Feminist

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain In 2022, a social network was formed in New York for women to share warnings about their interactions with men on dating apps. These were men who had allegedly lied, manipulated, cheated on, ghosted, used or abused them. Since then, "Are we dating the same guy?" (AWDTSG) groups have exploded online across Facebook and…

While her name is an awful mouthful, Barbara Leigh Smith Bodichon remains something of a Zelig figure. Pick up almost any book about Victorian literary circles and she’ll be in it somewhere. You see her here, you see her there, this much-admired artist and co-founder of Girton College, Cambridge, this cousin of Florence Nightingale and friend of George Eliot. In as much as she sticks in the mind when your attention is really supposed to be elsewhere, she is a pleasing, bustling kind of figure: independent, cheery, rather…

‘A middle-aged straight man’s fantasy about nymphomania’Samira Ahmed, presenter of Front Row on BBC Radio 4 and trustee of the Centre for Women’s JusticeI wanted to enjoy Poor Things. Emma Stone is a terrific actor, Mark Ruffalo a genuine good guy activist playing a cad. Hilarious! But Bella, Stone’s character, has an infant’s brain – and the consent issue for a woman with learning difficulties is a blazing red flag. She embarks on a “voyage of self-discovery” which leads, quickly, to an insatiable desire for sex with as…

It is roughly 58 years since Jodie Foster’s first acting role and there are things she won’t put up with on set. She won’t be told how to get into character. She won’t tolerate what she calls “­voodoo” directing, that is am-dram, shake-your-body-out ­nonsense. She won’t respond to certain types of “alpha” interference from people up the industry chain. (The only time Foster submits to bossy producers, she says, is when they are “super passive-aggressive ­British ­people” – a type she just can’t resist.) In work mode, and…

Get our free weekly email for all the latest cinematic news from our film critic Clarisse LoughreyGet our The Life Cinematic email for freeAmerica Ferrera has responded to complaints that her popular monologue from Greta Gerwig’s Barbie film “oversimplifies feminism”.The Ugly Betty star appeared in the highest-grossing film of 2023 as Gloria, an employee of toy company Mattel who ends up helping Barbie (Margot Robbie) when she ends up in the real world.In one of the film’s most talked-about moments, Ferrera delivers a…

Thelma & Louise remains one of Hollywood’s most treasured classics, but the film was nearly derailed at every turn. First was the task of getting it made in the first place. The screenplay behind the iconic 1991 release, written by Callie Khouri, floated around Hollywood for several years before finally getting picked up, and was referred to by its many dismissive detractors as simply “two b*tches in a car.” Nice. The task of casting was also a massive hurdle, and saw a huge number of names considered, and even…

Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain Kimberly Killen was an undergraduate at Wellesley College, which counts Hillary Rodham Clinton as an alumna, during the 2008 presidential election—in which Clinton was an early candidate. "That election was a complete eye-opener," Killen recalls. "Here I was 19, 20 years old, and my brain was…

Urdu poetry seldom goes beyond the reductive vision of women in classical imagery and decorous rhymes. The anguish and despair of a woman seeking solace from gender inequities and exploring her identity in a world beset by male desire rarely translates into an astonishing burst of creativity. Few Urdu poets have derided the tendency to reduce women to objects of beauty to be confined to the domestic sphere. Nor have they attempted to portray the multiple identities of this “exotic creature”. To do so requires a lengthy…

Xan, the creator of the comic strip "Promptlypaneled," has a knack for capturing the humorous, absurd, and ironic moments that resonate with many in their daily lives.With a dedicated following of 5.079k on Instagram, Xan's work gained popularity even before the 2019 pandemic. What sets Xan's comics apart is the infusion of a feminist perspective, adding a unique dimension to the humor. These comics are a delightful exploration of everyday experiences that are sure to bring a smile to your face as you scroll through…

Depending on your age, you likely either have some feelings about Shere Hite or know nothing about her. In 1976, Hite, an independent researcher of qualitative experience, sparked a “revolution in the bedroom”, as Ms Magazine put it, with her anonymous surveys on female sexuality. Namely, as she stated often and without equivocation, that women knew how to have orgasms when and how they wanted, with or without intercourse.The Hite Report was an immediate bestseller – it has sold over 48m copies worldwide – and turned Hite…