Sidetracks - Episode V
Jul. 25th, 2011 09:37 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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ladybusinessSidetracks is a collaborative project featuring various essays, videos, reviews, or other Internet content that has caught our attention that we want to share with each other. All past and current links for the Sidetracks project can be found in our Sidetracks tag.
➝ Girls gone missing: kids' movie posters in 2011
➝ YES: "Is it the positive role model thing? Because I don’t want only positive female role models. I want the spectrum. Angry girls, happy girls, mean girls. Lazy girls. Girls who lie and girls who hit people and do the wrong thing sometimes. I’m pretty sure my daughters can figure out for themselves which personality aspects they should emulate, if only they see the diversity." From Dogs and Smurfs by Max Barry (via Amy)
➝ I am generally a bit wary of Jezebel, but this was an interesting article: The women of the Harry Potter universe.
➝ And of course I have to draw attention to this article the previous one links to: Dear Pixar, From All The Girls With Band-Aids On Their Knees NOT that there's anything wrong with princesses, of course. But like Max Barry said above, we want the full spectrum and we want it now, please. kthxbai.
➝ July 25th-31st is Teen Lesbian Novel Week at Portrait of a Woman!
➝ Patrick Ness love! Phoebe North on A Monster Calls. I can't wait to read her Strange Horizons review. And I would love to hear my LB partners in crime's thoughts on the book. *coughHINTcough*
➝ Continuing my ladies and Harry Potter theme, How I Learned About Feminism and Motherhood from Molly Weasley. I thought this post was particularly interesting in the context of Renay's link and commentary below about how the heroines we tend to perceive as feminist icons are those who reject traditionally feminine roles. (Also, the post was an interesting counterpart to something I saw somewhere last week about J.K. Rowling being notoriously apolitical - um - but still letting her conservative, traditionalist values shine through in the series.)
➝ As much as I was not a fan of the film Me And You And Everyone We Know, I find the misogynist language that usually accompanies criticism of Miranda July's work horrifying. This article does a great job of deconstructing it. (Via Chasing Ray).
➝ Geek Feminism: Who is harmed by a "real name" policy?. Very relevant given the recent Google+ shenanigans.
➝ Twenty-five books about music by ladies! As usual, a list written in response to high profile websites creating lists that mostly (or completely) ignore women. I read the Lavinia Greenlaws earlier this year and it definitely made me want more.
➝ One last Harry Potter link: In Praise of Joanne Rowling's Hermione Granger series. I love HP despite its shortcomings, but I would have been ALL over this series. Even though "DON'T READ THE COMMENTS" is generally a good rule to follow in these cases, there are some interesting counterpoints in this one. Also, excellent discussion about the article and the series at Shakesville.
➝ Uncovering YA Covers: How Dark Are they? Even more interesting than the issue of darkness are the numbers regarding race and gender.
➝ 'The Womanly Art of Blogging' by Kerry Clare is a critique of Scott Rosenburg's 'Say Everything: How Blogging Began, Where It's Going and Why It Matters' which (as she describes it) is a book that erases the female contribution to blogging. I had no idea such a thing existed, but my jaw was on the floor while I read this post. I find it really worrying that women can still be erased from an area of life (especially blogging where they're often called out for 'dominating', this is the best rhetorical example of having it both ways I've seen in a while) simply because men chronicle the history of that part of life.
➝ Phoebe North posts about the manic pixie girl and how she tried to be one which made me think of Ana's post 'On Stories, Female Desire and Manic Pixie Dream Girls'. PS Can you believe we have been doing this ladybusiness thing for months now?!
➝ Rachel's most recent post about Downton Abbey, which I'm mostly posting because of the dress picture and the filming news which I am sure Ana will want to know about after her Downton fest.
➝ And Danielle at 'A Work in Progress' posted a big list of country house novels that any Downton fan might be interested in checking out. There's also a second list pulled from suggestions left in her comments.
➝ Hehe funniest post I've read recently, about Karen Healey's cake making adventure
➝ Did everyone know about Hipster Puppies apart from me? Why has this been kept from me?
➝ The History Girls is a new collaborative blog written by a group of female historical fiction writers. And I want to read all their books now.
➝ Yes, Renay, I have found The Inception Ponies.
➝ I really enjoyed Brenna Yovanoff's debut novel 'The Replacement' and while I wait for her second novel to come out I'm filling time with her blog, which is different from every other author blog out there. She spends most of her posts analysing her teenage years, when she went from home schooling, to public school. I know it sounds like a typical track for a YA writer to revisit their teenage years, but it's the way she's writing about those years that is really special. Her observations are so self-aware and she digs around for as much honesty as she can produce. This recent post called 'Candid' struck me in particular, because some of the things she says about her teenage persona are so me now, even in my twenties and it's confronting, but very amazing to see another person owning those feelings so openly.
➝ Cheryl Morgan's post about the life of trans artists Jeffrey Catherine Jones reminded me that sometimes I need to take space to just sit and listen to people inside a community. Very insightful piece that embraces the true complexity of life.
➝ Zetta Elliot's article about 'Navigating the Great White North: Representing Blackness in Canadian Young Adult Literature' is an accumulation of lots of ideas she's explored at her blog about the disconnect between Canada's YA publishing scene and it's image as a great example of a multi-cultural, representative country.
➝Loud, Proud YA novels listed by Daisy Porter who is one of the best kind of people.
➝ Anita Sarkeesian was interviewed on The Conversation concerning Women in Movies. The short segment is mostly about The Bechdel Test, but I am all for it getting more mainstream notice.
➝ I have never followed Shousetsu Bang*Bang super closely, but my general knowledge of it came from fandom, even if the stories are original. There's a really blurry line between original and fannish and of the stories I have read from the project it often feels like this melds the two worlds together. It keeps popping up on my radar, and it a great source of fiction: Shousetsu Bang*Bang is a webzine for original gay fiction/boy's love oneshot stories. Once a year they do an female issue, as well. Since I know you both like queer stories, I figure this project might be of interest to you! The back issues are listed here and they have tons of fun themes. :)
➝ I Figured Out the Problem With Romantic Comedies was a fascinating read. I am not sure I agree with some of the points, but it's an interesting view of the problem. :)
➝ SHERLOCK HOLMES 2 TRAILER. a'skf'aksd;aljsd;ajd;ajsdl'askddd
➝ Nancy Pearl interviews China Miéville. OH MY GOD HE IS SO SMART. *_* There is not a transcript of this, but it's so lovely.
➝ I actually added the above blog to my reader and started going through the archives (as I am wont to do with new blogs). Well. Unintended discovery! Allow me to quote:
FanFic is in some ways odd but more understandable and quite clever in the way it re-uses things and takes characters and ideas in different directions. SlashFic is a corruption of characters by sexualising them in ways that were either never shown to readers (though I don’t think thats the case in most relationships in SlashFic if I’m being honest) or wanting to see two characters get it on no matter how unlikely that is for some personal (sexual?) gratification of the author but not in keeping with the fundamental nature of the characters relationship.
Although, the response to the above is is pretty great.
➝ And, in further adventures of How to be a Meanie About Fanfiction....! Rad! But on the other hand there's this post by Daniel Abraham is a nice palate cleanser, too, although it's only one of the many many reasons people write. But I like when pro-authors get it, too.
When I was talking about re-editing Life on Mars, I was basically making a little fan fiction version of the show for an audience of just me. It was a freaking good show not because it was better than the real one, but because it was tailor-made to push my buttons. I know. I was the tailor.
➝ It was very strange to read these two entries back-to-back. First, N.K. Jemisin wrote The Limitations of Womanhood in Fantasy (and everywhere else, but for now, fantasy) where she said:
I see a lot of women in fantasy who are power brokers, good fighters, sexually assertive or dominant, technically/scientifically and sometimes magically competent — all good things. All in defiance of the kinds of stereotypes that have plagued women in America*. But I’m beginning to wonder if, along with rejecting the stereotypes imposed on women by society, we haven’t also rejected all characteristics commonly ascribed to womanhood — including those that women might choose for themselves. Why is it hard for a female character to be considered strong if she’s self-effacing or modest, for example? Lots of women who are trailblazers and asskicking heroesare modest. This is all of a piece with America’s ongoing devaluation of traditional women’s gender roles, like being a housewife. (Or a househusband; we also devalue men who chose “women’s work”.) I can’t remember the last American fantasy I read that starred a housewife. I’m hoping there are some out there — recommendations welcome — but offhand, I can’t think of any. But housewives can be great characters, if they’re written right.
Here’s the problem with this wholesale rejection of both societally-imposed and self-chosen “typical” women’s behaviors — in the end, it amounts to a rejection of nearly all things feminine. And that’s definitely not good for women.
It's a great post. I also am really interested in reading the manga she uses as an example, too. But immediately after reading that, I read a review of A Wrinkle in Time by Cat Valente where she said:
But...despite Mom being a scientist, she stays home and takes care of the kids while Dad has adventures. She is perfect and beautiful, (uncomfortably, Calvin's mother is expicitly not beautiful, and this is kind of a shorthand for her not being as Good as a Murry--though good heavens, a woman who has had seven children and lost all her teeth might have reason to be cranky) but domestic, cooking beneficently for her family while doing her experiments. She is not employed by the government; she is not even allowed to be involved in the rescue of her husband for no defined reason.
It was really, really interesting to run up against these posts like I did right next to each other (via a SF Signal linkspam) because I was torn in many different directions. I agree with both of them (sort of; I read a lot of the problems Valente had with Meg's behavior and actions completely differently), but on the other hand when I read A Wrinkle in Time as a child I er, didn't really care much about Charles Wallace or Calvin? I was all heart-eyes for Meg and girls being awesome and read A Wind in the Door specifically because I wanted to know what happened to her; what other adventures she went on. But really, it's so complicated — how do we write the full gamut of female roles without banishing roles that are traditionally feminine to never be handled or written about? I also agree we're often harder on female characters (and authors that choose to write them) than we are are their male counterparts. What do you both think?
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Date: 2011-07-25 11:06 pm (UTC)Also, I really liked N.K. Jemisin's post - will read Cat Valente's tomorrow and compare. This is like my favourite Sidetracks ever; I suspect I'll be reading stuff from it for weeks to come.
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Date: 2011-07-26 06:35 am (UTC)I love the internet. There is so much stuff!
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Date: 2011-07-26 07:46 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-26 07:54 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-26 12:25 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2011-07-26 06:39 am (UTC)Have you read any Miéville at all?
Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 08:11 am (UTC)So, there's Briar, but she's a single mother/widow. It seems that the idea that a mother and wife can fill those roles and be involved in day saving activities doesn't really seem to have spread to narratives containing nuclear families with two partners of opposite sexes. I find that so odd, because I know, I know child care is hard and often one person ends up staying at home and often it's the woman who takes that role because society is all kinds of weird (not that it's weird for a woman to want to stay at home with her kids, rock on, but there is a rather an imbalance in how often it's the woman staying home rather than the man)... Still, I have a hard time really getting why so many books hit such a pattern (without acknowledging the complicated intersection between women staying home and societal pressures) as if it's just natural, because both my parents worked after my mother's maternity leave was over. It's not a natural assumption to me that the woman will have to/will want to give up her job. I'm actually pretty amazed that (kick me if I've got this wrong) Molly Weasley doesn't work at least part time. They have so many kids and Arthur doesn't make great money for such a large a family. How do they survive and most importantly why do they keep having the kids?
I wonder what would happen in a book with a family that has two female parents...Would they end up slotted into traditional parenting patterns (one at home, one at work, one saving the day, one holding the domestic world together) or would something else, something more complicated happen?
And the beauty politics bit of that quote...tricky. I think that slots in with Nymeth's link about princesses. I adore princesses and I don't want them knocked out of existence, but there's no denying that traditional depictions of feminine beauty (a princess needs must be beautiful and dressed femininely at least by the end of the film) are much more common. They also get rewarded more often than ugly, or uncommon looking characters who are generally punished. And it's hard not to read something into that pattern and hope for entertainment that counteracts that trend. I mean you can take it too far and that's how we end up with traditionally cheerleaders always being the bitch (and that's why Buffy rocks out, for contradicting that stereotype).
I guess my solution for this issues would be for the creative field to avoid demonising, or removing the pretty, feminine girls (gah cheerleaders are evil is so played out), but remember that less attractive or less traditionally feminine girls need some serious representation (and seriously that doesn't just mean putting your ladies in jeans, but continuing to make them traditionally feminine pretty - we are past the point where a heroine who lives in jeans is revolutionary, think bigger). They need to get their rewards as well (both the traditional ones like the romance and the non-traditional ones like independent cool stuff).
PS MORE LADIES EVERYWHERE!
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 08:11 am (UTC)Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 08:31 am (UTC)Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 08:42 am (UTC)The problem with the "but why doesn't SHE get to go off on adventures?" removes the choice aspect for me. Maybe she likes being a stay at home mother while still getting to be a scientist, maybe she's doing her own research and trying to find a way without involving her kids. I know plenty of people who would love to be able to stay at home with their kids and work as well, even if they're not planning on tessering away across the universe. It's how the whole "wife" angle is kind of...not demonized, but made to look suspect just because the kids get to go off on an adventure and she gets left at home. There are valid arguments and discussions to be made about it without casting judgment on women who choose that path for themselves, I guess!
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 11:07 am (UTC)I think this is one of those choices where the conflict of representation comes in for me. All the things you said above totally work for me as realistic reasons why women may not go off on an adventure, but when there aren't a lot of women characters who are domestic and adventurers around and the reasons why they might choose to not go off adventuring must ALL be reader contributed...I mean obviously looking at my argument above I can see that's where I jumped (not enough representation of adventuring wives and mothers, need moar, failure of imagination, representation is KEY) while you went a different way character specific way.
Still, even while I'm arguing this I'm thinking that I hate representation arguments and I like your way better. It's hard for writers to get one character to be 'all', or avoid every stereotype (because society implants negative connotations into pretty much everything that some groups of people do) and create stories that work really well. And arguments like that can end up in really bad places (the 'letting down the team' argument against flamboyant gay male characters, to which ick). So, I don't want to be all 'Meg's mother and all domestic heroines need to do it all' but I would personally like it if writers could be a bit more explicit with their reasoning behind what their female characters do. Maybe if authors found a way to do that, without being heavy handed, more realistic complexity could be added into female characterisation? I guess while Meg's mothers reasons for staying behind not being delved into leaves a lot of room for reader interaction (hurray) I'd like to see some canon for 'reasons why ladies might not go off adventuring without being tricked by the patriachy into accepting a traditional role when they'd really like to go adventuring' appear in mainstream publishing, because otherwise huge anti-feminist assumptions rear their head. (I am very canon dependant though).
But then I'm a huge control freak and am probably asking that writers idk try to control their readers understanding too much through canon, which is obviously impossible. Once again Meg's mother staying home being seen as a negative could be best addressed by better education on the many different roles women may choose for themseves?
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 03:59 pm (UTC)I'm not really sure if I've made any sense, or how this kind of thing can be achieved...I've lost my thread. Maybe your own words work best here - there's no wrong way to be a girl.
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 05:37 pm (UTC)YEEEES. The other day I saw someone say in a comment (it might have been on one of the links in this post, actually) that they feel that romance plot lines undermined women by default, and I thought, whoa. What a problematic thing to say. I mean, obviously there are millions of legitimate objections to how certain romance plots play out (like the talk you two had about epilogues last week), but do we really want to add "fall in love" to the list of things "proper" feminist characters can't do? Ideally, that list would have zero items on it anyway. No wrong way of being a girl indeed.
I'm hoping to do a post about the romance thing in specific next week. TL;DR TO COME :P
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 07:12 pm (UTC)Also, that comment is horrible. :|
Re: Cat Valente link
Date: 2011-07-26 10:03 pm (UTC)And really, by default...like no matter what kind of romance plot line and (danger, anger rising)no matter what the gender of the partner staring opposite our heroine?
Moving on to fun stuff - Sherlock Holmes 2!! I am so glad you are pro-multiple Sherlock Holmes. I do not understand this 'We only need Sherlock' stance, like I love it but it has enough issues to make me glad we can have double the Holmes, double the Watson. And anyway, even if 'Sherlock' were perfect, I would still enjoy alternate Holmes.