Your Hockey is my Birthing Story

I happen to be one of 2 female trustees on a school board of 7. This translates into 28% female elected representation on our board which is significantly higher than the national rate of female representation in municipal, provincial, territorial and federally elected seats which sits at about 21%**… though maybe the participation rate will be higher after this most recent election.

At any rate, even though there’s 28% female representation in that room, sometimes being 2 out of 7 feels a bit outnumbered. Especially given that a lot of the Administrators that are in these meetings are also men.

Now I know that some women watch hockey. I definitely KNOW in my heart that when everyone in the room starts talking about hockey except for the only women present, that they aren’t purposefully trying to exclude us. People talk about things they know, things they have in common, they use these topics to build relationships. I do it too, if I know someone has a boat, I talk to them about it because thats what we have in common.  BUT….

The Preliminary UNCSW 54 Post-Mortem

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Commission on the Status of Women, United Nations

This is the final part of a series on the 54th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. Click on a link to read further.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7 , Part 8 , Part 9
I will probably write more than just one post-mortem on the 54th Commission of the Status of Women for me. I’m writing while staying up too late in Calgary, waiting impatiently to be home with my kids, and have stayed up to that point that I’m scared that if I go to sleep that I will miss my plane.

I didn’t actually get to see Senator Clinton. I had referred to her in my tweets, facebook and blog as “Hillary” and some other tweeple sent out a message to people blogging and tweeting the CSW asking that we refer to the Senator by her proper title. The Feminist communication on this is that when people refer to male politicians they do so by either the proper title and last name, or simply last name.

I suppose referring to a public or professional official by their first name kind of implies a familiarity that isn’t seen as respectful as the title-last-name thing. I’m not that picky about much. I usually refer to people by name because I’m never totally sure of their proper titles (unless it’s an easy one like “president” or “minister”) and I’m usually too lazy to google.

All of that, however, is secondary to the fact that I didn’t actually get to see her address the United Nations on the last day of the CSW. I did wait for over two hours in a line where I was shouted at by UN security personnel. I started livetweeting that after one of the security guards yelled viciously at a woman who looked over seventy. She had approached the guard because she wasn’t sure which line she should have been in.

Antigone Launches Feminist Social Networking Site on International Women’s Day!

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Blog for IWD, canadian, change., feminist, movement, social networking, women

This post is part of Blog for International Women’s Day

Hi Friends!

Happy International Women’s Day!
My name is Amanda Reaume and I am the Executive Director of The Antigone Foundation. We believe it’s time for Canada’s feminists and women’s organizations to work together to leverage the power of social networking to connect around common causes and concerns across the country, both online and in person.

That is why we are launching Antigone Connect , an online site working to engage women’s organizations and feminists across the country to work collaboratively for women’s rights and equality in Canada and around the world.

Our Goal:

We are hoping to create a powerful online network that will be able to help lead the Canadian women’s movement forward in the coming years. As we approach Canada’s 150th Anniversary, we are all aware that there is a great deal more to be done in Canada to ensure women’s equality. More women in politics and managerial positions, accessible child care, changes to the Indian Act, equal pay, and equal pensions are just a few of the things that the Royal Commission on the Status of Women identified as necessary for equality nearly fifty years ago. They have still not been fully realized and this is going to take cooperation and coordination to accomplish.

Canadian Women’s History

This past fall, Antigone Magazine put together an issue about Canadian Women’s History and we spoke to Marilou McPhedran. She talked about how women organized around constitutional issues in the 1980s to ensure that women were included within the Charter of Rights and Freedoms. As McPhedran mentions, they did this without even a fax machine. With phone trees, letters to MPs and a lot of conviction, these women changed our country. We can too. Many of us now have access to e-mail, the internet, social networking, maybe even Blackberries and Smartphones. Some also have well paying jobs and contacts with women and men in power who support work for women’s equality. We owe it to our foremothers to leverage all the technologies and privileges that we have to connect and make sure that their legacies are not forgotten.

Your Help

But this network is not going to happen overnight. We need your help in the days and weeks ahead to expand it and bring to the table the voices of women from all backgrounds, from groups that might not readily identify as feminists, or those who might have difficulties accessing the internet, and the voices of women and men that are allies to the work that we do. We need you to tell people about it. To e-mail your contacts about it. To post it on Facebook or Twitter. To contact your friends who might have worked for feminist causes in the past but who have gone off in other directions. To help the technically unsavvy negotiate the technology! We need to come together to create this network across Canada.

Canadian Women’s Future!

Inspired by the next issue of our magazine (to be released in March 2010) entitled The Future of Feminism, we will be offering individuals and organizations opportunities to write about their visions for Canadian feminism. In blog entries, on Antigone Connect forums, on Dreams for Women postcards, and by leading online chats, we invite people to contribute to imagining the future of feminism. Email us at antigonemagazine at hotmail.com if you are interested in helping out.

Join Us

We launched this campaign this week and we are moved and excited by the response so far. It would be great to see you at Antigone Connect.

Thanks in advance for giving this a few minutes of your time, and for sharing this message with anyone you know who would like the women of Canada to unite together to transform our country.

Thank you!

Amanda Reaume and the Antigone Team

Executive Director, The Antigone Foundation
www.antigonefoundation.wordpress.com
Author and blogger, Some Leaders Are Born Women
www.someleadersarebornwomen.wordpress.com

photo credit: wikimedia commons

UNCSW 54 March 3rd

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Commission on the Status of Women, United Nations

This post is part of a series on the 54th United Nations Commission on the Status of Women. Click on a link to read further.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 8 , Part 9 , Part 10

March 3rd was the day that the United Nations Celebrated International Women’s Day. The occasion is celebrated a few days before the actual event to allow Delegates to the UN the chance to get home in time to celebrate with their communities.

I started the Day at the NGO general briefing at the Salvation Army. A South East Asian delegate asked if we could lobby for a resolution specific to women in extreme poverty and women with disability with our respective government meetings and regional caucuses. The Women’s Labour Congress also asked us to join them in their lobby for a resolution on women’s economic empowerment, and women from Arabic women’s caucus would like to see a resolution on women in occupied territories, and the general women’s labour group finished and released a draft of their open letter to the Secretary General about the long lines and poor state of the UNCSW.

After the NGO debrief I moved back to the main building and made my way to the overflow room (Conference Room 2) to watch the UN celebration of International Womens Day.

It was very nice, the Secretary General made a wonderful and engaging address. He spoke about the way that he honors women because he is a husband and a father and a grandfather. He talked about how important he felt it was for men throughout the world to recognize that violence against women is a direct violation of their inalienable human rights.

Political Mavens, Suzanne Anton

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Political Mavens

Introducing, Suzanne Anton, a member of the Vancouver City Council! She took some time to answer a few questions for us. An avid volunteer, athlete, mother, math teacher and Crown prosecutor, Councillor Suzanne Anton clearly has a broad set of skills that she brings to the political arena. Before her position as Councillor, Suzanne served on many committees, boards, and associations, as well as a Park Board Commissioner. She has had several different roles on the Vancouver City Council; you can get a full biography, more information, updates and a view of her goals at her website: http://www.suzanneanton.ca

Q: How and why did you get involved in politics?

A: I was president of our local community soccer club and advocated for facilities and programs.  One day a light went on, and I realised I could run for the Vancouver Park Board and accomplish these things at the political level.  Until that moment (1999), it had never once in my life crossed my mind that I might go into politics.

Q: Why do you think women should get involved in politics?

A: Everyone who is interested should get involved in politics.  Women are underrepresented at most levels of government and most elected bodies; there is always a need for good women candidates.

Q: Have you ever experienced any discrimination as a woman in politics? If so, describe your experiences and how you handled them.

A: Some writers are particularly harsh – and only about women.  People are much more willing to comment on women’s looks and demeanor.

Q: What issues are you passionate about?

A: As a civic politician, I am most passionate about issues around how we build a better city – better for the environment, for families, and for businesses and the economy.

Q: If you could change one thing about politics, what would it be?

A: It is said women are more collaborative.  That is something I would love to see but do not.  All politics are intensely political, which seems as though it might be self-evident.  However policy should come first and politics second.

Q: Do you consider yourself a feminist? Why or why not?

A: I am indeed a feminist.  Women and girls do well in many areas, but there are still gaps, and politics is one of them.

Political Mavens, Jacqueline Biollo

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Political Mavens

Jacqueline Biollo is our second Political Maven! She is a Councillor for the town of Beaumont, Alberta. As an elected official, she wishes to educate and inform herself and her constituents about the issues, advocating for action, and ensuring transparency and accountability, sound judgment, integrity, conviction and passion to inspire. She is also the Executive Director for A Songbird’s Solo and boasts a variety of accomplishments, including founding an initiative called ArtStart, which was developed to give children in the inner city the opportunity to be exposed to the arts as well as the opportunity to develop their talents by establishing a multi-disciplinary arts education program. She took some time with us to talk about women in politics.

Q: How and why did you get involved in politics?

A: Always having been involved and engaged with matters of the community at large, and in some cases, for specific initiatives, it seemed a complimentary role that I might be approached and asked to run in an upcoming political election.  Having a young family, a solid career and other interests and hobbies, I took some time to weigh the pros and cons of an endeavour such as politics, whilst aligning myself with more community groups and becoming more self-educated on local issues and municipal governance.

Q: Why do you think women should get involved in politics?

A: Women should get involved with politics because they want to, because they have self confidence, a strong dedication to research and a belief in the democratic system.  Although many (both men and women) get involved with politics perhaps initially because of a particular cause/issue, I applaud individuals who are able to actively engage themselves in all agenda items and remain open to options and alternatives within the appropriate legislative proceedings.

Q: What issue do you see as particularly important for women?

A: Issues of importance to women should be no different than they are for a man – although I acknowledge that we may come at it from a different angle, or pose different questions, raise concerns, or champion something more intensely because of our natural tendency to seek collaborative solutions, put human attributes into perspective where applicable, and typically work towards a win-win solution rather than a one-upmanship or self-motivated one.

Q: Have you ever experienced any discrimination as a woman in politics? If so, describe your experiences and how you handled them.

A: Discrimination is also self-destructive (if you let it get the better of you) but that doesn’t mean it should be tolerated… so although there have been some obvious (or underlying) challenges in my political career, I have met each as a stand-alone situation, and if/when required, sought the support and advice of others within my network of colleagues, friends and family to pull me through.  My slogan has been to focus on the People ~ Possibility ~ and Potential of things (including myself), so I look at hurdles as simply something I need to overcome, work to educate myself better on, and ensure a similar situation doesn’t lend itself to happening again.

Q: What issues are you passionate about?

A: I’m passionate about encouraging and empowering others, about positive thinking, and about “thinking outside the box.”  I’m a risk taker, one with compassion and understanding… and although many might say my slogan SHOULD be “go big or go home.” What’s life if you’re not having a bit of fun in it as well?

Q:  If you could change one thing about politics, what would it be?

A: That we get back to the knowledge and understanding (and appreciation for) the democratic system; that politicians are people too – and that although we do make mistakes, we have the best interest of the electorate at hand, have tried to educate ourselves to the best of our abilities with the resources available, and progress at times can be steady and slow.

Q: What is your Dream for Women?

A: My Dream for Women is that they will find confidence in themselves (even when they think no one else does) and that they too champion something they are passionate about. Seek to leave your own legacy.

Q: Do you consider yourself a feminist? Why or why not?

A: Although not a feminist, I do applaud women who have been able to find their niche within the seemingly untraditional roles or professions. Further, I applaud ongoing efforts to allow any select group (visible minorities, persons with disabilities, women, etc.) to obtain additional (educational) resources which might allow them to be (more) successful and/or open new door of opportunity for them… in my opinion a ‘battle’ of the sexes does not seem productive now or with sustainability for the future.

Q: What advice do you have for young women?

A: My advice for young women is to believe in yourself, chart your path, take and acknowledge small opportunities and ‘wins’ to advance you further, give of yourself freely, volunteer, and seek out individuals to whom you respect and ask them to mentor you.

Political Mavens, Mira Hall

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Political Mavens

Hello!

I am Megan, a brand new face to Antigone, but excited to be starting up a new column here focusing on the female political leaders. Political Mavens will be talking to the women who are hard working within government to get something done about feminist issues, among many other things.

Introducing our first change-maker: Mira Hall

Mira Hall (Yellowknife, NT – pictured RIGHT) is studying political economics and pursuing a career in policy development relating to food security and affordable housing.  Mira is employed at the Centre for Northern Families where she provides a range of family support and community outreach services. Mira was once roommates with Antigone Magazine Editor Amanda Reaume when they were both delegates to the UN’s Commission on the Status of Women. This past fall, Mira ran for School Trustee in Yellowknife District 1 and won!

1. How and why did you get involved in politics?

I have always been politically active. My mother is an activist and she always encouraged me to be involved in the work that she was doing, or work that she saw others doing that she supported. I think that I was reluctant for a long time out of rebelliousness. At the end of the day I really care about community, about reducing marginalization, and I’m too passionate to stay away from politics.

2. Why do you think women should get involved in politics?

I think that women are the best qualified to represent women’s perspectives in government. For too long we have trusted that our male counterparts could represent our interests when they shape the policy that shapes our lives, but they haven’t been women so they couldn’t possibly have as deep an understanding of what our interests are as we do.

This was illustrated to me vividly during a forum during the last territorial election. Candidates were asked why they thought women weren’t participating in trades and non-traditional employment and how they as MLAs would encourage women’s economic participation in the lucrative employment opportunities provided by mining, oil and gas. The only candidate who pointed out that mothers aren’t often able to find childcare for the full two weeks that a standard camp rotation would be and that many mothers be unwilling to leave their children for two weeks out of every month was a mother of three.

3. What issue do you see as particularly important for women?

I think women’s economic independence is the number one issue for me, and that many other issues that women face are a direct result of their economic dependence. There is a persistent wage gap between men and women in Canada, and women are still structurally excluded from some types of employment.

The other issues that rank highly for me are violence against women, child apprehension, and the feminization of poverty.

4. Have you ever experienced any discrimination as a woman in politics? If so, describe your experiences and how you handled them.

Any discrimination that I notice is pretty subversive, and is rarely directed right at me in my presence. Although I notice that it seems to be women who are hardest on me and on other female candidates. I hear women calling female candidates things like “bitch,” “crazy,” “slut” and “shit-disturber,” generally when I hear the comments about male politicians and candidates the worst is “crazy” or “useless.” It makes me sad that women aren’t more supportive of each other.

It reminds me (as someone who is not affiliated to any party) of how leftists cling to the idea that Conservatives are “anti-woman” but in Canada they can claim the first female Prime Minister, and in the US they ran Sarah Palin. Leftist women are the first to say “well, they don’t really count” for whatever reason, and yet the “pro-woman” parties don’t even give us women “who don’t count.” They just keep feeding us “pro-woman” men. I’m really hoping that there is drastic change coming and that women step up and are supported by their parties and their communities.

5. What issues are you passionate about?

I suspect that all of my passions can be boiled down to “reducing marginalization.” I think that every school should be reflective of all the populations that share our community. Every school should be inclusive for girls and boys, for people with varying “ability,” for a variety of ethnicities and socio-economic backgrounds, and for fluid identities within those demographics. And not only should our schools be reflective of our multifaceted society, but our neighborhoods too, and our workplaces!

6. What is your dream for women?

My dream is to live in a world where each person can be both proud of their own culture, identity, and place in society as well as be loving and accepting of those who are different.

7. What advice do you have for young women?

Keep your chin up and know that no one can represent you or your demographic better than you! Change the world, and keep pushing!

Introducing: New Columns at Antigone Magazine

This fall, we are launching a number of exciting blog features and  columns! They are designed to engage in important conversations and to introduce you to amazing women. Over the years, we have met a lot of fabulous female politicians and feminists and we have unfortunately not been able to include them all in our print magazine.

And then we realized that we had a blog and could features whomever we wanted!

So, please welcome our new columns and columnists! They will be posting bi-weekly so look out for their content!

Political Mavens
By Megan Ryland
This column will feature interviews with awesome female politicians and candidates!

Feminists Who Totally Rock
By Emily Yakashiro
This column will feature interviews with awesome feminists who totally rock!

The Feminist Scholar
By Kaitlin Blanchard
This column will feature discussion of ongoing issues in feminist academia!

We will also be offering other blogs the opportunity to syndicate these columns on their blogs for free! To learn more about how you can publish one of these great columns on your blog (or Dreams for Women!) e-mail us at antigonemagazine@hotmail.com!

If you are interested in starting your own weekly or bi-weekly column we would LOVE to have you! E-mail us at antigonemagazine@hotmail.com

The Feminist Scholar: The Performance of Feminism Issue 1

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Battlestar Galactica, Female Presidents, Laura Roslin, Mary McDonnell, The Feminist Scholar

Surfacing the Female Leader: The Performance of Laura Roslin

I wasn’t going to blog on this until I had engaged the brilliant Mary McDonnell in her question and answer session at the Toronto sci-fi convention; however, she (sadly) had to leave to attend a memorial for one of the show’s producers–my condolences.

I’m in the process of organizing a paper on her character “Laura Roslin” and “her” relation to Western culture’s interpretations of female power. In my rush to develop my grant proposals on the position of the audience in post-restoration theatres and the intersections between theatre and activism, I have, sadly, put Laura to the side. However, meeting McDonnell and engaging in some interesting conversations with fellow fans has rekindled my urgency to discuss the character and her reflections of the tradition of the female leader’s body. Indeed, I’m reaching all the way back the mystics of the medieval era in order to examine how women in power become text; that is to say, how their bodies become the surface for ‘other’ discourses. One of the things which I find perhaps the most fascinating about “Laura” is the simultaneous omnipresence and absence of her body in the performance of leadership. Laura’s illness makes her body undeniably present insofar as it ‘escapes’ her attempts to diminish its presence through her countenance etc… , while at the same time, her illness renders the question of the gendered body perhaps a moot one. In a sense, her suffering both reveals and conceals the female body. I continue with perhaps too much philosophy below, but bear with me.

The suffering body, as Elaine Scarry has argued in her book The Body in Pain, cannot be represented in and of itself. That is, it requires ‘others’ to speak for it. Pain, for Scarry, is both universal and un-shareable. (Teresa Brennan has argued elsewhere that pain is perhaps the moment when the boundaries of the human dissolve most completely–an interesting point, which I will come to later.) But I digress, for Scarry, physical suffering is the paradox of simple presence: “…pain comes unsharably into our midst as at once that which cannot be denied and that which cannot be confirmed [by its sufferer]” (4). Pain, then, requires others in order to represent itself. Pain expresses itself through ventriloquism, an imitation which presupposes a split in presence (between the speaking mediator/performer and the suffering, inarticulate body).

The suffering body is a limit of mimesis (as a principle of absolute identity), but not necessarily the limit of catharsis (as a principle of partial identity). In displaying the suffering body in the performance of leadership, “Laura” engages with the subjunctive “as if” (Scarry 22) of pain as a relation of metonymy. That is, to ‘invent’ the suffering body is to represent it metonymically, through relations of partial substitution. “Laura” then comes to take on a series of discourses in order to perform pain. For viewers of the show, I suspect this prohibits reflection on the female body as a ‘absolute’ presence in leadership.

McDonnell makes a brilliant point in another interview discussing how her glasses symbolize yet another performance within Laura’s role. For McDonnell, the glasses act as a kind of mediating barrier between the femininity inherent in Laura’s leadership and her need to play the Machiavellian leader. She observes that glasses seem to act as an interpreter between the middle-aged woman’s countenance (in the political realm at least) and the world; almost as if we as a culture are not yet ready to view that which is the fact behind why so many female politicians have to adopt what might be considered very unforgiving demeanours: their very bodies. While she interprets this mediation as a result of the fact that women display their experience on their bodies, that they take-in the world differently from men, I would suggest that perhaps it simply that we as a culture are not ready to recognize female experience in this fashion. Indeed, if male politicians adopt what are understood to be maternal actions (crying, for example) they are criticized heavily. However, if women adopt cold and distancing politics they are praised and criticized in equal measure (ironically, in the case of criticism, for not being “feminine” enough). The feminine is, apparently, disavowed in the process of gaining political recognition. And this is where I will likely carry out the bulk of my discussion in the paper on the problematics of recognition. How do we ‘know’ people in a way that does not require an always-already formed knowledge of them; in other words, how do we know, how do we recognize without assuming a closed, or dominant bearing to others?

Teresa Brennan’s examination of the problematics of affective boundaries, of assuming that affects (emotions–though she wouldn’t like the use of this term) are owned, generated and contained by subjects might provide an answer. In the acknowlegement that we can be affected by others, that our boundaries do end and begin in others, that our intentions might not be solely our own, might lie the key to becoming more aware of our reactions to others. In other words, accepting that affects travel is to accept that we are not bounded; it is to stop living in fear of others. It is to surface the body so to speak. Until that day comes, however, McDonnell’s observations suggest another direction for understanding the feminine side to leadership.

McDonnell hits the nail on the head (yet again) with her observation here: “I read once in a Buddhist text, and it’s something I really responded to, that there’s a defensive way and an open way of perceiving life, or meeting life. In an open way, the image is straight back, open front – open heart. In a defensive way, the back is bent and the front is closed. I think the glasses were Laura Roslin’s attempt to keep the front open but protect it.”

I would translate this observation as what I (poaching from the equally brilliant Bettina Stuum) understand to be “bearing.” That is, our intentionality (as both a direction and a disposition) in our relations with others. An active bearing would assume an aggressive, or as McDonnell puts it a defensive, bearing, a kind of subjective lense on life. The person adopting an active “bearing” says “I am here” to life out of fear. While the person adopting a passive and more ethical (open to McDonnell) bearing responds to others; in other words, those adopting a passive bearing receive their agency and identity in an address from others (As Kelly Oliver has convincingly argued in her book Witnessing: Beyond Recognition) in a move which precludes the kind of performances which women leaders frequently have to put on in concessions to masculine ideas of leadership.

So where do we really have to look in order to recuperate the feminine side of leadership? Well, I would suggest it is not a question of looking; rather, it is a question of feeling. It is to give the feminine body what Eve Sedgewick suggestively calls “texture,” to read for the surface of the female body, rather than to inscribe upon it.

McDonnell has mentioned in an interview (I cannot remember the reference or I would note it) that she understands Battlestar as a show “searching for its femininity.” I wholeheartedly agree. I don’t know that Ron Moore’s answer of going back to the roots of survival–place–as a return to the maternal is perhaps the most adept answer to solving the deficit of female representation in politics, but it does suggest that women, as Luce Irigaray might agree, truly are the “elsewhere” when it comes to the political domain. Maybe, then, we just need to speak politics from that place, from our very womanly bodies…

~Kaitlin Blanchard

Antigone participates in Equal Voice Experiences

We’ve been featured! Check out the Equal Voice Experiences June newsletter here featuring our own Amanda Reaume, Kristen Myres, and Emily Yakashiro!

Experiences is a mentorship program that aims to engage girls and young women in learning and thinking about the impact of politics on their lives and how they might become involved.

For the most part, young women, don’t think like the average politician.

You’ve probably noticed this.
…
In fact, young people are very distinct in their way of thinking, and young women’s perspectives and priorities often differ from men’s.

That’s why it matters that your voices are heard, your views represented and your experiences considered.

Equal Voice has created Experiences for that very reason. Learn all about it – and some of the astonishing stories that inspired us – right here.