Iris: A Journal About Women articles from September 2004

Iris: A Journal About Women archives from September 2004

Editor's letter.(Editorial)
September 22, 2004... Lately there's a whole lot of confusion about what is fact and what is myth. Remember Michael Moore's 2003 Academy Awards acceptance speech, in which he gripped his Best Documentary Oscar and lamented the fictitiousness of our times and our...

Persephone's Crown.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... Persephone's Crown It's for a good cause, they say-- enough for me, at seven a tomboy aiming for the missionary life, to endure the pink yank of curlers, caged thorns of crinoline, white gloves, ankle...

Women at war.(Fuel Your Involvement ...)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... The war in Iraq has brought some major feminist issues to the fore. Courageous women fought and died for the United States, but they have done so amidst controversy and scandal. Why not take this moment in history to consider how feminism...

Where do you fit into all of this?(Fuel Your Involvement ...)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... The U.S. occupation of Iraq will not abate anytime soon. Take it upon yourself to better understand a culture that is most likely foreign to you. For a more comprehensive picture, try relying on news sources other than major television...

Dates of awareness celebration.(Fuel Your Involvement ...)(Calendar)
September 22, 2004... November 20: National Day of Transgender Remembrance. Transgender and transsexual people are often forgotten in the fight for equal rights. Make sure you don't make that mistake. December 1: World AIDS Day. Globally, 40 million people are...

Read all about it.(Fuel Your Involvement ...)
September 22, 2004... Some Basics: The Feminine Mystique This 1963 publication lays the foundations of liberal feminism; a must for any feminist bookshelf. By Betty Friedan Revolution From Within: A Book of Self Esteem Here Steinem explores...

Where have you gone, Mary Richards? Feminism's rise and fall in primetime television.
September 22, 2004... Flashback to 1970 and the fourth episode of the new Mary Tyler Moore Show, CBS's nod to the burgeoning Women's Liberation Movement. In this episode Mary and her somewhat frumpy friend Rhoda find out that the only way they can get cheap...

It's in her blood: Jewelle Gomez talks about activism, feminist playwriting, and a kinder, gentler vampirism.(Interview)
September 22, 2004... Artist, writer, arts advocate, and activist Jewelle Gomez sat down with iris to debunk her favorite myths about vampires and garlic, feminism and the media, her award winning novel and the theater, and to share her vision for what path...

Long girl.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... long girl that long girl's here--so long she's the wait-between-holidays-long memory-long mississippi-long nile-long and i want to say amazon-long but won't cuz that's an epic thing like her...

Girly girls.(personal essay)
September 22, 2004... IN EIGHTH GRADE I BEGGED MOM TO LET ME shave my legs, which is the third step to becoming a woman--the first being the training bra and the second the first pack of tampons. I'd look at my friends' shiny calves in gym class and yearn for the...

Cinderella Gets Smart.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... Cinderella Gets Smart I'm climbing out of my rags, paying a cleaner good money to sweep these filthy floors. My stepsisters smile--they look at my face and see their own. No matter that your sweet talk...

The trouble with Troy: misrepresenting myth.
September 22, 2004... At first glance, a movie about ancient warriors sacking a city is unlikely to be marketed to, or for that matter to appeal to, feminists or women in general (though Brad Pitt's rather revealing leather miniskirt is surprisingly difficult to...

Survivor: Texas A & M.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... Survivor: Texas A & M That night they raped her, boys at the fair. Aggies. 1954. Exactly how many she can't remember. My father in the living room can't hear. Can't change the subject--she's over that line, ...

Two weddings, one bond: the story of a lesbian couple in America.
September 22, 2004... Of all the indignities visited upon gays and lesbians, the issue of "multiple anniversaries" would hardly seem to top the list. The necessity of having to remember a number of dates, and to prioritize their significance (which is our "real"...

Canto .002.(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... Canto .002 the failure, so spectacular it is almost success like the opal against black silk... and the jeweled stone, the tiger's ...

Growing up and going down: a sexual (r)evolution.
September 22, 2004... When I was a senior in high school, a sex scandal arose in my hometown. It was an oral sex scandal, and yes, I do hail from the Washington, D.C. area, but no, I am not referring to Monicagate. The debacle began when a nurse at one of the...

Building a more perfect union: UVA's Jan Cornell.(Interview)
September 22, 2004... Jan Cornell is president and full-time organizer for Staff Union at the University of Virginia (SUUVA), established in 2002 with the mission "to give workers strength, dignity, and their own voice." Its hundreds of members include clerical...

We are perfectly fine.(fiction)
September 22, 2004... The realtor--her name is Suzanne--is telling David and Ruth about a neighborhood she thinks they'd both like (it's historic, she says, up-and-coming, filled with architectural gems) when she pulls her silver-white Mercedes out into an...

My Mother Dying.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... My Mother Dying My mother, like my father, was a musician. -K.C. Unconscious, says the doctor, speaking of His patient who has slipped into a coma, Your dying mother, whom you surely love Despite your scars,...

unwanted advances: broadening the conception of sexual assault.
September 22, 2004... One Friday night last year I was with my friends at the fraternity house that we often hung out at, goofing off, having fun, and drinking. I don't know whether my drink was stronger than I'd realized, or if it was just the result of mixing a...

The straight "man": a life in pictures.
September 22, 2004... The week after my great-grandmother moved in next door to me, I found a postcard of orange groves on which she had scribbled a note to her best friend. "Dear Evelyn," it said. "I'm too old to move. I don't know who I am anymore." I...

The truth about female genital mutilation.
September 22, 2004... Growing up as a young girl in Nigeria, I was completely oblivious to the fact that female circumcision was a common practice. It was never mentioned to me by mother or by any of my other relatives, and it was definitely never mentioned at...

The Fruit Stand.(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... The Fruit Stand When the last customer drove off and Gram finally closed up and came in, lugging baskets of bruised peaches and cherries for tomorrow's batch of homemade pies, usually all five of us cousins,...

Mirror, mirror, on the wall: the myth of women's lost selves.(Book Review)
September 22, 2004... The Lost Princess Syndrome Once upon a time there was a perfect little princess, and everything in her life was perfectly manageable until her wicked Aunt Flo embarrassed her and she was carried away by two brutes named Peer Pressure and...

Pretty pretty princess.
September 22, 2004... "What if there really is a handsome prince?" Columbia med student Paige (Julia Stiles) asks in the recent film The Prince and Me. This contemplation--verbalized by a successful, attractive, and confident modern woman--gives the lasting...

Low carbs high cost.
September 22, 2004... ever wonder how the American diet industry manages to rake in more than $40 billion a year? Considering that 5 million American women suffer from full-blown eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia, "80 percent of women have been on a...

The kids aren't all right: why middle class security is so last generation.
September 22, 2004... Could you afford the house you grew up in? It seems an innocuous question, but it's one that every middle-class young adult should ask themselves, because it holds a key to understanding our current economic situation. Generation Debt, they...

Check it While I Wreck it: Black womanhood, Hip-Hop Culture, and the Public Sphere.(Book Review)
September 22, 2004... Check it While I Wreck it: Black Womanhood, Hip-Hop Culture, and the Public Sphere Gwendolyn D. Pough Northern University Press, 2004 In her new book, Check it While I Wreck it: Black Womanhood, Hip-Hop Culture, and the Public Sphere,...

The Autonomy Myth: a Theory of Dependency.(Book Review)
September 22, 2004... The Autonomy Myth: A Theory of Dependency Martha Albertson Fineman New Press, 2004 In her recent book The Autonomy Myth: A Theory of Dependency, feminist legal scholar Martha Albertson Fineman, prompted by a sense of moral outrage over a...

Camp All-American, Hanoi Jane, and the High and Tight: Gender, Folklore, and Changing Military Culture.(Book Review)
September 22, 2004... Camp All-American, Hanoi Jane, and the High and Tight: Gender, Folklore, and Changing Military Culture Carol Burke Beacon Press, 2004 Written after Operation Iraqi Freedom had begun, Carol Burke's most recent book Camp All-American, Hanoi...

The Mommy Myth: the Idealization of Motherhood and How it has Undermined Women.(Book Review)
September 22, 2004... The Mommy Myth: The Idealization of Motherhood and How it has Undermined Women Susan J. Douglas and Meredith W. Michaels. Free Press, 2004 In The Mommy Myth, philosopher Meredith Michaels and cultural critic Susan Douglas articulate and...

Did you know?(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... Myth: Lesbians have had bad or negative sexual experiences with men. Fact: A distaste for men is not a prerequisite for lesbianism. A 1990 study of gay and hetero female students found that there was no significant dissimilarity in their...

Who the virgins are not.(Brief Article)(Poem)(Illustration)
September 22, 2004... Who the Virgins are Not Not the postulates dusting the crucifix in April light, eddying towards Easter, not the fusty librarians, not ballroom dancers of vicarious pleasure, not the babe on first base, not the...

To the Five Boroughs.(Beastie Boys)(Sound Recording Review)
September 22, 2004... To the Five Boroughs Beastie Boys Capitol Records 2004 The Beastie Boys are back and at the top of their game with To the Five Boroughs, their first full-length studio album in six years. From "fight for your right to party"--the title of...

Blueberry Boat.(Sound Recording Review)
September 22, 2004... Blueberry Boat Fiery Furnaces Rough Trade 2004 The Fiery Furnaces are Matthew and Eleanor Friedberger, a brother-sister duo from Brooklyn who grew up part of a musical family in Illinois (the Friedberger's grandmother was the choir...

Stripped.(Sound Recording Review)
September 22, 2004... Stripped Christina Aguilera RCA 2004 Vampish vocalist Christina Aguilera has changed considerably since her debut as an angel-faced Mouseketeer and Disney soundtrack songstress. Her sex-forward public image in recent years has received as...

Feels Like Home.(Sound Recording Review)
September 22, 2004... Feels Like Home Norah Jones Blue Note Records 2004 Since her debut in 2002, Norah Jones has been celebrated for giving American music an unpretentious and honest voice that is good enough to he popular without being pop. In her first...

What is a feminist?(Girl On The Street)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... Jennifer, 21: Someone who believes that women can do anything men can do... and probably better. Anne, 21: A girl who doesn't take crap from other people and is influenced by her gender in a positive way. Bo, 20: An empowered woman...

Have you ever been pigeon-holed?(Girl On The Street)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... Emma, 22: I have a blue streak in my hair, people assume that I am a lesbian or social deviant, when really I just like the color blue. Joe, 19: Everyone asks me what sport I play, because I am tall and black, I guess. But I just came...

What fairy-tale would you hate to be a part of?(Girl On The Street)(Brief Article)
September 22, 2004... Anne, 21: Cinderella. Is that an obvious answer? Poor girl, she goes from servant to wife and never gets to have fun. Jane, 22: The Little Mermaid. The guy loves her because she can't speak. Paul, 23: I would hate to be anyone in...

Insight from legendary women.(say what?)
September 22, 2004... Modern invention has banished the spinning wheel, and the same law of progress makes the woman of today a different woman from her grandmother. ~Susan B. Anthony I wasn't born a first lady or a senator. I wasn't born a Democrat. I...