feminist blogosphere

[Kathleen Lowrey]

I wonder how many other anthropologists read the feminist blogosphere -- I'm thinking of North America, though I'd be thrilled to find out what other sites I should be checking out around the world. Anyway, the sites I read regularly are Pandagon, Feministe, Jezebel, I Blame the Patriarchy, Historiann, Bitch PhD. What I love about them is the fact that although most of them are maintained by people younger than I am, they are sort of "old-fashioned" feminists in an bracing way. At least during the period and at the place where I went to grad school, feminism was kind of considered a worthy intellectual ancestor but a bit embarrassingly simple-minded, sort of like vulgar Marxism. I wonder both where this younger generation of feminists came from, and the more I read them, whether they've really got hold of an important thread that anthropology dropped. What do you feminist anthropologists think?

[deniz batum]

Thanks for mentioning these, I will definitely check them out. And I'm still interested in doing the reading project / idea with you :)

[deniz batum]

And by the way I have to say that, even in gender studies institutes, you find many young women in academia who are afraid to blatantly call themselves 'feminist'. (I am located in Holland). Ok maybe not 'afraid' but they just won't identify as such, even when you'd consider their views/perspectives feminist.

[Kathleen Lowrey]

Hey Deniz,

well, some of them are more serious than others so I hope you won't be disappointed! Jezebel for example is 50% celebrity gossip. It's a very pop-politics mix.

I know what you mean about that attitude toward self-identifying as "feminist"; in academia, I think it's less about politics than a fear of seeming old-fashioned, like calling oneself a "structural-functionalist", or something. Anyway, I've found the lively existence of feminism on the internet a really refreshing surprise.

[Megan Springate]

I read Historiann, IBTP, Tenured Radical, Feminist Law Professors regularly, and skim Feministing, Pandagon, and Tiger Beatdown, as well as a few others. I like the multi-disciplinary voices and the discussions. I do wonder at what seems to me a lack of anthropology voices in the blogosphere in general, particularly compared with other disciplines (science, history).

[Kim Fleming]

Even though I'm an ardent feminist, I often hesitate to call myself one-- especially in academic settings- not out of some variety of fear, but simply because I find that feminist anthropology, like many other specific perspectives, fall prey to far too much hyperbole (thus reducing the true nature and impact of situations that need not such aggrandizement) and lead to a real reductionism is reasoning and answers.

I suppose that might be what you mean by embarrassingly simple minded. But it's not really what I mean. I don't think it's simple minded, simply that it is prone to reductionism. But, I feel pretty strongly that a lot of schools of thought are prone to reductionism....and actually function best when combined with others.

Feminism is still a necessity, feminism still asks questions that need to be asked and addresses issues that need addressing. But sometimes, I just want to scream when I read an academic piece where the author is trying to convince me that the ENTIRE PROBLEM with the western bio-medical complex, especially as it is concerned with reproductive medicine, is that it is sees sperm as virile and ovum as receptive. (obviously, that's a specific example, and not simply a hypothetical.)

Of the sites you mentioned the only one I read absolutely regularly is Feminste. But I tend to check on the others you mention with some sort of regularity too...One I read that you didn't mention is Curvature...but can't really think of any others I read that you haven't mentioned. I tend to read a lot of feminist mommy-blogs (I'm not a mom, though I do intend to be someday. And I'm interested in reproductive medical anthropology and the anthropology of motherhood) If that's your cup of tea you might check out: bluemilk, motherworld, phdinparenting and raisingmyboychick.

[Kathleen Lowrey]

Tiger Beatdown sounds worth a look-see on the basis of the great name alone! :)

It's true about the relative absence of anthropologist bloggers -- it could just be that there are numerically fewer of us vs. sociology, history, literature, philosophy folks. But it does make certain kinds of discussions on-line frustrating, just because it seems to be so much more likely that anthropologists have read literature in soc, history, lit crit, phil, than scholars in those fields have read anthropology. Even Levi-Straussian structuralism I think is mostly read "in translation", in the sense of having been picked up in other fields of study not via the original but via, say, a lit crit scholar introducing the ideas and showing how they apply to lit crit.

[Kathleen Lowrey]

Important update from the field! Tiger Beatdown is hilarious! thanks Megan :)

Megan Springate said:

I read Historiann, IBTP, Tenured Radical, Feminist Law Professors regularly, and skim Feministing, Pandagon, and Tiger Beatdown, as well as a few others. I like the multi-disciplinary voices and the discussions. I do wonder at what seems to me a lack of anthropology voices in the blogosphere in general, particularly compared with other disciplines (science, history).