Modernization and Gender: a history of girls’ technical education in Turkey since 1927

This article is a historical analysis of Girls’ Institutes in Turkey. These schools were established in the early Republican era in order to educate girl students to gender roles compatible with modernization and with the westernization project of the Turkish state. The analysis is based upon qualitative data (including interviews and focus groups). The findings point to four trends in the history of Girls’ Institutes and in the characteristics and life‐chances of graduates in the period 1927–70. These were (a) the shift from ‘good housewife and mother’ training schools to vocational schools; (b) the downgrading of the employment of graduates; (c) a shift from singleness to marriage; and (d) the redefinition of gender roles by women themselves.     

Labour relations in the ‘formal’ and ‘informal’ sectors: Report of a case study in South Gujarat,India—Part I

The fate of peasants, agricultural labourers and others who leave the agrarian sector, either temporarily or permanently, to seek employment in towns and cities, must be of great interest to anyone concerned with the peasantry. Yet it is an area about which we are remarkably ignorant. Jan Breman's study of the ‘labour relations’ (or, one might say, the ‘poverty') of those who are, to a significant extent, first‐generation town‐dwellers, or who, indeed, although they seek employment in towns, have not yet severed their connections with the countryside, is extremely enlightening in this respect. Although it is not directly about peasants we publish it as an important contribution to our knowledge of this hitherto ‘dark’ area, in which rural origins or connections are of manifest significance. The author employs the ‘informal'/'formal’ sector dichotomy, with suitable scepticism, to examine in great detail the labour system outside agriculture in the Valsad district of South Gujarat.?     

‘Quality’, Cinema and the ‘Superior Woman’ Persona: understanding women’s film criticism in post‐war Britain (1945–59)

Criticism was a particularly buoyant area of film culture in Britain during the post‐war period, a regular feature in newspapers, periodicals, magazines, and BBC radio programmes. What has not been widely recognised is the central role that women played as critics of film at this time, and where their interests differed from those of their male peers. This article recovers the contribution made by women film critics, arguing that middle‐class writers such as C. A. Lejeune and E. Arnot Robertson adopted a form of ‘distanced amusement’ with regard to themes of sentimentality and romance (associated with low‐brow female pleasures). This strategy permitted them to engage with the broader cultures of film‐watching, commenting on subjects such as female crying and character identification, and recognising cinema‐going as a pleasurable activity for women, subjects which male critics did not discuss. These findings expand knowledge about film criticism in the post‐war period and reconfigure received understandings of film culture to account for women’s gendered contribution to the critical field.     

Labour relations in the ‘formal’ and ‘informal’ sectors: Report of a case study in south Gujarat,India. Part 2.

The fate of peasants, agricultural labourers and others who leave the agrarian sector, either temporarily or permanently, to seek employment in towns and cities, must be of great interest to anyone concerned with the peasantry. Yet it is an area about which we are remarkably ignorant. Jan Breman's study of the ‘labour relations’ (or, one might say, the ‘poverty') of those who are, to a significant extent, first‐generation town‐dwellers, or who, indeed, although they seek employment in towns, have not yet severed their connections with the countryside, is extremely enlightening in this respect. Although it is not directly about peasants we publish it as an important contribution to our knowledge of this hitherto ‘dark’ area, in which rural origins or connections are of manifest significance. The author employs the ‘informal'/'formal’ sector dichotomy, with suitable scepticism, to examine in great detail the labour system outside agriculture in the Valsad district of South Gujarat.??     

‘Drunken Tans’: Representations of Sex and Violence in the Anglo-Irish War (1919–21)

War is a highly gendered experience which is both informed by and informs constructions of masculinity and femininity. The dominant depiction of masculine heroes and feminine victims simplifies the complex intersections of militarism, nationalism and gendered roles and identities. Focusing on a case study of the Anglo-Irish War or War of Independence (1919–1921), this paper examines how violence against women, especially sexual violence, was written about and reported in ways which framed representations of Irish and British masculinity and Irish femininity.In addition, by analysing a range of varied sources including newspapers, autobiographical accounts and recorded testimonies, this paper attempts to assess the extent to which violence against women formed a key aspect of military practice in the war. In conclusion, I engage with some of the difficulties faced by researchers today in exploring evidence of gendered violence in specific historical, cultural and militarized contexts.     

The ‘Ins’ and ‘Outs’ of Women’s/Gender Studies: a response to reports of its demise in 2008

In the spring of 2008, fuelled by the impending demise of the undergraduate Women’s/Gender Studies programme at London Metropolitan University, a series of public statements proclaimed the death of Women’s/Gender Studies. This article constitutes a response to these statements. Taking a broadly European view of the state of Women’s/Gender Studies, it argues that the discipline has established a research infrastructure, mainstreamed its undergraduate curricula and its pedagogical underpinnings, and continues to attract research funding and significant numbers of postgraduate students. It finally suggests that the ‘fate’ of disciplines is not teleological but iterative.     

Positive Self-Beliefs as a Mediator of the Relationship Between Adolescents’ Sports Participation and Health in Young Adulthood

The present study examined the relationship between participation in sports during adolescence and physical activity and subjective health in young adulthood. A sample of 8,152 (males = 50.8%, females = 49.2%) adolescents from the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent Health were used. Results of the study showed that participating in an organized sport during adolescence was associated with higher levels of physical activity and better subjective health during young adulthood after controlling for participation in general physical activities (e.g., jogging, biking, skateboarding) during adolescence. Participation in sports during adolescence was associated with more positive self-beliefs 1 year later that, in turn, were associated with higher levels of moderate to vigorous physical activity and better subjective health 6 years later. Results suggest that positive self-beliefs partially mediate the relationship between adolescents’ participation in sports and two health outcomes in young adulthood: moderate to vigorous physical activity and subjective health. Findings highlight the utility of youths’ participation in organized sports for promoting healthy outcomes. Implications for policy and practice are discussed.

Young women’s negotiations of gender,the body and the labour market in a post-feminist context

This article explores the ways the body and femininity is understood and negotiated in relation to employment. This article draws on interview data from an Australian study which aimed to explore what it meant to be a ‘young woman’ in neoliberal late modernity, and in relation to the paradoxes of post-feminism. Though there has been an unprecedented rise in youth post-secondary school participation in Australia and elsewhere, girls’ and young women’s increased investment and participation in education has not provided the same gains as for their male counterparts. All interview participants described being aware of gender inequalities and gender discrimination in the workplace, including the glass ceiling, the gender pay gap, and demands and pressures on women to balance career and motherhood, however many did not associate these issues with ‘feminism’. We explore the dynamics of notions of equality, difference and the body in participants’ discussions of work and their anticipation of motherhood and the logics by which gender inequalities are sustained.     

what’s in a face?: Sara Baartman,the (post)colonial gaze and the case of <Emphasis Type="Italic">Vénus Noire</Emphasis> (2010)

The story of Sara Baartman, who was brought to Europe in 1810 to be exhibited as the erotic-exotic freak ‘Hottentot Venus’, is arguably the most famous case study of the scientific validation of (gendered) racism. Her scientific examination and post-mortem dissection by Georges Cuvier, who looked for an alleged connection between the Khoisan and the orangutan, have been the object of famous critical works (Gilman, 1985; Haraway, 1989; Fausto-Sterling, 1995), but also exposed her to the unpalatable fate of becoming the ‘quintessential’ figure of intersecting gender and racial oppressions. This paper deals with Abdellatif Kechiche’s film Vénus Noire (2010), which interestingly rearticulates the (in)famous narrative in unexpected ways. Shot by a male director who is also a postcolonial subject, the film exposes the performativity not only of gender and racial identities, but also of science theorisation, while at the same time raising the issue of whether exposing a violent male colonial gaze on a heavily exhibited woman can contribute to a counter-knowledge of her experience or rather risks reiterating the historical violence. The startling dynamic between the portrayed abuse and Kechiche’s peculiar filmic strategies is the crucial focus of this paper. While Sara’s body is continually exposed and violated, Vénus Noire relies on her face, shot in recurrent extreme close ups, as a haunting presence potentially exceeding violence. Drawing on Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s (1987 [1980]) account of the close up, I explore how Kechiche’s take on Sara’s face builds a strong connection with the spectator’s extra-filmic dimension. As a case of what Deleuze and Guattari call a ‘reflective face’, such close ups invest the viewer with the ethical responsibility of being complicit in the othering practices of (post)colonial times. Vénus Noire thus manages to engage the spectator’s own corporeal awareness of violence, and calls attention to the persisting exploitation of sexual and racial colonial tropes in the contemporary world.     

Gender bias in sport media: a critical analysis of Twitter content and the National Football League’s Carolina Panthers

The National Football League (NFL) is the most popular sport in the United States. Of the NFL’s passionate fan base, 46 percent are women. Despite the substantial attraction and following by women, communication to this audience has been compromised through gender discriminated sport media content. We examined Twitter posts from the NFL’s Carolina Panthers, over a two-month test period. The posts confirm a bias toward men. On the rare occasion woman were noted, it was framed in a stereotypical context, for example, promoting team cheerleaders. We conclude by making recommendations on future social media strategy for the NFL and its related teams. There is an opportunity to embrace womanhood and build trust among this viable stakeholder.     

‘When Two Loving Hearts Beat as One’: same‐sex marriage,subjectivity and self‐representation in the Australian case of Marion‐Bill‐Edwards, 1906–1916

This article focuses on the Australian case of Marion‐Bill‐Edwards who lived most of her adult life in male attire. It examines three bursts of publicity Edwards encountered, a 1906 criminal trial, her 1908 autobiography and a 1916 court case in which she was a witness. The case is significant because it makes an important contribution to understandings of the sexual subjectivity of women (especially women of the lower classes) who had same‐sex relationships in the early years of the twentieth century. The article explores changes in Edwards’ self‐representation and subjectivity in this pivotal period in which (research has indicated) new models for modern sexual identities began to emerge.     

The Women's Party of Great Britain (1917–1919): a forgotten episode in British women's political history

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the Women's Party, founded by Emmeline and Christabel Pankhurst in November 1917 at a time when Britain was still fighting in World War One. It examines the origins and aims of the Women's Party which, with the slogan ‘Victory, National Security and Progress’, conflated the winning of the war with the women's cause. It is contended that global politics on the world stage as well as local politics at home shaped the agenda of the Women's Party in many differing ways.     

‘Situated Knowledges’ and New Materialism(s): Rethinking a Politics of Location

Abstract

Playing a pivotal role in foregrounding a feminist politics of difference, a politics of location embodies what can be termed second-wave concerns that continue to inform contemporary feminist modes of inquiry and research. However, the attention to material specificity that locatability performs has emphasized the identity of the speaking subject at the same time as it has acknowledged materiality's entangled engagements as suggestive of the complicated production of any identity. In her 1988 essay ‘Situated Knowledges’, Donna Haraway both raises and responds to the challenge of a feminist politics of location in a way that anticipates a convoluted politics of the subject, in particular where she is not satisfied to relinquish universality and objectivity, or the ‘non-local’, in her provocative thinking through of situated knowledge production. The partial perspective she uncovers insists that the capacity for identity is addressed as a political gesture, with a reminder that any appeal to perspective is a non-innocent participation in what it helps to produce. In taking up Haraway's essay, the author engages with the problematic nature of a politics of location that is confounded by the direction of its critical interventions, and in such a way anticipates and performs new (feminist) materialist concerns. Questioning the nature of non-locatability and its political imperatives, the author suggests an ‘annunciative politics’ through which to consider some of the implications of Haraway's figuring of the partial perspective, to ask after feminism's political impetus with the tensions raised in Haraway's argument kept alive.     

The image of ‘ideal’ Turkish womanhood? a Bakhtinian approach to Halide Edib Adıvar’s Raik’in Annesi (Raik’s Mother) (1909)

Critics often read Halide Edib Ad?var’s Raik’in Annesi (Raik’s Mother, 1909) as an affirmation of the author’s vision of ‘ideal’ womanhood, one which is aligned with the visions of reformers involved in the projects of Turkish nationalism and modernisation. This article presents an analysis of the novel that both incorporates and goes beyond such accounts. Instead of focusing on depictions of the heroine (Refika) as signs of female objectification or as reflections of Ad?var’s views on the woman question, the analysis focuses on the dialogic properties of the text in order to attend to the ways in which the heroine is presented as the locus of an ongoing conflict between her own aspirations for independence and the various opinions and judgements about her that are set within the discursive boundaries of ‘ideal’ womanhood. The analysis draws on Bakhtin’s theory of dialogism (and concepts related to it, in particular ‘authoritative and internally persuasive discourse’ and the notion of internal dialogue) and examines the tension between the hegemonic discourse that asserts the role of ‘ideal’ wife-mother and the dissenting voices in the text that provide insight into the heroine’s experiences and struggles for autonomy. In doing so, we can develop a sense of the polyvocal, dialogic and inconsistent depiction of the heroine while drawing out the texts’ critiques of the conventions of womanhood and marriage and their effects on women. By analysing such contradictory depictions of Refika, the article aims to draw attention to the way in which the text problematises the image of ‘ideal’ womanhood, whilst offering reflection on the novel’s concluding commentary on the woman struggle for agency and freedom.