bibliofeminista

Check out my #WaronWomen Pinterest project

Fri, 04 May 2012 17:13:56 -0400

Check out my #WaronWomen Pinterest project:

And let me know if you want to contribute or know of any bills that have been brought forward this year that I may have missed (I know there’s been many.. too many!).

Equal Pay: Will We Ever Get There? An Interview With Lilly Ledbetter

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 14:39:38 -0400

Equal Pay: Will We Ever Get There? An Interview With Lilly Ledbetter:

April is the month every year when the paychecks of women working full-time, year-round catch up with what men earned by the previous December 31. This year Equal Pay Day falls on April 17.

There are a number of causes for the pay gap, including job segregation (so-called “men’s jobs” pay more than “women’s jobs”) and the fact that working moms are often seen as less serious or less reliable, despite solid evidence to the contrary.

But plain old sex discrimination plays a big part. Lilly Ledbetter found out the hard way after 19 years at Goodyear, when shelearned she had been underpaid all along compared to men doing the same job. She sued–and won in lower courts. But the Supreme Court overturned 40 years of precedent when it ruled against her in the now-infamous Ledbetter v. Goodyear case, saying she should have complained earlier–even though she didn’t know about the discrimination.

The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act restoring the previous standard (a victim has 180 days to complain beginning when she learns about the discrimination) was the first law President Obama signed. Ledbetter’s new book Grace and Grit: My Fight For Equal Pay and Fairness at Goodyear and Beyond chronicles her struggle and the aftermath. I interviewed her this month for my radio show Equal Time With Martha Burk.

To read the interview, click through the link. I had the privilege of meeting her at the Sewall-Belmont Museum’s Q&A and booksigning event a few weeks back. What an inspiring woman!

The Politics Of Safety For Women

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 14:36:42 -0400

The Politics Of Safety For Women:

Trigger warning, but a moving piece on safety for women (especially women of color), street harassment, violence against women, and fear.

Video

Mon, 16 Apr 2012 12:28:22 -0400

Trigger Warning: from the UK’s “This is Abuse”...

Sat, 07 Apr 2012 11:39:00 -0400

Trigger Warning: from the UK’s “This is Abuse” campaign:

“Sex with someone who doesn’t want to is rape.”

Women writers' neglect is a class issue

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 14:18:17 -0400

Women writers' neglect is a class issue:

Middle-class writers such as Sylvia Townsend Warner have enough champions. What about Ethel Carnie Holdsworth?

For about four decades now, rediscovering and promoting the work of women writers deemed to have been “abandoned” by readers has been a staple of the literary feminist. It is the raison d’être of the publishing house Virago, which has brought us many books that would have otherwise been long forgotten. So it was interesting to read Sarah Waters’s piece lamenting the “neglect” of Sylvia Townsend Warner – but it annoyed me, too. Townsend Warner, who has had six of her novels republished by Virago, hardly qualifies for inclusion on the “missing” list.

There are many other women writers who remain entirely overlooked, and whom present readers would doubtless enjoy and learn from. And one candidate worthy of being fished from the seas of oblivion and dragged into the literary lifeboat is Ethel Carnie Holdsworth.

I fear the reason why Carnie Holdsworth hasn’t yet proved an attractive prospect for the missionary feminist is that she was trenchantly working class. Carnie Holdsworth wrote stories for and about other working-class women; women who, like herself, were already working long hours in factories and at home. With no allowance to free up her time, nor a high level of education, she had an urgent need to show how it was for herself and women like her. It’s a very old plough, this; the absence of, and then, when she is there, the neglect of, the working-class woman. One of the reasons I am championing Carnie Holdsworth is because we share class origins; origins that make one only too aware of how hard it is to even realise that one could have a voice through the pen. But that’s not all: a survey of Carnie Holdsworth’s work makes all too clear her struggle and her significant achievements, which, in the end, wore her out…

What we need more than ever in our current climate are works that reflect these levels of inequality – not just between men and women, but between women and women – and north and south. I have often found it ironic that the feminists who cry foul at patriarchal cultural imperialism and the championing of male writers at the expense of better women, then go on to repeat the process among women along class lines, whether they know it or not.

I’d like to expand her article’s scope to issues of including women of different races and sexual orientations as well.

When women are “rediscovered” from history, it often starts with the most privileged women, because they are the easiest to find records about — the less privileged women were often less documented had to struggle much more against their background as both underprivileged AND a woman.

Photo

Tue, 13 Mar 2012 13:59:37 -0400

"I woke up this morning and my uterus was really heavy…and then I realized the religious right..."

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 11:04:41 -0500

““I woke up this morning and my uterus was really heavy…and then I realized the religious right was sitting on it.””

- Liz Chadderon at WIN’s Young Women of Achievement awards ceremony last night.

Rowling Returns With a New Book, This Time for Adults

Thu, 23 Feb 2012 10:49:30 -0500

Rowling Returns With a New Book, This Time for Adults:

J.K. Rowling, the British author whose “Harry Potter” fantasy series ignited a passion for reading for millions of children around the world, has emerged from a five-year publishing hiatus with a new book: this time for adults. Little, Brown and Company, part of the Hachette Book Group, said on Thursday it had acquired the rights to publish the book, whose title and publication date was not named.

“Although I’ve enjoyed writing it every bit as much, my next book will be very different to the Harry Potter series, which has been published so brilliantly by Bloomsbury and my other publishers around the world,” Ms. Rowling said in a statement. “The freedom to explore new territory is a gift that Harry’s success has brought me, and with that new territory it seemed a logical progression to have a new publisher. I am delighted to have a second publishing home in Little, Brown, and a publishing team that will be a great partner in this new phase of my writing life.”

Komen Foundation: Selling Us for the Cure

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 16:43:00 -0500

Komen Foundation: Selling Us for the Cure:

Komen has been eager to accept corporate funds from the likes of pharmaceutical giant Eli Lilly, but Eli Lilly also happens to be the sole producer of rGBH, a bovine growth hormone which, when it ends up in our dairy products, is known to increase cancer risks. What’s more, while Komen tells their supporters that the foundation’s partnership with the drugmaker is in service of finding a breast cancer cure, Eli Lilly - which also manufactures cancer treatment drugs - might profit from such a cure, or perhaps even prefer that it not be found.

Eli Lilly also manufactured DES, which Komen now denies may cause cancer. #facepalm

30 Clients Using Computer-Generated Stories Instead of Writers

Tue, 21 Feb 2012 13:24:00 -0500

30 Clients Using Computer-Generated Stories Instead of Writers:

Forbes has joined a group of 30 clients using Narrative Science software to write computer-generated stories.

Here’s more about the program, used in one corner of Forbes‘ website: “Narrative Science has developed a technology solution that creates rich narrative content from data. Narratives are seamlessly created from structured data sources and can be fully customized to fit a customer’s voice, style and tone. Stories are created in multiple formats, including long form stories, headlines, Tweets and industry reports with graphical visualizations.”

The New York Times revealed last year that trade publisher Hanley Wood and sports journalism site The Big Ten Network also use the tool. In all, 30 clients use the software–but Narrative Science did not disclose the complete client list.

…The Narrative Science technology could potentially impact many corners of the writing trade. The company has a long list of stories they can computerize: sports stories, financial reports, real estate analyses, local community content, polling & elections, advertising campaign summaries sales & operations reports and market research.

Here’s an excerpt from a Forbes earnings preview story about Barnes & Noble, written by the computer program:

While company shares have dropped 17.2% over the last three months to close at $13.72 on February 15, 2012, Barnes & Noble (BKS) is hoping it can break the slide with solid third quarter results when it releases its earnings on Tuesday, February 21, 2012.

What to Expect: The Wall Street consensus is $1.01 per share, up 1% from a year ago when Barnes & Noble reported earnings of $1 per share.

The consensus estimate is down from three months ago when it was $1.42, but is unchanged over the past month. Analysts are projecting a loss of $1.09 per share for the fiscal year.

The company originated with two electrical engineering and computer science professors at Northwestern University. Here’s more about the company: “[It began with] a software program that automatically generates sports stories using commonly available information such as box scores and play-by-plays. The program was the result of a collaboration between McCormick and Medill School of Journalism.  To create the software, Hammond and Birnbaum and students working in McCormick’s Intelligent Information Lab created algorithms that use statistics from a game to write text that captures the overall dynamic of the game and highlights the key plays and players. Along with the text is an appropriate headline and a photo of what the program deems as the most important player in the game.”

This, to me, is more game-changing for the publishing industry than all of the innovations in e-books and e-readers combined. Think of genres (like bodice rippers and some sci-fi or children’s books) could be written with some basic narrative inputs! Think of sports recaps or breaking news stories that could easily be generated with a few inputs!

I’m not saying this is ideal, because I can certainly see there would be a large margin of error with any program like this (not even touching on the whole job loss issue and fact that these stories would lose the “human” touch of writing and much personal opinion), but it’s interesting to see how programs like this will play out in the future.

"Andy: Who can tell me the safest form of safe sex? Darryl: Condoms. Andy: Incorrect. The only true..."

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:27:00 -0500

“Andy: Who can tell me the safest form of safe sex?
Darryl: Condoms.
Andy: Incorrect. The only true form of safe sex, okay, is abstinence.
Darryl: Oh, I didn’t realize we were doing trick questions. What’s the safest way to go skiing? Don’t ski.”

- -The Office

I’m posting this because it was on my tear-off Office calendar yesterday — only the most appropriate quote of the day given the contraception fiasco yesterday.

The Wonderful and Terrible Habit of Buying Too Many Books

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 14:05:32 -0500

The Wonderful and Terrible Habit of Buying Too Many Books:

There are just too many books to read. And while one might make the very good point that you could just wait to buy them when you have more room, there’s something about putting them in a row with other books, read and unread, that creates the cumulative impression of your reading self. Because, when it comes to reading, there will always be more book that you haven’t read than books that you have, and your reading ambition will always be more important than your reading accomplishments. “The most profound enchantment for the collector is the locking of individual items within a magic circle in which they are fixed as the final thrill, the thrill of acquisition, passes over them,” wrote Benjamin. “Everything remembered and thought, everything conscious, becomes the pedestal, the frame, the base, the lock of his property.”

A library of mostly unread books is far more inspiring than a library of books already read. There’s nothing more exciting than finishing a book, and walking over to your shelves to figure out what you’re going to read next.

So, the solution here is to just slow down on the buying, not cut it out entirely, which means things like limiting myself to one book per bookstore visit. As I start to chip away at the huge list of Books I Want To Read, I’m sure that list will deepen and broaden in ways I can’t predict, so eventually the library may be more balanced and not so skewed toward books I haven’t read, but it will never be fixed row of read books. Libraries aren’t meant to be intractable, they’re meant to change, and they change by buying books. As long as I don’t trip over those piles of books on my floor and break my leg, it seems to me that having too many books on your hands is a pretty wonderful problem to have.

"I think it’s really curiouser and curiouser that as we get further into this debate, the..."

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:43:27 -0500

“I think it’s really curiouser and curiouser that as we get further into this debate, the Republican leadership of this Congress thinks it’s appropriate to have a hearing on the subject of women’s health and can purposely exclude women from the panel. What else do you need to know about the subject? If you need to know more, tune in, I may, I may at some point be moved to explain biology to my colleagues.”

- Pelosi on the ridiculousness of yesterday.

NEWSFLASH: “Fetal Personhood” Law Passes Oklahoma Senate

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 13:38:08 -0500

NEWSFLASH: “Fetal Personhood” Law Passes Oklahoma Senate:

A bill declaring a fertilized egg to be a “person” with constitutional rights has passed the Oklahoma Senate. The bill is expected to pass the Republican-controlled House and be signed into law by the state’s anti-abortion governor, Mary Fallin.

Personhood laws would drastically limit women’s medical options:

By giving constitutional rights to a fertilized egg, the amendment could ban emergency contraception, birth control pills and IUDs as well as all abortions, even in cases of rape, incest, or to save the life of the woman or girl. It could eliminate medical choices for women, such as some cancer treatments or in vitro fertilization. It could allow the state to investigate and even prosecute a woman for a miscarriage.

Such measures have been unpopular with voters. A personhood measure on Mississippi’s November ballot suffered a resounding defeat. But personhood’s proponents are pressing on in 2012, with campaigns in 11 states and counting.

"Poor women are now at greater risk for breast cancer death because of less access to screening and..."

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 12:12:42 -0500

““Poor women are now at greater risk for breast cancer death because of less access to screening and better treatments.”

- American Cancer Society report

Can bells and whistles save the book?

Thu, 02 Feb 2012 11:29:57 -0500

Can bells and whistles save the book?:

Attempts to invigorate books with video and other digital bells and whistles keep bumping up against this fundamental problem: You can’t really pay much attention to anything else while you’re reading, so in order to play with any of these new features, you have to stop reading. If you’re enjoying what you’re reading, then the attentional tug of all these peripheral doodads is vaguely annoying, and if you’re not engaged by the story, they aren’t enough on their own to win you over.

This article makes a great point. Given our already-scattered and very distracted reading/TV watching/web browsing, we really can’t stand to have yet another distraction to pull us away from a book or e-book’s main feature: the text.

Has anyone else had similar issues with their “enhanced e-books”?

TRIGGER WARNING: This is an incredibly powerful and triggering...

Tue, 24 Jan 2012 14:37:08 -0500

TRIGGER WARNING: This is an incredibly powerful and triggering video on how anyone can prevent sexual assault and rape by watching out for friends, stepping in when something seems wrong, and saying something.

LIVE: Occupy Reproductive Freedom at the Supreme Court Note: you...

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 13:31:11 -0500

LIVE: Occupy Reproductive Freedom at the Supreme Court

Note: you may only be able to view the video through Tumblr. Click here for the original link.

NBC News Launches Digital Imprint

Mon, 23 Jan 2012 13:18:22 -0500

NBC News Launches Digital Imprint:

NBC News has launched a new eBook imprint called NBC Publishing. The imprint will release enhanced eBooks with videos inside.

The launch follows the media company’s success in the eBook business. Last year NBC worked with Penguin and The Perseus Books Group on various enhanced eBook titles including: JFK: 50 Days, Roots, D-Day:The Battle for Normandy and Berlin 1961.