully curated collection offers a modern window into the mind of a pioneering feminist. Charlotte Perkins Gilman succumbed, at least partially, to the racial biases of her era. She was, nonetheless, one of the most creative and versatile thinkers of her day—an inspiration to the burgeoning field of feminist economics.” — Nancy Folbre, University of Massachusetts AmherstTable of ContentsAcknowledgementsIntroductionCharlotte Perkins Gilman: A Brief ChronologyA Note on the TextsWomen and Economics: A Study of the Economic Relation Between Men and Women as a Factor in Social EvolutionSelected Poems from In This Our World and Other Poems The Rock and the Sea Heaven Where Memory Sleeps What Then? Baby Love For Us We, as Women To the Young Wife Mother to Child The Survival of the Fittest An Obstacle The Cart before the Horse The Poor Ye Have Always with You Waste Nationalism Selections from Suffrage Songs and Verses The Socialist and the Suffragist The Malingerer The Anti-Suffragists The Anti and the Fly Women Do Not Want It Song for Equal Suffrage Something to Vote ForAppendix A: Socialism, Feminism, Humanism 1. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Masculine, Feminine, and Human, Woman's Journal (9 July 1892) 2. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Women as a Class,Impress (7 November 1894) 3. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, When Socialism Began, American Fabian (November 1897) 4. Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Socialism and Patriotism, American Fabian (May 1898) 5. From Charlotte Perkins Gilman, Economic Basis of the Woman Question, Woman's Journal (1 October 1898) Appendix B: Early Reviews of Women and Economics in the United States and Abroad 1. Women and Economics, by Charlotte Perkins Stetson, Book Buyer (1 March 1898) 2. Women and Economics, Literary World (24 December 1898) 3. Mabel Hurd, Women and Economics, Political Science Quarterly (December 1899) 4. Women and Economics, Independent (26 January 1899) 5. Advertisement for Women and Economics, Living Age (30 September 1899) 6. From Women and Economics, The Bookman [London] (September 1899) 7. From Vernon Lee, The Economic Dependence of Women, North American Review (July 1902) Appendix C: Women, Work, and the Home 1. Penalizing Parenthood, Independent (20 March 1913) 2. The Edgell Case: May a Married Woman Be a Teacher? Independent (8 May 1913) 3. The Case of the Teacher Mothers, Outlook (6 December 1913) Appendix D: Nineteenth-Century Sociological Thought 1. From William Graham Sumner, What Social Classes Owe to Each Other (1883) 2. From Lester Frank Ward, Dynamic Sociology of Applied Social Science (1883) Works Cited and Select Bibliography

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Book SynopsisLisa Smith was a bright, young lawyer at a prestigious firm in NYC in the early nineties when alcoholism started to take over her life. What was once a way of escaping her insecurity and negativity became a means of coping with the anxiety and stress of an impossible workload. Girl Walks Out of a Bar is Smith's darkly comic and wrenchingly honest story of her formative years, the decade of alcohol and drug abuse, divorce, and her road to recovery. Smith describes how her spiraling circumstances conspired with her predisposition to depression and self-medication, nurturing an environment ripe for addiction to flourish. Girl Walks Out of a Bar is a candid portrait of alcoholism through the lens of gritty New York realism. Beneath the façade of success lies the reality of addiction.

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Book SynopsisIn Gardasil: Fast-Tracked and Fatal, the author argues that there is no evidence of how much cervical cancer the HPV vaccine will prevent. What is emerging, however, is evidence of its harmful effects. In the nine years since the experimental HPV vaccination program began, there have been 255 deaths worldwide and 43,000 adverse events.Gardasil was fast-tracked through the FDA, a process usually reserved for serious diseases where a new drug is required to fill an unmet and urgent medical need. Yet the incidence of cervical cancer had been markedly in decline due to Pap smear programs.Trade ReviewA brilliant, well-researched expose on the terrifying consequences of HPV vaccination for many children that will make all parents question its benefits. Stephen Tunley, Director of SaneVax

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Book Synopsis'How to find the right words to frame this horror? How to understand why men do what they do to women? How to comprehend this malign force that seems to seep from the male psyche and infect us all? . . . That is the central hope, the appeal, embedded in this book: that other men might join me in this investigation and ruthless self-interrogation-and in doing so, become part of the change that is so urgently required.'David LeserIn February 2018, the Good Weekend cover story by David Leser, 'Women, men and the whole damn thing', had an extraordinary response. David received hundreds of personal messages from readers around the world - both women and men - urging him to expand his story. Here is that book: a brilliant, impassioned, unflinching account of the firestorm of #MeToo, how we got there and where we must now go.In this essential and incisive investigation, Leser unearths the roots of misogyny, its inextricable links to the patriarchy, and how history brought us to the #MeToo movement and the wave of incandescent female rage that is sweeping the world. Crucially, he also interrogates his own psyche, privilege and culpability as he bears witness to the 'collective wound of the world' and asks how we can move towards healing and profound and permanent change.Trade ReviewI started reading this book with my heart in my mouth and finished it with a sense of profound relief. At last, a man has listened and understood. David Leser has taken women, their lives, their pain, their fears and their desires as seriously as he takes his own. It is all we ask. -- Jane Caro, author of ACCIDENTAL FEMINISTSOne of our finest longform journalists-certainly our deepest-divesinto the treacherous waters of #MeToo (and then some) and emerges with something so timely, connecting and regularly sublime that it feels like it was written as much for me and my mates as it was for my daughters. Resolutely human. Utterly essential. Wholly unputdownable. -- Trent DaltonStaggering in its range and depth. Leser sets out the whole horror story, the shocking scale of centuries of violence to women and girls. But he offers real hope at the same time...A landmark book. -- Steve Biddulph, author of RAISING BOYS IN THE TWENTY-FIRST CENTURY

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Book SynopsisLillian Beynon Thomas'' suffragist campaign succeeded where all others had failed. This full-length biography fills an important gap in the history of the ''votes for women'' movement, a campaign which saw Manitoba become the earliest federal or provincial Canadian jurisdiction to grant women the franchise.Lillian''s Home Loving Hearts page in the Prairie Farmer newspaper, a weekly column in which she advocated for a wide variety of women''s rights, made her one of the most popular, pioneering women''s page journalists on the prairie. During this time, she founded the rural Homemakers'' Clubs affiliated with the University of Saskatchewan. To achieve the franchise, she eschewed the then traditional tools of back-room, partisan party politics by instead developing a broadly-based, grass-roots movement which stands as a forerunner of modern political campaign techniques.Facing hostile opposition to her pacifist views in Winnipeg during World War One, she and her

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Book SynopsisA compelling memoir by the daughter of convicted polygamist Winston Blackmore explores a young womans journey from polygamy to feminism and independence. As the daughter of Mormon leader Winston Blackmore, Mary Jayne Blackmore grew up within the closed-off polygamist community of Bountiful, BC. She spent her younger years riding ponies, raising pet lambs and playing in the hay in the Old Barn. Her familys staunch Fundamentalist Mormon faith imposed fanatical doomsday preparation and carried an instilled fear of the world outside her community. The church community split in 2002 when her father was revoked of his leadership position by Prophet Warren Jeffs. In 2017 Winston Blackmore was convicted of practicing polygamy further inciting the media sensationalism and worldwide criticism that had surrounded Bountiful for decades. Through the evolving and controversial narrative of her young adult life, Mary Jayne was forced to redefine her faith, family and womanhood for herself. Today, through her work and her personal exploration of feminism, Mary Jayne is helping to heal an injured community, one that she watched turn from safe and loving to defensive and resentful. She is also building her own place in the world -- as a teacher, mother, writer and educated woman -- and she has managed to restore loving bonds with her family, including her father. From a childhood in an idyllic but sheltered community to early adulthood in an arranged marriage, ensuing divorce, and eventual return to Bountiful, Balancing Bountiful is Mary Jaynes journey of coming of age and coming to terms with her background as she strives to answer the question: What is the right kind of family, the right kind of woman and the right kind of feminist?

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Book SynopsisCarol Harvey Steski''s tenacious and unapologetic debut, rump + flank, explores the body in nature''s many incarnations: human, animal, plant, microbe, even chemical. The result is a fantastical poetic work that sheds light on what bodies-especially female ones-endure, probing the full range of experiences from pleasure and hope to deep loss and trauma.These poems are piercingly humorous, sexy, and peppered with startling absurdities, but are grounded by an undercurrent of nostalgia (and a soupçon of feminist rage): mercury reproduces like funhouse mirrors, oysters are whole notes dropped into eternal song, cancer is a surly character taking and discarding lovers, a domestic chore turns dark as a mother channels her inner Lady Macbeth. Lush imagery melds with organic rhythms to spawn a visceral experience, a tendon-and-muscle-driven engine that readers can feel racing within their own bodies.

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Book Synopsis100 years ago women in the UK won the vote and 50 years ago the Women’s Liberation Movement began a sustained campaign for equal rights. Eva Tutchell and John Edmonds draw upon historical perspectives and contemporary interviews to convey what it felt like to be in the heart of the campaigns—the excitement, the solidarity, the suffering and the humour. The tragedy is that, after hard-won successes, the revolution has stalled and equality for women is still a distant dream. Today, men are paid more and occupy nearly 80% of the most powerful jobs across society. The Stalled Revolution poses a vital question about the future: Are women ready to draw inspiration from past successes and take a third leap forward towards equality? The book’s three-part approach traces clear pathways through historical successes and disappointments, teaching a new generation of campaigners how to confront the many challenges that face women in the modern world. The Stalled Revolution showcases how the wisdom from our collective struggles can help form the bedrock of a new and successful liberation campaign today.Trade ReviewTutchell, who specializes in gender issues and advises public authorities in the UK, and Edmonds, a trade unionist and specialist in work organization in the UK, explore the need for a new women’s liberation campaign. They describe the Votes for Women campaign and the Women’s Liberation Movement in the UK, the disappointments in progress in the decades that followed, lessons that can be learned from them, the need to mobilize women, how a new liberation campaign might be developed, sexism in the 21st century, how women react to sexism and inequality, the motivation and methods for building a new movement, and the role of the arts. -- Annotation ©2018 * (protoview.com) *Table of ContentsAcknowledgements Chapter 1. The two great Anniversaries Chapter 2. Days of hope Chapter 3. Winning Votes for Women Chapter 4. The Women’s Liberation Movement Chapter 5. How the revolutions stalled Chapter 6. Lessons from our history Chapter 7. Twenty-first century sexism and inequality Chapter 8. Threats and trepidation Chapter 9. New writing on the banner Chapter 10. Living the impossible dream Bibliography Index

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Book SynopsisDid you know that Sirimavo Bandaranaike of Sri Lanka was the first woman in the world to become a democratically elected prime minister? That Tina Anselmi was a wartime resistance fighter who became the first woman to serve as a cabinet minister in Italy? Or that Sylvie Kinigi of Burundi was the first woman to serve as a prime minister in Africa? It is high time these extraordinary women who helped shape our world became household names, and this book brings them at last to the fore.Women Who Won is a celebration of 70 women from the last 100 years: politicians from around the globe who fought for election in a man’s world… and won. Beautifully illustrated by artist Emmy Lupin, it features well-known figures, including Kamala Harris, Benazir Bhutto, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, Jacinda Ardern and Julia Gillard, alongside lesser-known women whose stories are ready to be heard: Shidzue Katō, one of the first women elected to the Diet of Japan Yulia Tymoshenko, the first woman prime minister of Ukraine Shirley Chisholm, the first Black woman elected to the US Congress Peri-Khan Sofieva, the first democratically elected Muslim woman Ethel Blondin-Andrew, the first Indigenous woman elected to Canadian parliament Women of the past, but also women of the present and future. Women who smashed the political glass ceiling. Women who fought to leave a positive legacy for future generations. Women who paved the way for girls of today to become women who won.

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Book Synopsis'At a time when fluff and gossip reign supreme, Hanna Flint's work is consistently insightful, informative and engaging all at once. I always finish reading it feeling just a tad bit smarter.' Candice Frederick, Huffington Post'One of the smartest pop culture commentators out there.' Toby Moses, GuardianThe leading film critic of her generation offers an eloquent, insightful and humorous reflection on the screen's representation of women and ethnic minorities, revealing how cinema has been the key to understanding herself, her body image and her ambitions as well as the world we live in. A staunch feminist of mixed-race heritage, Hanna has succeeded in an industry not designed for people like her. She interweaves anecdotes from familial and personal experiences - from episodes of messy sex and introspection to the time when actor Vincent D'Onofrio tweeted that Hanna Flint sounded 'like a secret agent' - to offer a critical eye on the screen's representation of women and ethnic minorities. Divided into sections 'Origin Story', 'Coming of Age', 'Adult Material', 'Workplace Drama' and 'Strong Female Character', the book ponders how the creative industries could better reflect our multicultural society.Warm, funny and engaging and full of film-infused lessons, Strong Female Character will appeal to readers of all backgrounds and seeks to help us better see ourselves in our own eyes rather than letting others decide who and what we can be.Trade ReviewUnlike any film book I've read before, Strong Female Character is part-polemic, part-historical and social study of film, and part memoir. Hanna Flint deftly weaves these strands to tell a funny, angry and compelling story for right now: of how the cinematic world built this millennium girl's life. Covering absent fathers, MeToo, first loves, eating disorders and masturbation, there's little Hanna doesn't tackle head on with her signature honesty and humour. The huge authority with which she writes about film is only matched by the emotional power in describing her own experiences. Truly original. A must for any film fan who has wondered how their own life intersects with the art that they love. -- Terri WhiteA really gorgeous and thorough examination on films that have helped shape me into the woman I am today. Hanna's writing is sharp and wholesome and shows not only a forensic knowledge on movies but a deep love and respect for film. This book is a real celebration and ode to women who hold up the art of cinema. -- Mollie GoodfellowA really gorgeous and thorough examination on films that have helped shape me into the woman I am today. Hanna's writing is sharp and wholesome and shows not only a forensic knowledge on movies but a deep love and respect for film. This book is a real celebration and ode to women who hold up the art of cinema. -- Megha Mohan * co-founder of The Second Source *A glorious coming-of-age memoir, Hanna Flint's Strong Female Character is a tour through the pop culture that made her, from formative crushes on Edward in Twilight to making sense of sexual assault with some help from Gone With the Wind and Blade Runner. At turns witty and moving, it's a breeze to read and left me with a stacked new list of films to enjoy. -- Toby MosesPacked with enough film references to make any nerd heart sing but this book is so much more: this is bare-your-soul writing that tells us how important cinema is in not only how we understand the world but how we move through it -- Kate Herron * director of Loki *Strong Female Character is a journey both through the writer's life and the movies that made her. Bitter-sweet, funny and sharp, it's for everyone that Disney never made a princess for -- David QuantickHanna is a terrific writer, with an eye for a telling detail and a strong, unique, passionate voice. She's put together some of the most revealing profiles to have run in Empire in recent years, vibrantly bringing her subjects' stories to life. And her reviews, too, are highly insightful, while always keeping a light touch. A real force in film writing. -- Nick De Semlyen * Editor, Empire *At a time when fluff and gossip reign supreme, Hanna Flint's work is consistently insightful, informative and engaging all at once. I always finish reading it feeling just a tad bit smarter. -- Candice Frederick * Huffington Post *A brilliantly clever, sharp, witty writer who has the ultimate respect and love for story. -- Rachel De-Lahay * BAFTA-nominated screenwriter and playwright *Hanna represents that rare thing in film criticism today - a funny and fearless soul, dedicated to the promise of cinema as a space where everyone's voice can be heard. -- Clarisse Loughrey * Chief Film Critic, The Independent *One of the smartest pop culture commentators out there, Hanna is able to filter the latest releases through a sophisticated lens of social justice with wit and flair. -- Toby Moses * Guardian *

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Book SynopsisDoon Mackichan is best known for her comedy characters in the hugely popular Brass Eye, Smack the Pony and Toast of London - but throughout her career there are parts she's refused to take and stereotypes she's challenged to find more empowered characters.The Feisty Feminist. The Hot Lesbian. The Desperate Cougar.In My Lady Parts, Doon shares her experience on stage, screen and in real life, examining how our culture still expects women to adhere to certain stereotypes - and punishes those who don't. Doon looks at the stories we are telling and asks: what do these roles we give women tell us about their value in the society we live in? How do we hold our heads up without fear and say no to those that objectify us?The Deranged Mother. The Stupid Tart. The Hag.This is a courageous, vulnerable and empowering account of being a woman in an industry that has been exposed for its deep-rooted sexism. It is, above all, a call to reflect on - and radically rework - the implications such attitudes have for future generations.Trade ReviewDoon Mackichan's memoir savagely exposes the sexism of showbusiness by looking at the roles she has been offered. Yet Mackichan's tome is no misery memoir [ . . . ], rather the book is an inspiring tale of an actor and comedian standing by her principles * * Sunday Times * *Fierce, frank and funny, this is Doon at her very best. This book demonstrates that she is, and always has been, a trailblazer -- SANDI TOKSVIGAs we look back - and not that far - at how the misogyny was tolerated and even applauded in the 2000s, we should listen to the meticulous testimony of women like Mackichan. Because she has always called it out, but has often paid a high price * * iPaper * *A real page-turner; raw, urgent and entertaining * * Daily Mail * *A timely memoir . . . [Mackichan] has not been just an observer of change, but a driver of it. Hopefully times are changing for female comedians, but only because of the efforts of Mackichan and her generation. You can't keep a good woman doon * * Scotsman * *This is a fierce, frank and unfiltered account. [Mackichan] makes no secret of her fury at the way society treats women. But her readers will find that fury infectious * * Daily Mirror * *An articulate, whole-hearted and blazing account. Doon's been the bravest of us, someone who has consistently called out bad behaviour and unnecessary obstacles and challenged the industry to have more imagination towards women, even when doing so would cost her professionally. She's a role model to me and many others. Required reading - made me feel angrier and determined to be braver -- SALLY PHILLIPSA rip-roaring, brutally honest, brilliantly funny read. My Lady Parts is a triumph * * Buzz Magazine * *A sparkling, poetic and gloriousy witty whirl through Doon's brilliant career, with moments of deep poignancy and a bracing dose of feminist ire. Loved it! -- APRIL DE ANGELISA fierce and forthright slice of Doon's life, on and off-screen. Loud, angry and funny, it'll make you rage and cry and then cheer her on -- JENNY LANDRETH

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Book Synopsis'The Observer' described Anne Ridler as 'one of the best poets of her generation.' Her first book, 'Poems', was published in 1939, and her work developed in the light and shadow of the poets of the day - MacNeice and Auden, but also Durrell and Watkins. As important to her was an affinity with the secular and devotional writers of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Ambitious for her poems, she was never ambitious for reputation. Her work, like that of her friend E.J. Scovell, is only now receiving the attention it deserves. She has published ten collections of poetry, original and translated opera libretti, including Monteverdi's 'Orfeo'. She is the author of verse plays which have been performed in Oxford and London. This volume contains all that she wishes to preserve of her lyric poetry, together with choruses from the play 'The Trial of Thomas Cranmer'and a masque for music by Elizabeth Maconchy, 'The Jesse Tree'.

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Book SynopsisWhat drives young women and what drives them mad? Twenty-something women talk about living their feminism. What they do, how they do it and why they choose to do it as feminists. The private collides with the public, anger with humour, desire with ideals. Writing themselves into the debate, these young women are talking up.Trade Review"I finished this book feeling very optimistic. There is a new generation keeping the fires of feminism alight... They are fierce and brave and funny, and they are willing to fight. We are in good hands." --Anne Summers, "Sydney Morning Herald"

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Book SynopsisAn international anthology of writings on cyberculture and feminist interventions. A diverse and at times fractious discussion of issues raised by these new forms of cultural expression. The contributors engage with a range of questions including: What is cyberfeminism? How does feminism influence multimedia production? What are the possibilities for feminist activism and research on the internet? How are colonisation, cybersex and virtuality to be theorised? How do these technologies affect our theories about bodies and minds? And what are the implications for creative artists?

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Book SynopsisAfter September 11, feminists around the world spoke out, wrote for newspapers, for email lists and for the Internet. But in the male-dominated mass media, it was hard to find feminist perspectives. This collection brings together women who discuss the connections between war, terrorism, fundamentalism, racism, global capitalism and male violence. From the USA to Afghanistan, from Pakistan to Palestine, from Australia to Europe they have deconstructed this story and retold it from a feminist perspective in a powerful indictment of current global politics. Contributors include Barbara Kingsolver and Ani DiFranco, Naomi Klein.Trade Review"Written in highly accessible style, [it] will be of interest to students and researchers of conflict studies, feminists and anyone interested in global politics." --"Agenda", South Africa

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Book Synopsis‘Misogyny Re-loaded’ is an explosive manifesto against the resurgent sexual fascism of the new world order. By exposing the casual acceptance of snuff pornography in ‘gore’ culture through to the framing of rape as slapstick, Abigail Bray links the celebration of sexual sadism to the rise of an authoritarian culture of militarised violence. Arguing that a meaningful collective resistance has been scattered by the mass destruction of genuine social and economic security for ordinary women, Misogyny Re-loaded presents a scathing critique of the political drool of mainstream billionaire-friendly feminism.

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Book SynopsisRobin Hyde’s extraordinary but short life (1906–39) included a precocious early career as poet and parliamentary reporter. As a journalist, she juggled writing for the social pages with highly political reporting on unemployment, prison conditions and the alienation of Maori land. She struggled with drug addiction and depression, single motherhood twice over, and a lengthy period as a voluntary patient in a residential clinic (The Lodge) attached to Auckland Mental Hospital in Avondale. Her life culminated in brilliant reporting on the Sino/Japanese War following a journey into China in 1938.Table of ContentsIntroduction: A Fortuitous Moment; 1934 Autobiography; 1934-35 Journal Fragments; 1935 October Journal Fragment; 'The Cage with the Open Door' (Oct 1935); 1936 Journal Fragment; Essay on Mental Health in New Zealand; Notes on the texts; Bibliography; Index.

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Book SynopsisIn Not Sacred, Not Squaws, Cherry Smiley analyses colonization and proposes a decolonized feminism enlivened by Indigenous feminist theory. Building on the work of grassroots radical feminist theorists, Cherry Smiley outlines a female-centered theory of colonization and describes the historical and contemporary landscape in which male violence against Indigenous women in Canada and New Zealand is the norm. She calls out ‘sex work’ as a patriarchal colonizing practice and a form of male violence against women. Questioning her own uncritical acceptance of the historical social and political status of Indigenous women in Canada – which she now recognizes as male-centred Indigenous theorizing – she examines the roles of culture and tradition in the oppression of Indigenous women and constructs an alternative decolonizing feminist methodology. This book is a refreshing feminist contemporary challenge to the patriarchal ideology that governs our world and a vigorous and irreverent defence against the attempts to silence Indigenous radical feminists.Trade Review“In celebrating cultural differences, Cherry Smiley calls us all to take the courage to work together to challenge and change the patriarchy of male privilege, refusing any cultural practices that restrict, limit, or discriminate against women and girls because of their sex; all cultures and traditions are open for criticism and change.” —Judy Atkinson, AM, Professor Emeritus and author of Trauma Trails, Recreating Song Lines: The Transgenerational Effects of Trauma in Indigenous Australia, Founder We Al-li

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