Blog posts from January 2011
Wikipedia's male bias and does it matter?
by Jess McCabe // 31 January 2011, 14:50
Only about 13% of contributors to Wikipedia are women, while the average person adding to the crowd-sourced encyclopedia is in their mid-20s. The New York Times has an interesting story exploring some of the implications of the demographics of Wikipedia...
Weekly Round-Up And Open Thread, 31 January 2011
by Helen G // 31 January 2011, 14:35
TRIGGER WARNING: This post contains hyperlinks to external websites and blogs, some of which have comment threads and other material which some people may find triggering. The links here are posted in good faith but, as The F-Word has no...
New review: Cookie Party! (Death of the Elephant, Stella Zine and Ste McCabe)
by Jess McCabe // 30 January 2011, 21:37
Hayley Foster da Silva reviews an evening inspired by riot grrrl and feminist-friendly electro punk When I saw that Death of the Elephant, Stella Zine and Ste McCabe were playing on 4 November at the Bar House in Chelmsford, I...
New review - Gender Outlaws: The Next Generation
by Jess McCabe // 29 January 2011, 21:56
Social pressures impose binary gender on us all, but resistance is possible: Amelia Bayes reviews the follow-on anthology to a key text in queer theory Gender Outlaw: On Men, Women and the Rest of Us was published in the mid-1990s...
Media hypocrisy over sexist football jibes
by Guest Blogger // 28 January 2011, 14:03
Guest post by Matt Hill, who thinks men can - and should - be feminists too. He helps edit the politics and music website Green Wedge, and writes for various sites. Personally I find it hard to get too exercised...
Protesting unethical undercover policing
by Guest Blogger // 28 January 2011, 12:26
Emily Armistead demands justice for the women personally affected by undercover policing Almost three weeks after news broke that police are spying on the UK protest movement, controversy continues to emerge on a daily basis. Whilst any use of undercover...
Wolf-whistling: not flattered
by Guest Blogger // 27 January 2011, 15:19
According to an MSN story, women secretly love street harassment. Fiona H Halliday is exasperated Signing into MSN to read my email the other day, an annoying window popped up telling me what rubbish I could read on MSN. Doubtless...
Women's words - on politics
by zohra moosa // 27 January 2011, 12:49
Call for contributions from The Centre for Women and Democracy: March 2011 sees the centenary of the celebration of International Women's Day, and to celebrate it we're planning to publish an online collection of quotations from women involved in or...
As Time Goes By
by Helen G // 26 January 2011, 15:46
Letters of Note has an interesting post about the iconic photo V-J Day in Times Square, taken by the photographer Alfred Eisenstaedt on the day of the surrender of Japan during the Second World War. It seems that, in 1979,...
London's Black Feminists group on Twitter, blogging
by Jess McCabe // 26 January 2011, 12:54
The London-based group Black Feminists has launched a blog and is also newly on Twitter and Facebook. Black Feminists is a new group which meets regularly in London. They explain: This is a group for women who are ‘black’ in...
16-year-old girl convicted following "false rape allegation"
by Laura // 25 January 2011, 21:45
This rather alarming piece in the Guardian describes how a girl took a boy to court accusing him of raping her when she was 15 and he 14. She has now been convicted for perverting the source of justice, after...
Emily Davison Blues
by Catherine Redfern // 24 January 2011, 20:51
Thanks to a tweet from @pennyred, I've discovered the music of Grace Petrie, and I thought F Word readers might appreciate her song Emily Davison Blues: You might also enjoy her song Farewell to Welfare. Enjoy!...
T-shirts for boys - gender stereotypes and the flipside of 'pinkification'
by Jess McCabe // 24 January 2011, 19:45
T-shirts for boys value toughness and aggression, feature frightening imagery and emphasise rowdiness, according to a survey by The Achilles Effect. The parenting blog has posted a two part series looking at the artwork on t-shirts marketed for boys as...
Weekly round-up and open thread: what we missed
by Lynne Miles // 24 January 2011, 17:53
As usual, here's a round-up of stuff we haven't had chance to talk about in full yet. Consider the comments box below an 'open thread' to discuss these links or whatever else you fancy. Happy Monday! DIY Abortions in the...
New feature: Students offer a glimmer of hope
by Jess McCabe // 24 January 2011, 11:12
An encounter with students at an Oxford University festival on gender and equality leaves Lisa Ansell optimistic Since the Budget last year, I've felt a responsibility to speak loudly about the effect of the government's economic agenda on women. Partly...
More sexism in professional sport - who knew?
by Carrie Dunn // 23 January 2011, 10:45
A touch of context here - those of you who know me might already know that much of my time is spent working as a sports journalist, and I'm also writing my PhD thesis on female sports fandom. So it's...
Reminder: guest blogging for TFW
by Lynne Miles // 22 January 2011, 22:57
Hi everyone, just a reminder, following on from my post in December, that we're looking for volunteer guest bloggers to fill slots for the first half of this year. We're having a TFW Collective meeting this week and are going...
Taking a bystander approach to gender-based violence
by Guest Blogger // 21 January 2011, 20:22
This guest post is by Ellie Hutchinson, a prevention worker at Scottish Women’s Aid Have you ever walked past an accident or seen someone fall over and not stopped to help? Heard an alarm going off and not contacted the...
Mother asks social services to take daughter into care
by Carrie Dunn // 19 January 2011, 17:51
Just a quick entry before I leave the office (ssh!) but wanted to draw your attention to this terribly sad story, where a mother has asked social services to take her disabled daughter into care. She's been driven to it...
Weekly round-up and open thread, January 17th
by Laura // 17 January 2011, 21:04
Welcome to your weekly dose of links we've collected but haven't got round to blogging. As ever, a link does not constitute a seal of F-Word approval for its content, and we cannot guarantee that the articles and any subsequent...
Women's History Month
by Jess McCabe // 14 January 2011, 11:35
UPDATE: Chitra from WHM asked me to add: "WHM is a collaborative project and we're looking for women to get involved in many ways: researching and writing for our website, writing lesson plans, contributing to our reading list, suggesting links...
What would cave woman do?
by Laura // 13 January 2011, 19:44
Oh how dull. Yet another commentator rolling out the "women are evolutionarylarily programmed not to have casual sex and that's why we all secretly hate it so much" meme. Ever stopped to wonder, Maura, before you cite your evo-pysh-led...
Davos imposes gender quota on companies
by Jess McCabe // 13 January 2011, 14:26
Participants mill about at last year's Davos summit Companies sending senior executives to the World Economic Forum in Davos must send at least one woman for every four men, reports The Guardian: "The World Economic Forum annual meeting engages the...
Run for Refuge
by Jess McCabe // 13 January 2011, 10:42
Runners wanted: to raise money for Refuge, which runs a network of safehouses for women and children escaping domestic violence Domestic violence charity Refuge is seeking runners to raise money at some of the big runs this year. If you...
Mrs His Name
by Laura // 12 January 2011, 19:58
The Japanese government is facing a law suit brought by five people who claim that their constututional rights have been violated by the law forcing married couples to share the same surname, which in practice tends to be the man's....
New feature: Global feminism(s)?
by Jess McCabe // 12 January 2011, 10:30
Feminists in the UK should be learning from women’s activism in other countries, says Sarah Jones Global connections With all the hype around the UN Millennium Development Goals Summit in September, I have been thinking about the work I do...
New review: How to Become a Scandal: Adventures in Bad Behavior
by Jess McCabe // 11 January 2011, 19:03
Laura Kipnis’ “theory of scandal” starts an interesting conversation, says Katherine Wootton, but ignores the impact on victims to concentrate on gossip and society’s response Laura Kipnis, author of the polemics Against Love and The Female Thing, takes on another...
Police officer given two life sentences
by Jess McCabe // 11 January 2011, 14:23
A police officer in Northumbria has been given two life sentences for raping two women and targeting vulnerable women in the course of his duties, reports the Northern Echo. (Trigger warning) During the sentencing of PC Stephen Mitchell, the judge...
Hakim report prompts media delight
by Holly Combe // 10 January 2011, 20:30
It is hard to be shocked by misleading media reports about women. After all, it's commonplace to see the mainstream media gleefully twisting the results of a piece of gender research and claiming we now have conclusive end-of-debate evidence...
Women at Comment is Free & CiF trespass
by Jess McCabe // 10 January 2011, 12:38
Today is CiF trespass. In response to the commenting atmosphere at the Guardian's debate site, Comment is Free, Rowan Davies came up with the proposal: The idea is that people of mild temperament will shuffle gently onto CiF threads throughout...
Weekly Round-Up And Open Thread, 10 January 2011
by Helen G // 10 January 2011, 08:59
TRIGGER WARNING: This post contains hyperlinks to external websites and blogs, some of which have comment threads and other material which some people may find triggering. The links here are posted in good faith but, as The F-Word has no...
Zine on privilege launches, calls for contributions
by Jess McCabe // 9 January 2011, 22:24
A new zine called Dangerous Conversations is due to launch later in 2011, and thee people behind it are calling for submissions - they're also looking for others to participate in the editorial collective. They say the zine will be...
Naomi Wolf: a round-up of some recent links
by Helen G // 9 January 2011, 06:45
Last month, Naomi Wolf was quite vocal about the sex assault charges faced by WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange in her open letter to Interpol in the Huffington Post and her subsequent debate with Jaclyn Friedman (videos at Democracy Now: part...
Victoria Pendleton wears Lycra for a living
by Carrie Dunn // 7 January 2011, 20:33
Grr, I've just seen world and Olympic champion cyclist Victoria Pendleton advertising a make of bread on the television. She informs us that it's good for you and stops you snacking through the day, which is handy "when you wear...
The logo and women
by Jess McCabe // 6 January 2011, 19:50
How do you design a logo for a women's or feminist organisation? If this visual essay at Art Fag City is anything to go by, it's quite difficult to come up with something original. (Via Feministing) Swirly representations of women's...
New review - Burlesque: stripped of authenticity?
by Jess McCabe // 6 January 2011, 15:56
Director Steven Antin’s attempts to differentiate between wholesome teasing and tawdry stripping have provoked objections from the neo-burlesque community. At stake: the definition of the art, the answer to the empowerment v. misogyny debate and whether or not anyone should...
Haiti: Sexual violence against women increasing
by Helen G // 6 January 2011, 07:38
In a new report released today, Amnesty International has found that women and girls living in Haiti’s makeshift camps face an increasing risk of rape and sexual violence. Those responsible are reported to be predominately armed men who roam...
December 2010 comments now online and ready to read
by Jess McCabe // 5 January 2011, 23:44
The comments you made on features and reviews in December are now online and ready for your perusal. Roxanne's meditation on wearing the manteau proved quite contentious, while Annika's piece on being a feminist in a non-feminist environment prompted some...
Weekly round-up and open thread (28 December-3 January)
by Jolene Tan // 3 January 2011, 17:46
Happy New Year to all F Word readers! Here's what we missed in the week just past. As usual, please note that a link doesn't necessarily imply agreement with everything that's posted! Are political beliefs hardwired? (Tom Feilden/BBC) Girl gang's...
New feature: Punk women write back
by Jess McCabe // 2 January 2011, 19:37
Women from the 1970s punk scene in the UK have not stood by as their contributions were erased from the music history books, but have documented that time with their own books and films. Cazz Blase reports This is the...
A Year of Feminist Classics
by Helen G // 1 January 2011, 15:01
If you're casting around for a New Year's resolution that might offer both a sense of fulfilment and a way of expanding your literary horizons, it's not too late to take part in A Year of Feminist Classics. From the...
Founder of The F-Word, Catherine Redfern, has co-authored a new book with Kristin Aune. Find out more at the 
