Resources for feminist research : RFR = Documentation sur la recherche feministe : DRF最新文献

{"title":"Boston marriages : romantic but asexual relationships among contemporary lesbians","authors":"E. Rothblum, K. Brehony","doi":"10.5860/choice.31-5651","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.5860/choice.31-5651","url":null,"abstract":"Boston Marriages: Romantic but A sexual Relationships Among Contemporary Lesbians is an interesting addition to the varied discourses on devising and defining lesbian relationships and sexualities. Rothblum and Brehony provide a collection of theoretical articles and personal narratives which open a discussion of the centrality of sex to the definition of lesbian relationships. This discussion implicitly challenges what has been the definitive moment for the category lesbian. It also offers an opportunity to think about the links (and the ruptures) between sexual activity and intimacy in lesbian relationships.Although this book is aimed primarily at psychologists and psychotherapists, the project of finding ways to redefine or to expand existing definitions of \"relationship,\" \"intimacy,\" and \"sexuality\" in the lives of lesbians is of interest to any of us who live and theorize in, around, and through the boundaries of those definitions. Taking a critical look at the meanings of the terms \"sexuality,\" \"intimacy\" and \"relationship\" has profound implications for our lives, loves and politics, especially since such an examination necessarily calls the hegemonic meanings associated with these terms into question.Rothblum and Brehony suggest that we reclaim the nineteenth-century term \"Boston Marriage\" as one means to discuss intimate, but not sexually active, committed relationships without resorting to terms which would pathologize that sexual (in)activity. Many of the essays in the introductory and theoretical sections suggest inadequate and inaccurate language to describe lesbian sexualities and/or lesbian relationships. Indeed, the complex and various meanings associated with the terms of reference disrupt rather than connect the theoretical perspectives. The terms of the language, and the meanings attached to a \"Boston Marriage\" seem to muffle rather than clarify the voices of women trying to tell their own stories.The inadequacies of language are a problem of this text as well as a problem for this text. Although many of the authors give lip service to the need to rethink these terms, they often do not take this rethinking very far, nor do they provide any working consensus for how we should redefine these terms. The brunt of the blame for our inadequate language is levelled at the \"patriarchy\" for its role in erasing some original (essential) positively-valued feminine sexuality. What seems to be going on in many of the \"theoretical\" pieces here is a series of assumptions that this reader was not willing to leave unchallenged. For the most part, the term \"sex\" gets defined (implicitly and explicitly) as some form of genital contact which culminates in one or both partners having an orgasm. This definition produces an \"event-driven\" model of sex. In this model, pleasure is all but erased (subsumed by the orgasmic \"moment\") and the model itself is strongly rooted in what could be characterized as a phallogocentric and/or heterosexist conceptualiz","PeriodicalId":82477,"journal":{"name":"Resources for feminist research : RFR = Documentation sur la recherche feministe : DRF","volume":"23 1","pages":"53"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1993-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"71045258","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Lifting a Ton of Feathers: A Woman's Guide to Surviving in the Academic World // Review","authors":"P. Caplan","doi":"10.2307/3340734","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2307/3340734","url":null,"abstract":"Paula Caplan, in her book Lifting a Ton of Feathers: A Woman's Guide to Surviving in the Academic World, outlines the myths and dilemmas that plague women's entrance into (and success in) academia. While sobering, the information provides a handy map to the pitfalls and mines that currently impede women's progress in academia. Most crucially, she exhorts female academics not to blame themselves for these impediments, but rather to recognize their familiar faces in the anecdotes and stories detailed in this book. Through flowing narrative and fascinating examples, Caplan provides an easily read and pragmatic profile of the current difficulties and delights that should be carefully entertained before a woman (or person of minority status, or both) considers a career in academia.This book resulted from an initiative by the Council of Ontario Universities' Committee on the Status of Women, and was inspired by a desire on the Committee's part not only to offer data supporting discrimination against women in academia, but also to offer solutions. As a result, Dr. Caplan was asked to create a book that had three overall objectives: first, to document the under-representation and mistreatment of women in universities in Canada; second, to speculate upon the causes of these adversities, and third, to offer suggestions to both the individual and the system which address these problems.For the data addressing under-representation, Caplan offers within Appendix 1 (\"The Data on Gender Bias in Academia\") a rich, three-dimensional look at the studies and work that have been conducted to document the lack of support available to women academics as they climb the professorial ladder. For information on the mistreatment of women, Caplan interviewed women of colour, women with disabilities, aged, lesbian and bisexual women, white, able-bodied, younger and heterosexual women, both during a workshop and individually. She also conducted extensive literature searches and consulted with experts in the field. The information gathered in this way formed the nucleus for her documentation of women's mistreatment (see Appendix 2, \"The Maleness of the Environment\") as well as for the presentation of sources and guises of the current gender biases, and their possible solutions.Chapter 1, entitled \"The Good, the Bad, and the Perplexing,\" offers reasons why women should try to overcome the obstacles meticulously documented throughout the rest of the book. The joys and reasons for waging the academic career battle are presented in a clear, compelling manner. Like Caplan, I too would recommend not only starting with this chapter, but returning to it if some of the later material becomes too disheartening.The next four chapters, \"Why Can't a Woman Be More Like a Man? or The Maleness of the Environment\" (Chapter 2), \"Unwritten Rules and Impossible Proofs\" (Chapter 3), \"The Myths\" (Chapter 4), and \"Damned if You Do, Damned if You Don't\" (Chapter 5), are presented to familiarize aspir","PeriodicalId":82477,"journal":{"name":"Resources for feminist research : RFR = Documentation sur la recherche feministe : DRF","volume":"61 1","pages":"71"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1993-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.2307/3340734","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"69362385","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}