feminist blogs

As Samhita steps into the role of Executive Editor, the rest of the Editorial crew wanted to take a moment to thank and reflect on the work of Jessica, our outgoing Executive Editor. While Jessica isn't going anywhere (thankfully!) and will remain with us as an Editor, it felt important to us to recognize her incredible leadership over these last six years.

Jessica has been the vision behind this blog turned community. She's poured her blood, sweat, tears and time into writing content, recruiting bloggers, and introducing a whole new brand of feminism to our generation. Her personal style of writing, her wit, hilarity, and ferocity has been (and continues to be) an incredibly strong force on Feministing, and her brilliance and innovation has contributed largely to what it is today. Her steadfast commitment and dedication to her readers and fellow editors for all these years has been invaluable, and all of us here at Feministing couldn't be more grateful. She's been a huge driving force behind the success of Feministing and without her, this community would not exist.

Unlike so many who end up under the bright, exclusive media spotlight, Jessica has consistently tried to widen the circle--pointing producers towards other feminist writers and activists, mentoring younger women about blogging and book proposals, and securing media training for the entire editorial team of Feministing. This intention and effort is part of her larger conviction that, though she is identified as the face of young feminism so often by external forces, she sees the next wave as one of true collaborators. Her loyalty, both to her friends and her values, is stunning.

So thanks Jess, for your leadership, your laughter and your incredible vision. We're lucky to have you and excited to see what direction your contributions to Feministing go next.

The Lezzy's is a yearly award competition hosted by The Lesbian Lifestyle to honor the best blogs written by or contributed to by lesbians.

Thanks to everyone who voted and congrats to the other winners!

So as you may already know, Feministing decided last year to start an official college tour, and oh, did we have fun in the fall. Not only were we humbled to find we had so many awesome readers in Canada and Boston, but were also thrilled to be able to collaborate with schools and highlight some of the amazing student panelists that joined us to engage in our discussion on the state of the feminist movement.

And now that the Spring is here, we're back for more. Samhita, Miriam and I will be in Iowa and Minnesota next week and we would love to have readers in the area come out and support. Here are details:

University of Iowa
Tuesday, March 9th
7:30 p.m.
@ 100 Phillips Hall

University of Minnesota
Wednesday, March 10th
6:00 p.m.
@ Coffman Memorial Union
300 Washington Avenue SE
Afterparty at the Kitty Kat Club with the White House Project
8:00 p.m.

We're in the process of booking tours in April and May, so contact our tour organizer if you're interested in having us come to your school!

It is that time of year again for SXSW! For those of you that have been reading the blog for a while know that Feministing is part of the SXSW community and has been since my first very exciting (some may say mind-blowing) experience there my first year and then again last year, and has helped me in thinking about the line between identity and the internet. This year they have kindly asked me to do a solo presentation as part of their diversity series on "Asians and the Internet." Since I don't do anything text-book I decided to switch it up calling my session, "Redefining Asians and the Internet: I am not your fetish."

"Chances are if you google "Asians on the Internet," you are not going to get a list of the unique and cutting edge ways that different Asian communities interact with online environments. The Asian community in all its diverse and diasporic formations has a long trajectory of interacting with online environments, both in how they interact and how they are interacted with.

Amongst the questions covered in this Future15 will be: How are Asians perceived with regard to the internet? How are they represented online? What are critical ways that Asian communities are interacting with online communities that either exemplifies their lived reality or exists in opposition to it? What would a redefinition of how we understand Asians and the Internet be? What can we expect in the next few years?"

Also, I am very excited to announce that Jessica will be at SXSW this year as well and is currently one of the featured speakers on the conference site. She is on a panel about commenting culture called, "From Trolls to Stars: The Commenter Ecosystem."

This panel will explore the fascinating and often bizarre world of commenter culture. From trolls on 4chan to Star Commenters on Gawker Media blogs, panelists will discuss: - The nuances of commenter/blog symbiosis (including the benefit/detriment to the business side of ad-supported blogs) - The nature of commenter hierarchies - The sociology of self-policing/group determination of community standards of behavior - The implications of the shift from handle-based identities to real-world identities (Facebook Connect)

You can get all our panel information from the links provided and stop by and say hi if you are at the conference.

(Most of) The Feministing Crew 2010

When Jessica first asked me to start blogging at Feministing in 2005, I posted one thing every Sunday, because I had a full time job. Back then, we felt that it was really important to have at least one post up per day and for me, I was thrilled if I got two comments. Oh my how times have changed. I didn't realize that after three years we would be writing eight posts a day and be one of the most important spaces for the changing face of feminism online and be part of a vibrant community of feminist blogs that work tirelessly to contest the boundaries of identity, activism and theory. And I certainly didn't ever think that after five years I would have the honor of being the face of Feministing.

Recognizing this huge network of bloggers, activists, thinkers and writers that have been integral in carving out the space for feminist voices online, I accepted the executive editor role with gratitude for the opportunity to potentially shape the direction of our community. It signals that we are learning from the past and pushing ourselves in our commitment to centralizing disenfranchised voices. My co-bloggers have given me a tremendous opportunity to not only boost my own profile, but the profile of the site and the profile of the issues that I am committed to, issues that I have consistently written about for 5 years.

Feministing is a collective, as can be seen by the diversity of names on the homepage. Behind the scenes, all members of Feministing contribute in profound and important ways, committing their lives to much more than putting up blog posts. Each editor has leadership over several key pieces of our work and collaborates on that work, carving time out of her personal life and often doing much more than is expected. If it were not for Vanessa we would not have such a vibrant local community of folks that get together for our parties, not to mention her consistency in blogging on hard-hitting issues, while constantly picking up little pieces of invisible work that make the site run. As many of you may know, Miriam is "the business" and has been integral to moving us forward with her strategic mindset, allowing us to implement policies that are the core of how we operate. Jessica has taken the helm on moving our technology forward (more to come on that later!) and it was her consistent hard work and high standards that made Feministing what it is today -- not to mention her humility in stepping back after all that hard work so other people can step up. Ann's impeccable eye to edits, advice on organizational structures and ability to make shit happen has been central in making Feministing so powerful. And Courtney's support, facilitation, relationship-building with the greater feminist community and ability to be compassionate in the most difficult of situations has helped boost our morale and commitment in new ways. Feministing has run on the backs of our other jobs, in the in-between spaces of lunch breaks and meetings. It has been a project run on passion and the tireless work of myself, Vanessa, Miriam, Courtney, Ann and Jessica. More importantly, we have all stayed friends or become friends through this process which has been the most cohesive element of the group.

And at our retreats and on editor conference calls we have talked about issues of privilege and how they effect our power dynamics internally, recognizing how external perceptions of us as individuals affect our group -- that is, after all, how oppression functions. Within our editorial collective, we have worked hard to make these moments of hidden privilege visible, sharing privilege when possible. But attempting to reflect that externally has been a completely different challenge. My acceptance of this role is a concrete way to push back against dominant ideas of leadership in feminism and a recognition that power and privilege impact who is considered an authority. In order to fight these imbalances we have to be strategic and definitive in how we see leadership and who we identify as leaders. And not just as a tokenizing gesture, but as an intentional decision to fight against prescribed ideas of leadership within feminism itself.

Externally, my commitment to you, our community, is to continue the quality and diversity of the content of this site. Marginalized issues in feminism are still marginalized, and the constant work of teasing out the tensions hidden in the erasures of a mythical monolithic "feminism" lies in the conversations and unique moments of activism that make Feministing what it is and what make the feminist blogosphere such an important place.

Internally, I am committed to sustainability. The hard work of activism, how we run our collective, and the impact Feministing has on feminists worldwide is both emotionally, psychologically and spiritually satisfying and, at the same time, a huge responsibility. So while I am committed to diversity and being the strongest feminist online resource we can possibly be, I do not think that is possible without a crew of folks that feel healthy, balanced and excited about the work. This reality is more so important with the addition of new members to our team who we are so so excited about (and would be the new faces in that picture up top!). I realize this can't be all the time. The work is hard, things will get us down, we can be (and often are) overwhelmed. But I want to push us to really try and institute a culture of sustainability -- the one thing I find lacking in so many activist-oriented intentions, so we can continue to be such an important part of feminism online.

“Our society is so intensely gendered in ways we don’t even notice.”

Wise words from Miriam Zoila Pérez who visited my Queer Identities: LGBT Literature and Film class earlier today. Miriam is one of the editors at Feministing and is also the founder and sole blogger at Radical Doula.

I invited Miriam to visit the class to talk about her trajectory in the reproductive justice movement as well as to share her personal story as a queer Latin@.

At one point, Miriam joked: “Ellen Degeneres was the only inkling I had of what it meant to be a lesbian and since I wasn’t attracted to her, I figured I couldn’t be a lesbian.”

During her college years at Swarthmore, Miriam started her activist work as a volunteer for the Feminist Majority.  In 2004, at the March for Women’s Lives in Washington, DC, she found herself attracted to the work of the National Latina Institute for Reproductive Health based on their strong intersectional analysis of women’s health from the perspective of women of color. During the course of the march, she felt connected to their Spanish/English signs that read “Salud, Dignidad, y Justicia” (Health, Dignity, and Justice) and became immediately hooked to their mission.  After college, she began working for the NLIRH.

When asked how reproductive health is a queer issue, Miriam explained how many LGBT individuals have a range of reproductive health needs from lesbian survivors of sexual assault seeking abortion to bisexual women seeking contraception to lesbians and transgender people seeking reproductive healthcare services. “Ultimately,” she said, “reproductive rights is about bodily autonomy, and that’s important to queer folks.”

After hearing Miriam talk about the intersection of queer identity and healthcare, students immediately made connections to their reading of Leslie Feinberg’s Stone Butch Blues, in which Jess, the protagonist, is denied services at a women’s clinic due to her male gender expression.

As part of the conversation, Miriam explained terms such as cisgender, and talked about how she came to identify as genderqueer: “In the beginning, I couldn’t quite identify fully as a butch because I thought you had to be a certain kind of tough and a certain kind of hard to be butch.  But I still felt this inclination towards a more butch or masculine expression, so identifying as genderqueer fit.”

At the end of her visit, Miriam recommended the Logo series Gender Rebels for students to continue their interest in exploring issues of gender.

One student noted: “The speaker was really fascinating.  I really like that she expanded our discussion of queer issues and reproductive justice.”

I agree.  I especially admire Miriam’s ability to bridge her work across movements: feminist, queer, and reproductive justice.  It’s this kind of bridging that makes activists like Miriam an amazing model not only for young people looking for ways in which to make an impact but also for all of us who seek new inspiration for making our world that much more healthy, dignified, and just.

If you are interested in having Miriam visit your campus or classroom, please contact her here.

Hello dear readers! We don't frequently write to you as a group, but this felt like something that should come from all of us. As you may know, the editors at Feministing have long struggled with how best to organize the editorial structure of the site and create a feminist organizational model that works for us. At Feministing's inception, Jessica held the title of Executive Editor. But as time went by our work became more shared, and Feministing began to run as a collective, with six diverse editors making decisions in collaboration. Despite our new structure and the value we place on collective leadership, the world (the media, especially) loves a traditional hierarchy. And we came to realize that no matter how we organized ourselves, only one or two of us were recognized as Feministing spokespeople.

So while we will continue to function as a collective - with all six of the editors having equal input into all decisions regarding the site -- we've also decided that we also want to be strategic about our work, how it gets represented, and by whom.

To this end we've decided to keep our collective model, but to also appoint a rotating Executive Editor to chosen by the other editors every year. All decisions will continue to be made by the group, but the Executive Editor will be the media spokesperson and external relations contact for the site -- basically, they will be the face of Feministing. We're hoping that this will not only throw a wrench in the way that the site is seen, written about, and discussed - but will also serve to raise the profile of the person chosen to be Executive Editor for the year, ensuring that everyone who has worked so hard for Feministing gets the recognition they deserve.

So onto the big news! This year, we're incredibly excited to announce that Samhita Mukhopadhyay will be Feministing's new Executive Editor. Samhita has been with Feministing for five years (her first post was written in this month of 2005, in fact) -- blogging, representing us at conferences, events and in the media, planning our big shindigs, and advising in all things tech and social media-y.

Samhita has been a writer and feminist activist for the last 10 years. She is the web manager at the Center for Media Justice, an Oakland-based organization that provides media strategy and action for justice-based grassroots organizing groups. She has written for Wiretap Magazine, The Nation and The American Prospect. In 2007 she was named a Champion of Sexual Literacy by the National Sexuality Resource Center. She has been featured in magazines, including Alternet and India Currents. Samhita has a Bachelors degree in Sociology and Women's Studies from SUNY Albany and a Masters in Women's Studies from San Francisco State focused on blogging, gender, social networking technology and activism and has lectured at colleges, universities and conferences on feminism, race, new media and identity. In short, she's no fucking joke and we couldn't be happier to have her as the face of the site.

We hope that between our collective structure, our new fabulous Executive Editor, and our commitment to bringing on new and diverse feminist voices (check out the bios of our new contributors and Community Editor in the sidebar), Feministing will continue to grow into an online community and model of feminist media we can all be proud of.

One of the activities we did as an ice breaker at our recent retreat was to talk about our very first concert on our own. Hilarity, as you might imagine, ensued. We thought we'd share some of the stories with you all...

Miriam - Alan Jackson and Deanna Carter, c. 1996, Raleigh, North Carolina
It's true, I grew up in the South! I went with a friend and her mom when I was in middle school. I can't say I was an Alan Jackson fan, but when Deanna Carter sang Strawberry Wine I was into it.

Ann - Cornershop and Gus Gus, c. 1997, Milwaukee, Wisconsin
I grew up in a small-ish town in Iowa where nationally known musical acts only play when their careers are long dead. Seeing live music meant driving several hours -- something my mom and dad were loathe to let me do. When I was a freshman in high school, I told my parents I was going to watch Hamlet (the longest movie I could think of) at a friend's house, and snuck off to Wisconsin to see the "Brimful of Asha" band (wow, um, yeah) and some random Icelandic act I had never heard of. I got in big trouble later.

Courtney-Smoking Groove Tour, 1998, Boulder, Colorado
As the Fugees were performing in a very small venue, a woman from the audience threw her bra up at the keyboard player. Lauryn Hill stopped singing and made everyone stop playing music, and then did a ridiculously amazing freestyle about how the girl needed to respect herself. I was stunned.

Lori-Musiq Soulchild/Mary J. Blige, c. 2002, Electric Factory, Philly, PA
At 16, my friend's recently acquired learner's permit enabled he and I to follow the neo-soul trail from S. Jersey to Philly Phil. Thoroughly wooed by the ridiculous r&b riffs, I'm pretty sure I cried tears of luv & joy at least twice between episodes of "Jusfriends" and "Soulstar". Afterwards, armed with the audacity only starstruck teenagers can conjure, my friend and I invented a story about winning a radio station contest to bust backstage and take a pic w the soulchild himself. To this day, I spell "musiq" with a Q.

Vanessa-Debbie Gibson Concert, c. 1989, New York
Sue me, I was 9. My cousin brought me and I was rocking the Debbie Gibson hat, leggings with a long shirt tied in a knot at the side -- the works. I begged my cousin to bring me to the front of the stage as hoards of girls my age and older were scrambling to get closer, my cousin lifted me up as Debbie reached down to greet her fans...and we touched hands. Electric Youth indeed.

Chloe: Avril Lavigne, February 2002, Sydney
I don't think I'll ever live this one down, music-wise. At the time, I was a huge Avril fan, convinced that, as the "anti-Britney," she was the greatest thing to happen to Girl Power since the Spice Girls. I went to the concert with my older sister and we jumped up and down like maniacs and screamed out the lyrics to all the songs. Do I still know them all? Stop asking questions.

Samhita-Ween, c. 1993, NYC
I was 15 and I was a nerd (as you can tell by the first band I went to see) and it was really exciting to be in NYC with just my friends at the age of 15!

Jos-The Polyphonic Spree, 2004, Boston
I needed a transition from the live music of my Christian fundamentalist upbringing, and this cult-y show certainly fit the bill. Two nights in a row.

And for vintage amusement:

Our awesome columnist Shark-Fu is celebrating her birthday today!

Check out her site and send her some birthday love in comments.

Our very own Professor Foxy was awarded a Young Women of Achievement Award by the Women's Information Network last week.

Women's Information Network is a local DC group for pro-choice democratic women.

She was recognized for her achievement in the area of non-profit service and advocacy.

Congrats Professor Foxy!