Posts tagged with sexism
Sorry, not a coincidence
An assistant professor at UC Berkeley recently analyzed The New York Times' "By the Book" column (which asks authors about the specific books on their nightstands)...
So useful!
If you have a spare moment, I encourage you to check out this handy chart that allows you to "describe yourself like a male author would". You no longer need to think up synonyms for "voluptuous"; this chart does it for you...
Behind the times
In an impressively out-of-touch article for the Guardian, Imogen Russell Williams gushes over the "thrilling rise" of the YA anti-heroine, a phenomenon she seems to think is recent...
WOW.
In celebration of South Africa's Women's Day (August 9th), Bic Pens' South African division released an impressively tone-deaf ad that reads "Look like a girl/Act like a lady/Think like a man/Work like a boss. #HappyWomensDay" This jaw-dropping misstep...
Gloomy reality check
Novelist Nicola Griffith recently posted a disheartening study regarding the last 15 years of six major fiction awards. According to her research...
An ongoing and uphill battle
According to the recent NPR article "See Priya Cook", gender bias is prevalent in textbooks worldwide. Women are generally portrayed in subservient or domestic roles, while men are depicted as figures of authority and action...
Computers are hard.
When I first read this vitriolic plot summary of the book Barbie: I Can Be... A Computer Engineer, I honestly thought it was a joke. I mean, no one, not even Mattel, could be that tone-deaf, right? Turns out I was wrong: according to NPR, Mattel...
MTV shows its age
People have been justifiably incensed by the MTV Movie Award nominees for 'Best Hero', which are 100% male. (And no, there's no 'Best Heroine' category.) Despite the huge and ongoing success of the Hunger Games adaptations, Jennifer Lawrence's Katniss Everdeen lost out to Robert Downey Jr.'s Iron Man, Henry Cavill's Clark Kent, Chris Hemsworth's Thor, Martin Freeman's Bilbo Baggins, and Channing Tatum's, uh, whoever he played in White House Down, which nobody saw...
A step towards awareness
I am ridiculously excited by this idea: Sweden is introducing a new rating to its movie theaters based on the famous "Bechdel test", which requires a movie (or book or TV show or whatever) to include...
The evolution of a magazine
The Atlantic recently posted a slideshow of their coverage of "the changing dynamics between women and men in America", starting with the 1859 article "Ought Women to Learn the Alphabet?" and ending with last month's "The Weaker Sex", by Sandra Tsing Loh...
Pride and Prejudice goes R-rated
And speaking of Jane Austen-related pain, check this out:The above is what its publisher describes as a "deliciously naughty updating" of Austen's Pride and Prejudice, making it "the story you lov...
Ah, the pearl-clutching shockers of bygone generations...
The fine people at Entertainment Weekly recently put together a list of 24 Classic "Steamy" Books. The list is worth clicking through for the vintage covers alone, but some of the quotes are grea...
Sage advice for the young'uns
Ah, satirical advice from Disney's cartoon princesses! Check out these words of wisdom from "Belle" and "Ariel":To be fair, I feel like cherry-picking objectionable messages from Disney films is ...
Behind (way behind) the times
In a little bit of magazine news, Salon.com's Broadsheet points out that Time magazine's annual "Person of the Year" coverstory hasn't featured a standalone female pick since 1986(!!!). They go o...
Books for girls
People are all up in arms over the fact that Publishers Weekly's "Best Books of 2009" list features no female authors. I'd care, but I'm too busy shaking my head over the fact that they've got "be...
No books for teenage boys?
Roger Sutton, editor in chief of The Horn Book, recently wrote an essay for the Times about two buzzworthy young adult titles—John Green's Paper Towns and Kevin Brooks’s Black Rabbit Summer. I'm o...
I think we're reading these titles a little differently.
Check out this blog post on Guardian.co.uk about the sexism faced by female fantasy authors. I have no doubt female writers encounter considerable sexism*, but I'm not sure I agree with such stat...