The Rise of Neoliberal Feminism
C. Rottenberg
In this paper, I argue that we are currently witnessing the emergence of neoliberal feminism in the USA, which is most clearly articulated in two highly publicized and widely read ‘feminist manifestos’: Sheryl Sandberg's Lean In (a New York Times best-seller) and Anne-Marie Slaughter's ‘Why Women Still Can't Have It All’ (the most widely read piece in the history of the Atlantic). Concentrating on the shifting discursive registers in Lean In, I propose that the book can give us insight into the ways in which the husk of liberalism is being mobilized to spawn a neoliberal feminism as well as a new feminist subject. This feminist subject accepts full responsibility for her own well-being and self-care, which is increasingly predicated on crafting a felicitous work–family balance based on a cost-benefit calculus. I further pose the question of why neoliberalism has spawned a feminist rather than a female subject. Why, in other words, is there any need for the production of a neoliberal feminism, which draws attention to a specific kind of inequality and engenders a particularly feminist subject? While this new form of feminism can certainly be understood as yet another domain neoliberalism has colonized by producing its own variant, I suggest that it simultaneously serves a particular cultural purpose: it hollows out the potential of mainstream liberal feminism to underscore the constitutive contradictions of liberal democracy, and in this way further entrenches neoliberal rationality and an imperialist logic. Indeed, neoliberal feminism may be the latest discursive modality to (re)produce the USA as the bastion of progressive liberal democracy. Rather than deflecting internal criticism by shining the spotlight of oppressive practices onto other countries while overtly showcasing its enlightened superiority, this discursive formation actually generates its own internal critique of the USA. Yet, it simultaneously inscribes and circumscribes the permissible parameters of that very same critique.
Feminism Is for Everybody : Passionate Politics
B. Hooks
Whose Science? Whose Knowledge?: Thinking from Women's Lives
S. Harding
2975 sitasi
en
Political Science, Sociology
Teaching Note: Reading the Romance; Women, Patriarchy, and Popular Literature
Richard Ohmann
The phenomenal success of romances has naturally stirred the contempt of high culture critics, and more recently the concern of feminists, who have generally understood these narratives as promoting a kind of false consciousness, coating patriarchal values with a frosting of fantasy. The "Smithton women" appropriated romances as a pleasure strictly theirs, an antidote to the endless claims made on them by husbands and children, and a defense of "female" values like emotional sharing and (more or less) egalitarian marriage. [...]for many, regular reading of these books fed a kind of proto-feminism that made for real gains in their lives, within the limits patriarchy sets for women.
Reseña de: Valdés, Alicia (coord.), Marta Echaves, Juan Evaristo Valls Boix y Sara Torres. La potencia afectiva. Deseo, cuerpo y emociones. Madrid: Continta Me Tienes, 2025. 252 pp. ISBN: 978-84-19323-31-6
Jose Manuel Llopis Piquero
Reseña de: Valdés, Alicia (coord.), Marta Echaves, Juan Evaristo Valls Boix y Sara Torres. La potencia afectiva. Deseo, cuerpo y emociones. Madrid: Continta Me Tienes, 2025. 252 pp. ISBN: 978-84-19323-31-6.
The family. Marriage. Woman, Women. Feminism
Women of Color and the Reproductive Rights Movement
J. Nelson
ContentsAcknowledgments Introduction: From Abortion to Reproductive Rights 1 "Let's hear it from the real experts": Feminism and the Early Abortion Rights Movement 2 "An act of valor for a woman need not take place inside of her": Black Women, Feminism, and Reproductive Rights 3 "An instrument of genocide": The Black Nationalist Campaign against Birth Control 4 "Abortions under community control": Feminism, Nationalism, and the Politics of Reproduction among New York City's Young Lords 5 Race, Class, and Sexuality: Reproductive Rights and the Campaign for an Inclusive Feminism Conclusion Notes Index About the Author
107 sitasi
en
Political Science
Women's inheritance rights reforms and impact on women's empowerment: evidence from India
Minali Grover, Ajay Sharma
This paper explores the influence of inheritance rights on women' empowerment in India. We employ the quasi-natural experiment framework wherein; five states amended the Hindu Succession Act (HSA) from 1976 to 1994 before it was federally amended in 2005. Further, we apply difference-in-difference (DID) strategy and consider triangulation approach to identify women empowerment indicators namely: access to resources, agency, and outcomes to measure varying dimensions of empowerment. Using the India Human Development Survey (IHDS-I), our results indicate a positive impact on marriage choice, intimate partner violence, physical, and civil autonomy. However, negative impact on household autonomy and no significant on economic participation for women exposed to state amendments. Further, exploring the heterogeneities in terms of socio-economic status, location, level of patriarchy in a state, gender of the head of the household. Overall, the study highlights that the impact of inheritance law is not unfirm across different groups.
From Platform Migration to Cultural Integration: the Ingress and Diffusion of #wlw from TikTok to RedNote in Queer Women Communities
Ziqi Pan, Runhua Zhang, Jiehui Luo
et al.
Hashtags serve as identity markers and connection tools in online queer communities. Recently, the Western-origin #wlw (women-loving-women) hashtag has risen in the Chinese lesbian community on RedNote, coinciding with user migration triggered by the temporary US TikTok ban. This event provides a unique lens to study cross-cultural hashtag ingress and diffusion through the populations' responsive behaviors in cyber-migration. In this paper, we conducted a two-phase content analysis of 418 #wlw posts from January and April, examining different usage patterns during the hashtag's ingress and diffusion. Results indicate that the successful introduction of #wlw was facilitated by TikTok immigrants' bold importation, both populations' mutual interpretation, and RedNote natives' discussions. In current manifestation of diffusion, #wlw becomes a RedNote-recognized queer hashtag for sharing queer life, and semantically expands to support feminism discourse. Our findings provide empirical insights for enhancing the marginalized communities' cross-cultural communication.
Designing Robots to Help Women
Martin Cooney, Lena Klasén, Fernando Alonso-Fernandez
Robots are being designed to help people in an increasing variety of settings--but seemingly little attention has been given so far to the specific needs of women, who represent roughly half of the world's population but are highly underrepresented in robotics. Here we used a speculative prototyping approach to explore this expansive design space: First, we identified some potential challenges of interest, including crimes and illnesses that disproportionately affect women, as well as potential opportunities for designers, which were visualized in five sketches. Then, one of the sketched scenarios was further explored by developing a prototype, of a robotic helper drone equipped with computer vision to detect hidden cameras that could be used to spy on women. While object detection introduced some errors, hidden cameras were identified with a reasonable accuracy of 80% (Intersection over Union (IoU) score: 0.40). Our aim is that the identified challenges and opportunities could help spark discussion and inspire designers, toward realizing a safer, more inclusive future through responsible use of technology.
Women for Quantum -- Manifesto of Values
Almut Beige, Ana Predojević, Anja Metelmann
et al.
Data show that the presence of women in quantum science is affected by a number of detriments and their percentage decreases even further for higher positions. Beyond data, from our shared personal experiences as female tenured quantum physics professors, we believe that the current model of scientific leadership, funding, and authority fails to represent many of us. It is time for a real change that calls for a different kind of force and for the participation of everyone. Women for quantum calls for a joint effort and aims with this initiative to contribute to such a transformation.
en
physics.soc-ph, quant-ph
Women's Participation in Computing: Evolving Research Methods
Thomas J. Misa
A 2022 keynote for the ACM History Committee on "Why SIG History Matters: New Data on Gender Bias in ACM's Founding SIGs 1970-2000" presented new data describing women's participation as research-article authors in 13 early ACM Special Interest Groups, finding significant growth in women's participation across 1970-2000 and, additionally, remarkable differences in women's participation between the SIGs. That presentation built on several earlier publications that developed a research method for assessing the number of women computer scientists that [a] are chronologically prior to the availability of the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) data on women in the IT workforce; and [b] permit focused investigation of varied sub-fields within computing. This present report expands on these earlier articles, and their evolving research method, connecting them to the ACM SIG Heritage presentation. It also outlines some of the choices and considerations made in developing and refining "mixed methods" research (using both quantitative and qualitative approaches) as well as extensions of the research being currently explored.
Adapting Deep Variational Bayes Filter for Enhanced Confidence Estimation in Finite Element Method Integrated Networks (FEMIN)
Simon Thel, Lars Greve, Maximilian Karl
et al.
The Finite Element Method (FEM) is a widely used technique for simulating crash scenarios with high accuracy and reliability. To reduce the significant computational costs associated with FEM, the Finite Element Method Integrated Networks (FEMIN) framework integrates neural networks (NNs) with FEM solvers. However, this integration can introduce errors and deviations from full-FEM simulations, highlighting the need for an additional metric to assess prediction confidence, especially when no ground truth data is available. In this study, we adapt the Deep Variational Bayes Filter (DVBF) to the FEMIN framework, incorporating a probabilistic approach to provide qualitative insights into prediction confidence during FEMIN simulations. The adaptation involves using the learned transition model for a predictive decoding step, generating a preliminary force prediction. This predictive force is used alongside the displacement and the velocity data from the FEM solver as input for the encoder model. The decoder reconstructs the likelihood distribution based on the posterior. The mean force of this distribution is applied to the FEM solver, while the predicted standard deviation can be used for uncertainty estimation. Our findings demonstrate that the DVBF outperforms deterministic NN architectures in terms of accuracy. Furthermore, the standard deviation derived from the decoder serves as a valuable qualitative metric for assessing the confidence in FEMIN simulations. This approach enhances the robustness of FEMIN by providing a measure of reliability alongside the simulation results.
Coğrafyaya Erkeklik Kavramının Yerleşmesi ve Hegemonik Erkekliğe Yaklaşımlar
Miyase Yalçın
This study explains the establishment of the concept of masculinity in the
discipline of geography and how hegemonic masculinity is formed in places
and places. Since masculinity is an interdisciplinary subject, the works of
sociologists and feminist social and cultural geographers were used. It
consists of sections on geography and hegemonic masculinity, organizing
hegemonic masculinity, radical feminism and masculinity, place, patriarchy
and heteronormativity, Spaces have become central to the production of
gendered and sexualized bodies. The closet in spaces has become a place
where gender and sexuality performances take place. In closet spaces that are
connected to each other, masculinity is constructed relationally, thus
patriarchy and heteronormativity are reproduced. This situation caused the
oppression of homosexual men and women in the closet and the subordination
of women. For social change, homosexual rights must be guaranteed and the
discipline of geography, which is often heterosexist, must change. The aim of
this study is to contribute to the discussion of these issues in geography studies
in Turkey, to compile the literature and to create an environment for these
concepts to be established, especially in Turkish.
“I Had My Hair Cut Today to Share #Women_Short Cut_Campaign”: Feminist Selfies Protesting Misogyny
Sunah Lee
This study examines the #Women_Short Cut_Campaign movement, a feminist hashtag activism that began on Twitter (rebranded as X in 2023) in 2021. The movement was to defend a South Korean female archer and Olympic gold medalist, An San, from misogynistic attacks that accused her of being a man-hating feminist, given her short hairstyle. Informed by theories about social media’s affordances and affective politics, this article unpacks how women harness social media affordances to combat sexist oppression, particularly in the sociocultural context where women’s hair is fraught with gendered stereotypes and women’s bodies are historically deprived of agency under Neo-Confucian influence. The qualitative textual analysis of 1,849 tweets mostly written in Korean, with a focus on 811 selfies and images, suggests that #Women_Short Cut_Campaign functions as networked, affective counterpublics where oppressed women construct counter-narratives against the attempts to control women’s bodies. The hashtag also challenges the binary of online or offline and stretches the traditional notion of participation by urging digitally networked participants to take action offline. Participants practiced media solidarities by encouraging each other to protect themselves from potential sexual violence. In doing so, they realized affordances for practice through optimizing and contextualizing the original use of technologies. This research contributes to discussions on the sustainability of digital activism and the need for the pluralization and diversification of contemporary feminism. It also offers an opportunity to address the call for decolonial approaches in mobilizing Western-originated theories. Finally, it invites scholars to focus more on the visual in interrogating digital feminist activism.
Communication. Mass media
Instagram Use and Self-Objectification: The Roles of Internalization, Comparison, Appearance Commentary, and Feminism
Chandra E. Feltman, Dawn M. Szymanski
Women's Perspectives on Harm and Justice after Online Harassment
Jane Im, Sarita Schoenebeck, Marilyn Iriarte
et al.
Social media platforms aspire to create online experiences where users can participate safely and equitably. However, women around the world experience widespread online harassment, including insults, stalking, aggression, threats, and non-consensual sharing of sexual photos. This article describes women's perceptions of harm associated with online harassment and preferred platform responses to that harm. We conducted a survey in 14 geographic regions around the world (N = 3,993), focusing on regions whose perspectives have been insufficiently elevated in social media governance decisions (e.g. Mongolia, Cameroon). {Results show} that, on average, women perceive greater harm associated with online harassment than men, especially for non-consensual image sharing. Women also prefer most platform responses compared to men, especially removing content and banning users; however, women are less favorable towards payment as a response. Addressing global gender-based violence online requires understanding how women experience online harms and how they wish for it to be addressed. This is especially important given that the people who build and govern technology are not typically those who are most likely to experience online harms.
Gender imbalance in retracted publications is more favorable toward women authors
Kiran Sharma, Harsha V. Garine, Satyam Mukherjee
Numerous studies in the literature highlight that women are underrepresented in the scientific domain which further leads to the underrepresentation of women in prestigious publications, authorship positions, and collaboration. However, the representation of women in scientific misconduct has not been studied yet, hence the study aims to investigate the female involvement and authorship position in retracted publications. To conduct the analysis, 3750 retracted scientific papers were extracted from the Web of Science, and the respective gender was identified for each author. The evaluation included the year-wise representation of female authors, females at various authorship positions, collaboration, and female-to-male odds ratio. In all, 26.43% of authorship is held by women and the share of male-female collaborative retracted publications is 55.11%. In retracted publications, women are less likely to hold the last authorship and more likely to hold the middle authorship position.
Prevalence and Associated Factors of Human Papillomavirus Infection among Iraqi Women
Maitham G. Yousif, Fadhil G. Al-Amran, Alaa M. Sadeq
et al.
Human papillomavirus (HPV) is a significant public health concern, as it is a leading cause of cervical cancer in women. However, data on the prevalence of HPV infection among Iraqi women is scarce. This study aimed to estimate the prevalence of HPV infection and its associated factors among Iraqi women aged 15-50 attending health centers. In this cross-sectional study, 362 female participants aged 15-50 were recruited from health centers in Iraq. Serological tests were used to screen for HPV infection. Sociodemographic information, obstetric history, and contraceptive use were collected. Pap smears were performed to assess cervical changes related to HPV infection. Of the 362 participants, 65 (17.96%) tested positive for HPV. The majority of HPV-positive women were aged 30-35 years, housewives, and belonged to lower social classes. Among HPV-positive women, 30% had abnormal Pap smears, with 55% diagnosed with cervical intraepithelial neoplasia grade 1 (CIN1), 25% with CIN2, and 15% with CIN3. Biopsy confirmed the diagnosis in 5% of cases. No significant association was found between HPV infection and contraceptive use. Most HPV-positive women were multiparous. This study reveals a considerable prevalence of HPV infection among Iraqi women attending health centers, particularly in the age group of 30-35 years and among housewives. These findings highlight the need for targeted public health interventions to increase HPV awareness, promote regular screening, and improve access to healthcare services for women, especially those from lower social classes. Further research is warranted to better understand the factors contributing to HPV transmission in Iraq and to develop effective prevention strategies.
Opinion | Think Physics, Think Man: Barrier's to Women's Participation in Physics Education
Eliot Jane Walton
An analysis of barriers to women's participation in physics education is presented. It is expected that in undergraduate physics the most common situation for a women is that she is cisgender and one of a numerical minority in the classroom. The effects of other intersectional identities are not considered. The analysis is based on evidence from the author's lived experience as a transgender woman who transitioned as an undergraduate and on evidence from the literature on the effects of gender differences in academic disciplines. It is expected that the teaching philosophy and practice in physics classrooms favours men over women and these gender dynamics are partially responsible for the under-representation of women in physics. These expectations require further research to be substantiated.
en
physics.ed-ph, physics.pop-ph
Status of Women in Astronomy: A need for advancing inclusivity and equal opportunities
Mamta Pandey-Pommier, Arianna Piccialli, Belinda J. Wilkes
et al.
Women in the Astronomy and STEM fields face systemic inequalities throughout their careers. Raising awareness, supported by detailed statistical data, represents the initial step toward closely monitoring hurdles in career progress and addressing underlying barriers to workplace equality. This, in turn, contributes to rectifying gender imbalances in STEM careers. The International Astronomical Union Women in Astronomy (IAU WiA) working group, a part of the IAU Executive Committee, is dedicated to increasing awareness of the status of women in Astronomy and supporting the aspirations of female astronomers globally. Its mission includes taking concrete actions to advance equal opportunities for both women and men in the field of astronomy. In August 2021, the IAU WiA Working Group established a new organizing committee, unveiling a comprehensive four-point plan. This plan aims to strengthen various aspects of the group's mission, encompassing: (i) Awareness Sustainability: Achieved through surveys and data collection, (ii) Training and Skill Building: Focused on professional development, (iii) Fundraising: To support key initiatives, and (iv) Communication: Dissemination of results through conferences, WG Magazines, newsletters, and more. This publication provides an overview of focused surveys that illuminate the factors influencing the careers of women in Astronomy, with a particular focus on the careers of mothers. It highlights the lack of inclusive policies, equal opportunities, and funding support for women researchers in the field. Finally, we summarize the specific initiatives undertaken by the IAU WiA Working Group to advance inclusivity and equal opportunities in Astronomy.
en
astro-ph.IM, astro-ph.CO