feminist blogs

If you need some Tuesday morning truth, I highly encourage you to check out this brand new video for the Reflection Eternal track "Ballad of the Black Gold". The song is one of my favorites off their new album, and the video was directed by a very talented up and coming filmmaker named Sam Ellison around my neighborhood in Brooklyn. Plus, it brings a timely-- and feminist-- message about the negative consequences that can come as a result of our collective dependence on oil- the BP oil spill in the Gulf being one of them. For more on the negative effects of the oil spill on women, check out this article on reproductive health concerns in the aftermath of the BP oil spill.

*On a completely non-serious note, if you look closely at this video you may or may not catch a cameo by a certain Feministing contributor. *Shameless self-promotion alert* Enjoy!

If you need some Tuesday morning truth, I highly encourage you to check out this brand new video for the Reflection Eternal track "Ballad of the Black Gold". The song is one of my favorites off their new album, and the video was directed by a very talented up and coming filmmaker named Sam Ellison around my neighborhood in Brooklyn. Plus, it brings a timely-- and feminist-- message about the negative consequences that can come as a result of our collective dependence on oil- the BP oil spill in the Gulf being one of them. For more on the negative effects of the oil spill on women, check out this article on reproductive health concerns in the aftermath of the BP oil spill.

*On a completely non-serious note, if you look closely at this video you may or may not catch a cameo by a certain Feministing contributor. *Shameless self-promotion alert* Enjoy!

Yesterday was the birthday of renowned Mexican artist Frida Kahlo. She would have been 103 years old. Frida was a passionate painter, well-known for her self-portraits depicting her physical struggles as a survivor of a severe bus accident as a teen. She was married to Diego Rivera, another famous Mexican muralist. Kahlo died at the age of 47 and much of her fame came after her death, as feminist art historians began writing about her work.

In honor of her birthday, google created a "doodle"--changing their logo for the day to honor her. As Shelby Knox points out at Feministe, the number of times they have done this to honor women is appallingly low.

Happy Belated Birthday Frida!

Artemisia Gentileschi was raped by Agostino Tassi, 'an artist her father had hired to teach her perspective'.

Technically, she was not on trial. stood accused of raping her. ... Artemisia, however, was the one who was tortured to see if her story would remain consistent. The authorities used thumbscrews, tied cords around her hands and pulled them tight, which would be agonizing for anyone to go through but for a painter held a special horror. Tassi was not tortured, though his testimony was so contradictory that the judge told him repeatedly to stop lying. Artemisia was also subjected to a public examination to determine whether she had in fact been a virgin before the rape.
Source: Artemisia Gentileschi: Artist and Rape Survivor

The story has somehow always haunted me: true, today no authority (one hopes) would torture a woman who made an allegation of rape. There are, however, far too many instances where people whether they be healthcare providers or those involved in law enforcement who do, nonetheless, engage in the contemporary equivalent.

Even in the most uncontroversial cases, cases where they are not even required to take any action because the person victimised chooses not to, there is a class of people who will, regardless, take it upon themselves to confirm the validity of the woman's story. That confirmation could take myriad forms: asking questions repeatedly to confuse the woman, informing her that her lived realities are invalid, discussing in her presence the likelihood of her lying, making it impossible for her to pursue legal remedies by creating impediments.

What's sad is that Artemisia Gentileschi's story doesn't seem alien in today's context. Neither is that of Agostino Tassi, her rapist. "Tassi originally denied the accusation, stating, 'Never have I had carnal relations nor tried to have it with the said Artemisia... I've never been alone in Artemisia's house with her.' He later claimed that he had visited the her house in order to safeguard her honor."

The trial in relation to which he was not tortured ended with his being convicted of rape in 1612. The trial took seven months and, "it was discovered that Tassi had planned to murder his wife, had committed incest with his sister-in-law and planned to steal some of Orazio's paintings. At the end of the trial Tassi was imprisoned for one year."

One year of imprisonment (apparently). Nothing more. He was, however, probably prematurely pardoned, and therefore remained imprisoned for only eight months after the conclusion of the trial.

Work in Progress, posted with permission from the artist, Clarity Haynes

Clarity Haynes emailed us to share her project, The Sunset Park Breast Portrait Project: a feminist portraiture project. It focuses on the torsos those who've had mastectomies as a result of cancer treatments.

As a figurative artist interested in paint and in portraiture, I appreciate the stories the body tells that, unlike those on the face, are usually not made public. Although the composition is the same, every torso portrait is different, and it is the process of discovering that difference, that unique beauty, that I find engaging.

The Breast Portrait Project began in 1998, when I began doing commissioned torso portraits in pastel, often at women's festivals and retreats. After every portrait, I took a picture of the model with her portrait, and asked her to write something about her story and perspectives. Over time I have collected photographs and handwritten text from over 400 participants in a series of journals that have become "The Breast Portrait Books."

I enjoy working with models with a range of body types and a variety of life experiences. Cancer survivors are just one group that has found participating in the project to be a positive and emotionally healing experience. I'm grateful for all of the interactions I've had through this work -- I have learned from and been touched by the openness, courage and generosity of each model.

I think that sharing these folks experiences, and seeing the pride with which they display their bodies is a radical act. It never ceases to amaze me how little we see of the diversity of our bodies in the mainstream media.

They are beautiful.

Malory Graham is the founder and Executive Director of Reel Grrls, a Seattle-based nonprofit that teaches young women and girls how to make films. Graham, who grew up in New York City, caught the filmmaking bug as an undergraduate at Hampshire College, where she studied under the feminist researcher and author Susan Douglas. "They gave me a camera on day one and said 'create your own major,' so for four years, I made films." Once she graduated, she worked in the film industry, but found that teaching filmmaking was her real passion. She founded Reel Grrls in 2001 with the goal of teaching young women how to work behind the camera as well as in front of it, and how to make films about issues that matter to them.

Reel Grrls offers day camps, weekend programs, after-school programs and bootcamp workshops where students focus on just one aspect of filmmaking. They also run an apprenticeship program, where advanced students are placed with nonprofits in the Seattle area, to provide video production services. In other words, Reel Grrls teaches girls filmmaking skills, and then creates opportunities for them to use those skills for a good cause. And while only 3% of cinematographers in Hollywood are women, Graham says that the 120 girls who come through Reel Grrls every year are starting to make their voices heard and their viewpoints seen. If you know someone who would benefit from becoming a Reel Grrl, you can check out the different programs available here.

And now, without further ado, the Feministing Five, with Malory Graham.

Chloe Angyal: How did you come to combine teaching and filmmaking, and what led you to found Reel Grrls?

Malory Graham: I founded Reel Grrls about nine years ago, because I was a filmmaker myself. I graduated from college with this idea that I wanted to use media to change the world, and I ended up getting my first couple of jobs in the industry, and I was really disappointed. I ended up working for Turner Broadcasting for a short stint, doing sports coverage, and then I did fashion show coverage for Nordstrom's, and I thought, "Wait a minute, this is not why I got into media to begin with, so I really need to totally change the game and do things on my own terms instead of thinking that I need someone to give me a job."

From that point on I started getting offers to go into classrooms and to talk to students about how to get into the film industry, and I realized that I loved being in the classroom. I loved teaching and I loved being able to speak to students. So that really was my shift from working in the industry to teaching. I started out, in the nineties, teaching mixed gender groups, and I was really shocked that the boys totally took over running all the equipment and doing all the filming, and the girls ended up being the pretty faces in front of the camera. And even with myself as a role model, a filmmaker, it was so classic walking into classrooms and having that happen, and having that be the case in all the schools I went to. The media programs were run by boys, and the girls were tentative about technology, and really kind of fearful to touch anything in case they might break it. That was my experience of realizing that the media industry kind of had the same stigma for girls that getting into math and science did, and I thought, "Wow, this has to change." And that was when I had a bunch of girls come up to me, and asked them what was going on, why they were so scared. And they said, "Create a program for us that's all girls." And I thought that was an interesting idea.

So that was the founding of Reel Grrls, in 2001. It was a group of 20 girls who all came together for the course of a school year, and it was such a profound experience, because the girls just thrived when it was all girls. I brought in all my filmmaker friends who are women, to mentor. The Reel Grrl model is partnering girls with adult women filmmaker mentors. The process is as much about collaboration and community as it is about learning the technology, so a lot of it is the relationships that girls build with their mentors. And then also figuring out how to come up with topics that are really empowering, how to take the lens and point it at yourself and tell a personal story, that's usually the first project, making a film about themselves. Then they point the lens outward and make a film about an issue that's important to them. So we've been going nine years straight, and every year we have about 120 girls come through the program, and some of them just drop in for a three-day media bootcamp or a workshop in animation, but some of them stick with the full year program, because they get the filmmaking bug. And because the program is now nine years old, it's really exciting to see a bunch of girls who have gone on to film school, who are graduating and coming back to become instructors, or who are making their own films. So we're starting to see a shift, we're starting to see our girls get out in the world and into the industry, which is really exciting.

CA: Who is your favorite fictional heroine, and who are your heroines in real life?

MG: My favorite fictional heroine is Pippi Longstocking. I was Pippi when I was eight years old. I dressed up and put wire in my pigtails, and totally did the Pippi Longstocking thing because out of all the options that were given to me as a young girl, all the fairy stuff and the Barbie stuff, Pippi was the one person who was rebellious and adventurous, she was a little pirate, and she was a little scrappy too. I identified with her a lot more than with any of the fairy princesses in little girl heroine world.

I look up to a lot of women who are in the film industry. Of course, I'm thrilled that Kathryn Bigelow just got the Academy Award, so she certainly goes down in history as a film heroine for having done that. But I think that the woman who really speaks to me is [choreographer] Martha Graham. I am really intrigued by women who are not necessarily using the medium of politics for her empowerment. She was such a visionary in terms of dance and movement, and to see a woman who was so connected to the body, and who has left us these lasting quotes about finding meaning in your life, she was definitely a heroine for me.

CA: What recent news story made you want to scream?

MG: Just yesterday, I read a New York Times article that I just wanted to scream at. It wasn't a feminist issue, but it was a front page article about pitting climate scientists against meteorologists, saying that 50% of meteorologists don't believe that climate change is real, and they're the ones on television talking to Middle America. And they have absolutely no education or credentials to be making that claim. And it really pissed me off that the New York Times was basically pitting these two groups against each other, the meteorologists against these elitist climatologists, without really looking at the major issue of climate change.

CA: What, in your opinion, is the greatest challenge facing feminism today?

MG: It's been interesting watching the girls that we get enrolling in Reel Grrls. I saw girls come in nine years ago who were really eager to talk about media literacy, and how women were portrayed in the media, and body image, and over the course of nine years, that has really changed. The girls now are so jaded and so, "Oh, that's such an issue of yesterday, that's a 1970s feminist issue, and we're so beyond that." So I would say that the biggest issue facing feminism today is complacency. I think a lot of young women feel a false sense of equality that really isn't there. I'm always shocked when I'm talking to a group of 13- or 14-year-old girls here at Reel Grrls and I tell them that we live in a country that hasn't ratified an Equal Rights Amendment, and they're like, "Oh, that's interesting." I'm shocked at the complacency that I see in young women. In some ways it's fantastic that they don't feel inequity, but I'm also a little bit like, oh, girls, wait until you enter the work world, or open your eyes to salary inequity.

CA: You're going to a desert island, and you're allowed to take one food, one drink and one feminist. What do you take?

MG: A bottle of homemade limoncello, a chocolate tart and my husband.

Trigger warning.

A young burn patient named Zahara sits with gauze over her face to keep the flies off. Zahara never admitted to setting herself on fire.

The Whitney Biennial has an unprecedented gender balance this year, an exciting new development. It comes as no surprise, then, that subject matter like this is part of this year's show. American photojournalist Stephanie Sinclair has a devastating documentary photography series titled "Self-Immolation in Afghanistan: A Cry for Help." Since 2005, over 700 women have set themselves on fire in Afghanistan. According to Planet, most incidents were caused by repeated abuse, fear of their husbands and petty household disputes. Echoing intersectionality, Sinclair explains:

You know, it was one thing to show the horrific response these girls have to their lives, but I felt in order to deal with that responsibly, I needed to look at the reasons why this was happening. What was so bad that would cause a woman to set herself on fire?

One common denominator I noticed is that many of these girls were married at a very, very young age, almost prepubescent. The more I work on the issue of child marriage, the more I realize it's really related to most of the country's gender issues, from maternal mortality to trafficking to self-immolation. This project actually spurred a lifetime project on the issue of child marriage.

Thanks to a reader for the heads up.

Christine Smith is a San Francisco Bay Area cartoonist, freelance illustrator, and activist. Her webcomics Eve's Apple and The Princess tell the stories of a trans woman and a young trans girl. I think the comics are funny and human while also engaging with some very real issues facing trans folks.

I interviewed Christine Smith about writing comics about trans characters, her art style, and place in the world of webcomics.

Jos Truitt: What inspired you to tell the stories of a trans woman and now a young trans girl in web comics form?

Christine Smith: At the risk of sounding glib, 'These are the stories of my people'.

Okay, that may be overstating the case, but so often we in the transgender/transsexual communities have lives that are invisible to the public eye. When we are visible we're usually fetishized, and when we're NOT fetishized..... we're idealized in ways that obscure the tensions in our gender identities. Movies, for instance, will often cast a cisgender woman in a transgender role in order to normalize the character. The sad flip side of THAT coin is that the assumption that women with bodies like ours, which are often broad in the shoulders, taller than average, narrower in the hip, and with deeper voices are presumed to be abnormal and unsavory. I had seen a few webcomics about transfolk on the web, and although they're wonderful in their own rights, the characters all hew to the model of being traditionally beautiful/handsome in the mode of the gender they present in. As is true with cisgender women, some few will be deemed beauty queens, but the rest of us never find our own beauty celebrated in the media. All of this made we want to create Eve, a beautiful woman, one who is fat, and, who is taller than anyone else in the room. That I share these qualities probably isn't a coincidence.

Over a year after I started Eve's Apple, I became aware of the growing trans youth movement. The psychological profession has theorized that a great majority of transpeople suffer from post traumatic stress disorder..... even those who came from non-abusive and otherwise supportive backgrounds. The cause of that, the thought goes, is that forcing a child to conform to a gender identity that is not native to their souls is a traumatic upbringing in and of itself. Can you imagine telling a child as young as five that they had to suppress and lie about who they knew themseves to be at the core of their being? This is what society does to trans children, this is what happened to me, and it's a tragedy. The irony in all this, of course, is that the people who love us most do this to us...... for absolutely the most compassionate and loving reasons in the world. They know that the world is severe to those who are different, they have a glimpse of the torment that would face their child if they continued to express themselves in what would be seen as a cross-gender manner, and they want to spare thier child that pain. They want to protect their child. In other word, often our parents and adult role models do absolutely the worst thing they can to us, for absolutely the best reasons in the world. So when I heard of the story of little Josie Romero, a transgirl, now eight years old, who is being raised by understanding parents, and when I learned of Kim Pearson and Trans Youth Family Allies, which offer support to families and education to school, it struck me as a thing of amazing beauty. I wept from the beauty, just hearing that some families are beginning to learn, and have the resources, to support their transgender children. So this is what inspired Sarah in my head. I'd meant her to be a minor character in Eve's Apple. but it became rapidly apparent to me that she had more to say than could be said in Eve's, and she needed her own strip. The amazing reaction I've gotten from some very wonderful and gracious people, shows me that there is growing interest in these children, and how to raise them with integrity and dignity.

JT: Can you tell me a little bit about the evolution of your art style?

CS: It took me a long time to learn to draw my characters simply! As a kid, I was greatly inspired by the old Looney Tunes character designs, and I feel my real strength is in character design. Over the years I tried MANY times to start a strip.... the trouble is that I had over designed the characters so much that I couldn't easily render the characters again and again, in different sizes and from different angles. If you compare the best animation.... the Looney Tunes, Classic Disney..... to the best comic strips.... Krazy Kat, Peanuts, Calvin & Hobbes.... you'll find that those native to the newspaper page are drawn with greater simplicity, because too many lines will clutter the look. So I started off with horribly overdrawn characters that looked cluttered in the space of small panels.

Over time, I came to look to the house styles of Archie Comics (Archie, Jughead, Betty & Veronica) and Harvey Comics (Caspar the Friendly Ghost, Wendy The Good Little Witch, Richie Rich) as really successful examples of characters designed to look distinctly individual while at the same time being drawn very simply. Let's face it... the difference between Archie and Jughead are just a few bare lines..... but they're used to great effect! It's about doing the most with the least..... and in The Princess I've really taken that to heart and I feel my art has in some way evolved by tossing out whatever's not needed..

JT: In both Eve's Apple and The Princess we find out transphobic characters are actually crushing on our transgender heroes. Do you think uncomfortable attraction is the root of a lot of transphobia?

CS: Oh, yes. I've been off and on involved with the trans murder issue over the years. One of the things that strike me, again and again, is that you find that the murderer had sex with the victim before murdering them. Alas, this has led to the 'trans panic defense' where people have, often successfully, evaded justice by claiming the shock of discovering that the victim was trans was so great as to make them lose control of themselves. You see that over and over again. Certainly, you saw it in the Gwen Araujo case. To go back a bit, look at the Chanel Pickett in Watertown, Massachusetts. WIlliam Palmer, the killer, picked Chanel up in a bar that was known as a cruising ground where cisgender men could meet transwomen. Other transwomen there attest that he had previously has sexual relationships with them, and eyewitness accounts reveal him telling Ms. Pickett, "You're the best-looking pre-op transsexual I've ever seen." He then took her moments and, in a few hours, had strangled her to death.

I think there's a fear of "If I'm attracted to a woman who has or had a penis, what does that make me? Does it make me gay if I'm a straight male identified? If I'm a lesbian identified, does it make me straight?" This has a huge impact on creating a culture of transphobia. It affects transmen in exactly the same manner.

Bisexuals and transgender folk have at various times described themselves as being allied communities. I wonder if part of the reason that bisexuals have historically seemed more comfortable with us than monosexuals is because in being attracted to us, their understanding of themselves is not challenged.

JT: Your stories are funny but they also deal with some pretty serious topics. How do you balance the humor and accessibility of your strips with the trans issues you cover?

CS: Honestly, nobody's more surprised than me that these stories are accessible!

I'm guessing that it helps for me to have a sense of humor about the troubles I've have as a transwoman. Also, When I'm making a point, I try to make it in a character-driven way and avoid the soapbox. I could stand on a soapbox and rant all day... but that's for the public square, not for the comics page! When I make a strip, I try to tell the stories of the people in it first and foremost. I try not to whip up a situation in order to showcase an issue. I try to drop these characters who have such-and-such a point of view together in such-and-such a situation, and let them work it out between them. Or fail to.

JT: The mainstream comics industry is dominated by male creators and characters and has a sad history of misogyny. The internet has proved to be a place where female comics artists and female-centric stories can gain recognition and a following. How has it been for you to tell stories about trans folks in the world of webcomics?

CS: It's amazing. I'm probably jinxing myself, but I started Eve's in '08, and I haven't had hate mail or even one hateful comment Not one. Everyone I've gotten feedback from has been amazingly positive, and I've gotten a few messages from people who thank me for what I'm doing and share how it's helped them with their own difficulties, particularly with The Princess. I've had mothers thank me for the strip, for providing a place where their children's gender experiences are normalized. What more can someone ask for in life than to be able to do that for someone? It's an amazing privlege, and quite humbling and happy making when I hear from parents about the meaning of the strip for their families. I draw The Princess out of compassion for the child who I was back then, and I draw it to send a little love out to the little transgender Princesses and Princes growing up today.

by Andrea Simon

GWN mentor Vani Kannan (left) and her mentee Cherish Smith.
Photo credit: Meghan Hickey

It began with a text message. While in school, 15-year-old Girls Write Now mentee, Cherish Smith, wrote to her mentor, Vani Kannan, "I hate Mondays." The response: "Me 2." This was, as the famous movie line goes, "the beginning of a beautiful friendship."

In its first major get-together of the season, the New York City nonprofit organization, Girls Write Now (GWN), which matches professional writers with underserved high-school girls, holds an orientation for all its mentors and mentees, this year numbering 55 pairs. At last year's orientation, Cherish, then a sophomore from Far Rockaway, Queens, and Vani Kannan, an associate managing editor of psychotherapy books at W. W. Norton & Co, who lives in Park Slope, Brooklyn, were placed in the same subgroup. In an exercise dubbed, "speed dating," a mentee sat with a mentor for five minutes, shared an intense "get-to-know" session, sprang up, and proceeded to the next candidate. At the end, participants wrote down their secret choices. "We got along right off the bat," Vani said, "and we each requested the other."

Vani and Cherish decided to meet weekly on Sundays, forestalling the dreaded Mondays, at Barnes & Noble in Brooklyn. During one of their early meetings, Cherish mentioned that she was taking guitar lessons in school. Vani also played the guitar and the two planned a jam session. Remembering that text message, "I hate Mondays," they had their first line. Before long, they added, "I hate Tuesdays, because Tuesdays follow Mondays." Wednesdays also turned out to be no good; and Thursdays, well, they were the absolute worst days for Cherish because it was when an annoying boy Anthony would try to kiss her in gym, a behavior she of course loved to hate. Hatred culminated in Friday when everything was "due." Adding melody to these lyrics flowed just as naturally and before long, "The Weekday Blues" was born.

GWN required participants to select a pairs writing piece to read during "Girls Write Now Day" on March 8, 2009 at The New School. The reading could be written for the occasion, it could evolve from the one-on-one writing exercises, or it could develop from a GWN workshop on memoir, poetry, fiction, or playwriting. Originally, Vani and Cherish thought of their song as a lark; then they changed their minds and took the risk. "I was nervous at first; I don't like to get on stage," Cherish said, "And it was early in our relationship; I hardly knew my mentor."

They practiced a lot. They visited music stores and found a kazoo, the perfect accompaniment to solidify the song's humor. And best of all, they solidified their own relationship. "We had a lot of laughs," Cherish said. "Vani is not only my mentor but she's now my friend."

The GWN event was a celebration of the Second International Support Women Artists Now Day, popularly know by its acronym SWAN Day, the purpose of which is to inspire communities around the world to recognize and support women artists. If ever there was an occasion for GWN's talented ducklings to turn into SWANS, this was their time of writerly awakening.

During the day, the pairs recited poems and stories. Vani and Cherish walked onstage with their guitars; there was a sudden hush. The composers sat on chairs, positioned their instruments, and introduced their song, "The Weekday Blues," bewailing, "I hate Mondays, Mondays are no fun." The audience chuckled. But when the pair got to Friday and sang, "I want to scream "I'M THROUGH!" and Cherish bleated her kazoo while Vani invited the audience to sing-along, it was clear that these songwriters had a hit on their hands.

More on GWN and Andrea's bio after the jump.

SWAN Day Celebrates "Herstory." This year Vani and Cherish continue to challenge their creative spirits. "What is great about GWN is that by introducing the girls to different genres," Vani explained, "it helped Cherish get out of her comfort zone, which was fiction." For their upcoming pairs reading, they chose two monologues based on prompts they did during freewriting exercises. Cherish, who loves acting and auditions for commercials, wrote a piece flowing from the line, "I could be an actress if ..." Vani's began, "I could be a musician if ..." Vani said, "One of the reasons we chose these two lines was to help us with self-doubt, to overcome the terror of succeeding or failing in the arts."

But the musical muse has been calling them again. They could just change their minds and perform another song. There's one in the works about Cherish's cute Spanish teacher and Vani's cute French teacher when she was in high school.

SWAN Day this year will be celebrated on March 27th. Since 2010 is the 75th Anniversary of the federal Works Progress Administration (WPA), special recognition will be paid to those female artists who helped stimulate the economy during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Girls Write Now has scheduled one of its spring reading series (CHAPTERS) as a Swan Day event, for Friday, March 26th. It will be held at The Center for Fiction, founded in 1820 as the Mercantile Library. The only organization in the country devoted solely to the art of fiction, The Center provides an intimate atmosphere in an historic building. Special guest will be Nami Mun, author of her award-winning first novel, Miles from Nowhere, the heartbreaking story of a teenage runaway. And, of course, the stars will be the mentee/mentor pairs, who like Vani and Cherish, will surely combine their talents in unique and moving ways.

Also in conjunction with Swan Day, on Saturday, March 27, Eileen Fisher will sponsor a sale at its nine New York area stores. Ten percent of all proceeds will benefit Girls Write Now. By appointing GWN as its philanthropic partner, the Eileen Fisher Foundation helps fulfill its mission of empowering women and girls, true to the spirit of its founder. Fisher started her business 25 years ago when she was an interior and graphic designer who "couldn't sew and only had $350 in the bank."

In another honor, Girls Write Now was nationally recognized as one of 15 youth arts and humanities programs to receive the prestigious 2009 Coming Up Taller Award. Founder and Executive Director Maya Nussbaum, along with third-year mentee, Tina Gao, traveled to Washington, D.C. in November, and accepted the award from First Lady, Michelle Obama.

Girls Write Now is the first and only East Coast organization to combine mentoring and writing training within the context of all-girl programming, which also includes anthology publications and college preparation assistance. Since 1998, Girls Write Now has helped nearly 3,000 deserving teenage girls from New York City's public high schools. A hundred percent of its seniors go on to prestigious colleges and many have received a Scholastic Art & Writing Award.

Nussbaum helped create GWN in order to debunk the myth of the isolated writer. "I wanted to build an organization based on the guiding principle that writing is actually a communal enterprise," she said. "It's so much easier to take creative risks like the ones Vani and Cherish boldly have when we feel the safety and pleasure of writing together, with people we trust."

Cherish summed up their relationship, "I have not only learned from Vani, but I think she has learned from me." Though she aspires to be a pediatric psychiatrist, Cherish has begun to have doubts. "My mother thinks I'll be a writer," she said, "a novelist." It's no wonder since Cherish and her twin sister Joy, also a GWN mentee, have already co-written a novel called Alexei in Hell about a teenage girl who lives in a city called Hellix. The plot is chock-full of family drama and romance. Luckily for Cherish, she doesn't have to go far for help; Vani is busy editing the manuscript. Wherever this unique writing pair decides to go, they have built the foundation that only words can describe.

Andrea Simon is a writer and photographer who lives in New York City. She has worked as an editor and writer for many years, and was the co-owner of an editorial/production company that specialized in health-related educational materials. More recently, she has devoted her efforts to fiction and literary nonfiction, including her published memoir/history, Bashert: A Granddaughter's Holocaust Quest. Several of Andrea's stories and essays have also been published; and she has been the recipient of prestigious literary honors, including first place in the Ernest Hemingway First Novel Contest and Authors in the Park Short Story Writing Contest. Andrea's photography has been featured at numerous venues. She is a proud Girls Write Now mentor. Her website is: www.andreasimon.net

To learn more about SWAN Day, run by WomenArts, go here.

via Mother Jones, this is a cute concept for a music video: the mostly-male Swedish band Hold Your Horses re-enact major works of art.

70 Million by Hold Your Horses ! from L'Ogre on Vimeo.

Seeing these men adopting the roles of both men and women in classical paintings really serves to highlight the Guerrilla Girls' points about how women frequently appear in art: naked. Another lesson in why drag can be so powerful. It really makes you see gender norms in a new way.

Oh, and fun music for a Friday afternoon!