Iris: A Journal About Women articles from September 2003

Iris: A Journal About Women archives from September 2003

Letter from the editor.(Editorial)
September 22, 2003... Passion. How we all long for it in our lives. And from a quick glance at the table of contents in this issue, readers will see how varied are the passions of our writers. Stories about teaching and feminist learning, our attachments to...

Stargazer Lily.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Stargazer Lily Alone at the campfire mizzle, the ballet dancer roasts her slippers, toasts them to farted rose over the orange spangada. She stands in fifth position so stappity long, shakable stars fall...

Fyi: fuel your involvement.(Women's Choice)
September 22, 2003... FEMINIST BOOKWORMS UNITE Whether it's for leisure, education, or downright curiosity, here are some books every iris reader ought to check out: * El Saadawi, Nawal. A Daughter of Isis: The Autobiography of Nawal E1 Saadawi....

So wrong it's right: the guilty pleasures of reality television.
September 22, 2003... The number of television shows focusing on a bevy of young (or not-so-young) people vying for "true love" seems to grow exponentially with each passing season, as do the number of bizarre and increasingly cruel competitions in which these...

Make me over! A short history of how I and the rest of America became addicted to makeovers.
September 22, 2003... It's pretty easy to guess why Americans are so obsessed with makeovers--it's a little harder to pinpoint where it all starts. For some girls, it was the Barbie "Makeover Head" or maybe Halloween. For me, it all began when I was nine and rode...

The Mona Lisa Is a Very Tiny Painting.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... The Mona Lisa Is a Very Tiny Painting At 1:03 am on Wednesday even Brooklyn's still in motion someone told me good cities never rest and this must be true because it's 1:04 now and it's Wednesday really Thursday morning and I...

Girlhood revisited.(A Photo Essay)(Column)
September 22, 2003... I began photographing girls seriously in 1996. This began as a mental comparison of my childhood to that of my sisters who were seven and eight at the time. I wanted to contextualize my own childhood experiences with my sisters living in 90s...

Dating, in 5 acts.
September 22, 2003... Do people fall in love anymore? Did we ever? Was it ever more than hormones? I tell my friends that I think we should all just be locked up in a room with all the single people and a lot of booze and whomever you hook up with for the...

Tempting antidote: Jenny Toomey discusses music, activism, and passion.
September 22, 2003... Rock stars are notoriously unpredictable, and asking one of them about passion sounds like a bit of a risky proposition--we've all seen enough interviews to expect lurid tales of the fantastic and the forbidden, especially if any hair-metal...

Reasonable person: a feminist goes to law school, Part III.
September 22, 2003... [L]aw school tuition rates doubled-yes, doubled-between 1991 and 2001, and average debt levels at graduation rose 59% between 1993 and 2000. Faced with average educational debt payments of close to $1,000 a month approximately one-half of a...

Ghazal of Nines.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Ghazal of Nines If skin is a map as we lie side by side today marks nine times I've traced our journey since that day: ninth afternoon of another January, your hand caught in mine as we pledged each other to each...

Activist profile: Alexandra Arriaga.(Biography)
September 22, 2003... Alexandra Arriaga's spirit soars. Sitting on the steps of the Rotunda at the University of Virginia at dusk, she hugs her knees to her chest and sighs contentedly. "I'm very lucky to be working in a field that I'm passionate about," she says....

Savonarola's Cape.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Savonarola's Cape executed in Florence in May, 1498 How to explain my fear of Savonarola's cape, spread flat as bat wings on the cloister wall above his pitiful ropebed and pitted breviary? My fear of his great...

Regarding idealism.
September 22, 2003... I AM A DREAMER. I am the girl who, in choosing a movie to watch, passes by deeply artistic dramas or spine-tingling thrillers or masterpiece war reenactments to watch romantic comedies (every time). Sometimes I even fast-forward past the...

Responding to Aradia: young fiminists encounter the second wave.
September 22, 2003... Introduction In 1977, a group of women in Grand Rapids, Michigan, formed the nonprofit organization Aradia to formalize the vibrant feminist, sometimes separatist, and predominately lesbian community that existed in western Michigan....

Ultra sound.
September 22, 2003... Five months pregnant, I fly to Minnesota for Christmas from New York. My husband, Mark, a Pacific Northwesterner, finds the Midwest huge and sweet, my family maddening and kind. He eats the heavy dairy diet, talks the weather talk, gets to...

My Daughter's Dresses.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... My Daughter's Dresses My six-year-old is no longer the docile receiver of every dress I gush over in department stores, replaying the best pieces of my childhood with the velveteen jumpers, mother-of-pearl ...

Clear Blue Sky: Fido.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Clear Blue Sky: Fido When I became a feminist it was as simple as the clear blue sky, nothing that was not amenable to patient explanation--measured, reasoned. "You see," I'd say and right there I was...

"Why are we reading a handbook on rape?": teaching and learning at a women's college.
September 22, 2003... When I was hired to teach eighteenth-century English literature at Mills College in Oakland, California, I got the job of my wildest dreams. A small liberal arts college in the San Francisco Bay area, Mills attracts impressive students and...

Paradelle of Portent.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Paradelle of Portent Mourning dove enters the classroom in a burst Mourning dove enters the classroom in a burst Heads straight for windows that do not open Heads straight for windows that do not open Heads burst, a...

A Belle's last toast.
September 22, 2003... I've heard that to understand the South, you must be born here. But that logic doesn't help me much. I grew up here just as my mother and her mother did. I perfected my inflection for "y'all" and "ain't" on sticky evenings thick with the...

Feminist pop quiz.
September 22, 2003... 1. Bitch, Ms., Sojourner, HipMama, and MoXie are all: A. Cute and funk little nicknames that your dad, boyfriend, and elderly next-door neighbor have taken to calling you. B. The types of chicks that your parents warned you about when...

Women's health activism: instilling a passion for learning and social justice.
September 22, 2003... I used to agree with second-wave feminists who said that the movement's greatest resource is women over 40. The young haven't experienced enough of life to know about the inequities in society, in the workplace, and in the home. I was...

Becoming.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Becoming Everything is becoming something else. The caterpillar becomes a creature with wings. The mixed tape becomes a piece of a river. Everything is becoming something else. The sand becomes part bathing suit & ...

The wonderful world of aphrodisiacs.
September 22, 2003... People have believed in the power of aphrodisiacs since the beginning of history. When human beings developed civilizations, sex became more than just an act to ensure the survival of the species. With the arrival of nonprocreative sex came...

Here's to you, Staci: a personal account of growing up with American television.
September 22, 2003... I am not the only American who dislikes television. I know there are lots f us out there. While I don't have a "Kill your television" bumper sticker, I always smile at drivers who do and let them merge into my lane without so much as a glare....

Is something wrong down there? (what your health teacher never told you).
September 22, 2003... Before my college career began, I attended private school, and not just any kind of private school. It was all girls, all estrogen, all the time. What we lacked in assimilation to the "real world" of men and women we made up for with an...

More than just sex in a city.
September 22, 2003... You know the scenario: you're at a party or social gathering, mingling and making small talk. Someone mentions Sex and the City, and the females in the vicinity suddenly grow animated, excitedly comparing favorite characters and immediately...

Sex and the City a moderated group interview.
September 22, 2003... Over the past few years, HBO'S series Sex and the City has become a national phenomenon. On the show, four women in their 30s come together to talk about sex, relationships, and everything in between. One of the most remarkable aspects of the...

A passion for ... menstruation?
September 22, 2003... Everyone knows that remarkably awkward experience where you feel as though you have stained your clothes for the world to see and every guy or girl that approaches will give you the horrible news. Or maybe you've felt the gushing sensation...

Dippermouth blues.
September 22, 2003... My father always told me there were two kinds of jazz: white people's jazz and "the real thing." When he said "real"" he'd draw the "e" out a good long while, letting it crest into a warbling falsetto. He'd retrieve an LP from the boxed...

Geisha.(Poem)
September 22, 2003... Geisha All day I had not cried and she was pleased. She showed me the drawer with a painted moon drifting off-center, with silver painted trees; the drawer in the lacquered cabinet fitted with metal, inlaid with...

The Assault on Diversity: An Organized Challenge to Racial and Gender Justice.(Book Review)
September 22, 2003... The Assault on Diversity: An Organized Challenge to Racial and Gender Justice Lee Cokorinos Rowman and Littlefield, 2003 Published shortly before the US Supreme Court heard the University of Michigan affirmative action cases, The...

Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century's End.(Book Review)
September 22, 2003... Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century's End Sara M. Evans Free Press, 2003 For readers in search of an accessible historical account of so-called second wave feminism and its impact, Sara Evans' Tidal Wave: How Women Changed...

Literature After Feminism.
September 22, 2003... Literature After Feminism Rita Felski University of Chicago Press, 2003 "Literature after feminism is an expanded field, not a diminished one." This is the central claim of University of Virginia professor Rita Felski's recent book...

Labyrinth of Desire: Women, Passion, and Romantic Obsession.(Book Review)
September 22, 2003... Labyrinth of Desire: Women, Passion, and Romantic Obsession Rosemary Sullivan Counterpoint Press, 2003 ppbk, 2001 Chances are, you already know her. She may be your mother, your best friend, yourself. She is accomplished in her...

3 Asian American Writers Speak Out on Feminism.(Book Review)
September 22, 2003... 3 Asian American Writers Speak Out on Feminism Mitsuye Yamada, Merle Woo, and Nellie Wong Radical Women Publications, 2003 First published in 1986, this reprint from Radical Women Publications offers an often-refreshing, occasionally...

Let It Rain.
September 22, 2003... Let It Rain Tracy Chapman Elektra/Asylum 2003 As I sat in Wolf Trap's outdoor theatre this summer, I began taking notes on the most heterogeneous group of concertgoers I'd ever seen. Straight, gay, and mixed-race couples; the tattooed;...

The Dancing Machine Erase Errata Remix Record.
September 22, 2003... The Dancing Machine Erase Errata Remix Record Erase Errata Troubleman Unlimited 2003 Erase Errata is not your average quartet--they are loud and in your face and you cannot ignore the high energy from these four talented ladies. Together...

Now.(Jessica Andrews' new album)
September 22, 2003... Now Jessica Andrews Dreamworks 2003 Jessica Andrews' third album, Now, beautifully highlights the young singer's clear, powerful voice. Time has changed the tone of her music from that of an innocent young girl seeking identity and love...

Goldfrapp concert.
September 22, 2003... Recently I have become extremely passionate about live music. I revel in the concert scene equally for the bustling atmosphere, opportunities for people-watching, and the abundance of flashing and colored lights as much as for the actual...

Say what? iris celebrates passionate women by sharing inspiring and insightful quotes by women from all over the world.
September 22, 2003... Do what you are afraid to do. --Mary Emerson The women's movement hasn't changed my sex life. It wouldn't dare. --Zsa Zsa Gabor Write to amuse? What an appalling suggestion! I write to make people anxious and miserable and...