New Books in Gender

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Priya Kandaswamy, "Domestic Contradictions: Race and Gendered Citizenship from Reconstruction to Welfare Reform" (Duke UP, 2021) Sep 24, 2021

Show notes

In Domestic Contradictions: Race and Gendered Citizenship from Reconstruction to Welfare Reform(Duke UP, 2021), Priya Kandaswamy analyzes how race, class, gender, and sexuality shaped welfare practices in the United States alongside the conflicting demands that this system imposed upon Black women. She turns to an often-neglected moment in welfare history, the advent of the Freedmen's Bureau during Reconstruction, and highlights important parallels with welfare reform in the late twentieth century. Kandaswamy demonstrates continuity between the figures of the "vagrant" and "welfare queen" in these time periods, both of which targeted Black women. These constructs upheld gendered constructions of domesticity while defining Black women's citizenship in terms of an obligation to work rather than a right to public resources. Pushing back against this history, Kandaswamy illustrates how the Black female body came to represent a series of interconnected dangers-to white citizenship, heteropatriarchy, and capitalist ideals of productivity -and how a desire to curb these threats drove state policy. In challenging dominant feminist historiographies, Kandaswamy builds on Black feminist and queer of color critiques to situate the gendered afterlife of slavery as central to the historical development of the welfare state.

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Minna Salami, "Sensuous Knowledge: A Black Feminist Approach for Everyone" (Amistad, 2021) Sep 17, 2021

Show notes

Minna Salami's book Sensuous Knowledge: A Black Feminist Approach for Everyone(Amistad/HarperCollins, 2021)is a collection of thought provoking essays that explore questions central to how we see ourselves, our history, and our world.

-What does it mean to be oppressed?

-What does it mean to be liberated?

-Why do women choose to follow authority even when they can be autonomous?

-What is the cost of compromising one’s true self?

-What narratives particularly subjugate women and people of African heritage?

-What kind of narrative can heal and empower?

As she considers these questions, Salami offers fresh insights on key cultural issues that impact women’s lives, including power, beauty, and knowledge. She also examines larger subjects, such as Afrofuturism, radical Black feminism, and gender politics, all with a historical outlook that is also future oriented. Combining a storyteller’s narrative playfulness and a social critic’s intellectual rigor, Salami draws upon a range of traditions and ideologies, feminist theory, popular culture—including insights from Ms. Lauryn Hill, Beyoncé, Audre Lorde, Toni Morrison, and others—science, philosophy, African myths and origin stories, and her own bold personal narrative to establish a language for change and self-liberation.

Sensuous Knowledge inspires reflection and challenge us to formulate or own views. Using ancestral knowledge to steer us toward freedom, Salami reveals the ways that women have protested over the years in large and small ways—models that inspire and empower us to define our own sense of womanhood today.

In this riveting meditation, Salami ask women to break free of the prison made by ingrained male centric biases, and build a house themselves—a home that can nurture us all.

Learn more about author Minna Salami at the MsAfropolitan blog.

Lee M. Pierce (she/they) is an Assistant Professor at SUNY Geneseo specializing in rhetoric, race, and U.S. political culture. They also host the Media & Communications and Language channels for New Books Network and their own podcast titled RhetoricLee Speaking.

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Ginetta Candelario on Feminism, Race, and Transnationalism Sep 16, 2021

Show notes

Welcome to The Academic Life. You are smart and capable, but you aren’t an island and neither are we. So we are reaching across our mentor network to bring you podcasts on everything from how to finish that project, to how to take care of your beautiful mind. Wish we’d bring on an expert about something? DM us on Twitter: The Academic Life @AcademicLifeNBN.

In this episode you’ll hear about: Dr. Ginetta Candelario’s path from journalism-major-hopeful to sociologist, how her family history shaped her intellectual questions, what inspired her to return to Smith after campus racism drove her out, a model for building an intentional community, editing a journal dedicated to the scholarship and voices of women of color, and a discussion of Meridians: 20th Anniversary Reader.

Our guest is: Dr. Ginetta Candelario, who is a faculty affiliate of the Latin American and Latina/o Studies Program, the Study of Women and Gender Program, and the Community Engagement and Social Change Concentration at Smith College. She is the founding vice president of the National Latin@ Studies Association, and a founding executive committee member of the New England Consortium for Latina/o Studies, and was appointed by the American Sociological Association to its Committee on Professional Ethics for 2017–20 and to the Finance Committee for 2021-2024. Dr. Candelario is widely published, serves on editorial boards, and is a peer reviewer. Her research interests include Dominican history and society, with a focus on national identity formation and women’s history; Blackness in the Americas; Latin American, Caribbean and Latina feminisms; Latina/o communities (particularly Cuban, Dominican and Puerto Rican); U.S. beauty culture; and museum studies. She has been a Fulbright Scholar in the Dominican Republic twice, and has been the editor of Meridians: feminism, race, transnationalism since July 2017.

Our host is: Dr. Christina Gessler, the co-creator and co-producer of the Academic Life podcasts. She is a historian of women and gender.

Listeners to this episode may be interested in:

Dr. Candelario’s Ted Talk
Meridians’ materials referenced in the podcast
Meridians' portal for submissions
Cien años de feminismos dominicanos, 1865-1965. Tomo I: El fuego detrás de las ruinas, 1865-1931. Co-edited by Ginetta Candalario, April J. Mayes, and Elizabeth Manley, Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic: Archivo General de la Nación, 2016.
Black Behind the Ears: Dominican Racial Identity from Museums to Beauty Shops, Durham: Duke University Press, December 2007.
Salome by Julia Alvarez
Almanac of the Dead by Leslie Marmon Silko
Democracy in Chains by Nancy McClean
YouTube recording of the Meridians’ 20th anniversary celebration talks

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Teri A. McMurtry-Chubb, "Race Unequals: Overseer Contracts, White Masculinities, and the Formation of Managerial Identity in the Plantation Economy" (Lexington, 2021) Sep 14, 2021

Show notes

Teri A. McMurtry-Chubb is the author of Race Unequals: Overseer Contracts, White Masculinities, and the Formation of Managerial Identity in the Plantation Economy, published by Lexington Books in 2021. Race Unequals takes a look at the complex relationship between enslavers and overseers in order to explore the ways in which the “white South” was not a monolithic identity, but one in which white male identity was constantly created, contested, and compromised over. By examining contracts, public law, and plantation management, McMurtry-Chubb shows how the plantation not only created one of the nation’s first class of managerial people, but how this system stymied upward mobility, created and controlled social boundaries, and furthered white supremacy.

Teri A. McMurtry-Chubb is a Professor of Law and Associate Dean for Research and Faculty Development at the University of Illinois Chicago Law School.

Derek Litvak is a PhD candidate at the University of Maryland—College Park. His dissertation, "The Specter of Black Citizens: Race, Slavery, and Citizenship in the Early United States," examines how citizenship was used to both bolster the institution of slavery and exclude Black Americans from the body politic.

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Shlomit Naim Naor, "The Things We Are Not Talking About" (2020) Sep 13, 2021

Show notes

Shlomit Naim Naor’s poetry is a unique voice in Israel. She is inviting the readers to delve deeper and engage in a dialogue with the Jewish religion and texts which are relevant to the most banal, everyday life. In her poetry, Naim Naor searches for places to which the Divine is NOT welcome, like abortions or the Oncology Department. She openly speaks about the (un)meaningful lives of single (religious) women and more. In her sensitive way she shares with us her personal journey as an Orthodox Jewish woman who lives in Jerusalem, but her words speak universally to all of us. In this podcast we will focus on her books: No End in Sight (2016) and The Things We Are Not Talking About (2020).

Shlomit Naim Naor is a poet, an educator and a religious feminist. She lives in Jerusalem with her partner and their three daughters.

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Postscript: The Changing Landscape of Abortion Politics Sep 13, 2021

Show notes

Today’s Postscript (a special series that allows scholars to comment on pressing contemporary issues) engages the latest chapter in American abortion politics as the United States Supreme Court has just allowed a Texas statute banning abortions after 6 weeks to go into effect. Lilly Goren and Susan Liebell have assembled a panel of experts in political science and law to interrogate the construction of the Texas law, the Supreme Court ruling, and how these cases map onto the wider political landscape.

Dr. Renée Ann Cramer is a Professor of Law, Politics, and Society at Drake University -- and the author of Birthing a Movement: Midwives, Law, and the Politics of Reproductive Care from Stanford University Press, 2021.

Dr. Rebecca Kreitzer is an Associate Professor of Public Policy and an Adjunct Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill -- and the author of some of the most downloaded articles in political science on the policy environment in which abortion laws are passed. Her most recent work, “Anti-Abortion Policymaking and Women’s Representation” (co-authored with Reingold, Beth, Tracy L. Osborn, and Michele Swers) appears in Political Research Quarterly.

Dr. Andrew R. Lewis is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Cincinnati and the author of The Rights Turn in Conservative Christian Politics: How Abortion Transformed the Culture Wars (Cambridge, 2017). He writes at the intersection of politics, religion, and law in America with expertise in Evangelicals and politics, conservative legal activism, and rights politics.

Dr. Joshua C. Wilson is Professor of Political Science at the University of Denver -- and the . author of The Street Politics of Abortion: Speech, Violence, & America’s Culture Wars and The New States of Abortion Politics both from Stanford University Press 2013 and 2016. His article “Striving to Rollback or Protect Roe: State Legislation and the Trump-Era Politics of Abortion appeared in Publius last summer.

Dr. Mary Ziegler is a Stearns Weaver Miller Professor at Florida State University College of Law. She is the author of Abortion and the Law in America: A Legal History, Roe v. Wade to the Present (Cambridge University Press, 2020) and has a forthcoming book Dollars for Life: The Antiabortion Movement and the Fall of the Republican Establishment expected from Yale University Press, 2022).

Daniella Campos assisted with this podcast.

Susan Liebell is Dirk Warren '50 Professor of Political Science at Saint Joseph’s University in Philadelphia. Lilly J. Goren is professor of political science at Carroll University in Waukesha, WI.

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Sara E. Lampert, "Starring Women: Celebrity, Patriarchy, and American Theater, 1790-1851" (U Illinois Press, 2020) Sep 10, 2021

Show notes

Women performers played a vital role in the development of American and transatlantic entertainment, celebrity culture, and gender ideology. In Starring Women: Celebrity, Patriarchy, and American Theater, 1790-1851 (U Illinois Press, 2020), Sara E. Lampert examines the lives, careers, and fame of overlooked figures from Europe and the United States whose work in melodrama, ballet, and other stage shows shocked and excited early U.S. audiences. These women lived and performed the tensions and contradictions of nineteenth-century gender roles, sparking debates about women's place in public life. Yet even their unprecedented wealth and prominence failed to break the patriarchal family structures that governed their lives and conditioned their careers. Inevitable contradictions arose. The burgeoning celebrity culture of the time forced women stage stars to don the costumes of domestic femininity even as the unsettled nature of life in the theater defied these ideals. A revealing foray into a lost time, Starring Women returns a generation of performers to their central place in the early history of American theater.

Andy Boyd is a playwright based in Brooklyn, New York. He is a graduate of the playwriting MFA at Columbia University, Harvard University, and the Arizona School for the Arts.

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Angelica Malin, "She Made It: The Toolkit for Female Founders in the Digital Age" (Kogan Page, 2021) Sep 09, 2021

Show notes

Today I talked to Angelica Malin about her new book She Made It: The Toolkit for Female Founders in the Digital Age (Kogan Page, 2021).

Female entrepreneurs don’t tend to receive the same funding assistance as do their male counterparts, but in turn they have the advantage of often connecting more effectively with their target markets. It’s their soft skills, in effect, that can see them through observes Angelica Malin. Plus one should never forget the power of having a greater purpose, a sense of mission by, for instance, by addressing a need that other, often male entrepreneurs may overlook. This guest has no fear of public speaking, whatsoever – and it shows. This is a very engaging episode as Angelica gives crisp, lively answers to questions like: why it helps to be personal and quirky in addressing journalists, how Instagram has changed in recent years, and how Taylor Swift helped make She Made It possible.

Angelica Malin is the Editor-in-Chief of About Time Magazine and the U.K.’s rising voice for championing women founders and entrepreneurs. She’s appeared on the BBC News and LBC Business Hour and has been featured in The Telegraph, Forbes, and Real Business.

Dan Hill, PhD, is the author of nine books and leads Sensory Logic, Inc. (https://www.sensorylogic.com). His new book is Blah, Blah, Blah: A Snarky Guide to Office Politics. To check out his related “Dan Hill’s EQ Spotlight” blog, visit https://emotionswizard.com.

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Gender Ideologies, Conservative Christianity, and Legislation in the U.S. Sep 08, 2021

Show notes

Gender, and regulations of and discourses on it, have historically been a cornerstone of the conservative Christian belief system. The stance of the Catholic Church on feminism, for instance, has often been criticized for being reductive and exclusionary. As Christianity has exerted a profound influence on the government and principles of the United States from the time of its founding, in this modern age, it is natural to examine the extent of its influence on LGBTQ-related, and particularly trans-related legislation.

In the fourth episode of our themed series Across the Rainbow, Dr. SJ Crasnow, Assistant Professor of Religious Studies at Rockhurst University, Kansas City, and author of the article “The Legacy of ‘Gender Ideology.” Dr. Crasnow talks to us about the current state of anti-trans legislation in the U.S., and the role played by conservative Christianity in shaping it.

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Jan Bardsley, "Maiko Masquerade: Crafting Geisha Girlhood in Japan" (U California Press, 2021) Sep 06, 2021

Show notes

Maiko Masquerade: Crafting Geisha Girlhood in Japan(University of California Press, 2021) explores Japanese representations of the maiko, or apprentice geisha, in films, manga, and other popular media as an icon of exemplary girlhood. Dr. Jan Bardsley traces how the maiko, long stigmatized as a victim of sexual exploitation, emerges in the 2000s as the chaste keeper of Kyoto’s classical artistic traditions. Insider accounts by maiko and geisha, their leaders and fans, show pride in the training, challenges, and rewards maiko face. No longer viewed as a toy for men’s amusement, she serves as catalyst for women’s consumer fun. This change inspires stories of ordinary girls—and even one boy—striving to embody the maiko ideal, engaging in masquerades that highlight questions of personal choice, gender performance, and national identity.

Dr. Jan Bardsley is Professor Emerita of Asian Studies at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill.

Emily Ruth Allen (@emmyru91) is a PhD candidate in Musicology at Florida State University. She is currently working on a dissertation about parade musics in Mobile, Alabama’s Carnival celebrations.

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