“Dreams are extremely important. You can’t do it unless you can imagine it.”

Tags

Dreams for women, YWLP

These postcards were sent by the Young Women Leaders Program, a mentoring program sponsored by the UCF Women’s Studies Program. YWLP originated at the University of Virginia, and UCF launched the program in the Orlando community. YWLP promotes middle school girls’ leadership abilities, pairing collegiate women with middle school girls.

What are your dreams for yourself, your friends, your sisters, your daughters? Paint, draw, write, sketch, or decoupage your dreams on a postcard and send it to us.

“We must be the change we wish to see.”

Tags

Dreams for women, YWLP

These postcards were sent by the Young Women Leaders Program, a mentoring program sponsored by the UCF Women’s Studies Program. YWLP originated at the University of Virginia, and UCF launched the program in the Orlando community. YWLP promotes middle school girls’ leadership abilities, pairing collegiate women with middle school girls.

What are your dreams for yourself, your friends, your sisters, your daughters? Paint, draw, write, sketch, or decoupage your dreams on a postcard and send it to us.

“If you have knowledge, let others light their candles in it.”

Tags

Dreams for women, young women leaders, YWLP

These postcards were sent by the Young Women Leaders Program, a mentoring program sponsored by the UCF Women’s Studies Program. YWLP originated at the University of Virginia, and UCF launched the program in the Orlando community. YWLP promotes middle school girls’ leadership abilities, pairing collegiate women with middle school girls.

What are your dreams for yourself, your friends, your sisters, your daughters? Paint, draw, write, sketch, or decoupage your dreams on a postcard and send it to us.

“History is herstory too.”

Tags

Dreams for women, Young Women Leaders Program, YWLP

These postcards were sent by the Young Women Leaders Program, a mentoring program sponsored by the UCF Women’s Studies Program. YWLP originated at the University of Virginia, and UCF launched the program in the Orlando community. YWLP promotes middle school girls’ leadership abilities, pairing collegiate women with middle school girls.

Help support Antigone Magazine and the Dreams for Women project by purchasing our 2011 Calendar in collaboration with Women’s Worlds.

“Women’s empowerment is intertwined with respect for human rights.”

Tags

Dreams for women

What are your dreams for yourself, your friends, your sisters, your daughters? Paint, draw, write, sketch, or decoupage your dreams on a postcard and send it to us.

Help support Antigone Magazine and the Dreams for Women project by purchasing our 2011 Calendar in collaboration with Women’s Worlds.

The Preliminary UNCSW 54 Post-Mortem

Tags

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!

Tags

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

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.

And… we’re back! / Dreams for Women Week 27

Greetings, all! Amanda and Kaitlin are away finishing theses and wrapping up loose ends, so I’ll be posting Dreams for Women postcards from now on (because I rock and am awesome [says Amanda]). Here are some long overdue postcards, as promised. Keep them coming!

A special thanks to Anne Prampart, who made us the beautiful envelope and message (the first three below). Merci, Anne!

What are your dreams for women?

What are your own dreams for yourself, your friends, your sisters, your daughters? Paint, draw, write, sketch or decoupage your dreams on a postcard and send or e-mail it to the address below:

Antigone Magazine
c/o WILLA UBC
Box 61-6138
SUB Boulevard
Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1Z1
OR antigonemagazine(at)hotmail.com

————————————————————————–

What is Antigone Magazine? We’re a grassroots national magazine that works to encourage young women to get involved in politics in Canada. We work to empower young women to engage politically and civically and to actively take part in leadership roles. We are raising money in order to help launch the Antigone Foundation, a national foundation that will encourage young women aged 10-30 to get politically and civically engaged. Help support Antigone as we help to make the dreams of young women come true!

Tell Mayor Sullivan Your Priorities — Come to the Citizen Budget Forum

Dear friend,

What kind of city do you want Vancouver to be? Will we see deep cuts to the
Parks Board, more shifting of the commercial tax base to residential taxpayers, or stepped-up investment in affordable housing to address our deepening homeless crisis?

Each year, the City of Vancouver holds a public consultation process for the upcoming civic budget. Think City wants to bring more people into this process so more Vancouverites can get informed and more citizens can be heard.

Think City and the University of British Columbia ‘s Political Science Department invite you to learn about, discuss and deliberate the 2008 City of Vancouver budget on the evening of March 19, 2008. HSBC Hall, UBC Robson Square , 7:00-9:30 pm, 800 Robson Street, Vancouver.

Space is limited so sign up today for this exciting evening of conversation:
http://thinkcity.ca/event_signup

Make sure your voice is heard, when city council decides the priorities for this year’s budget!

Think City’s survey and more information can be found at
http://www.thinkcity.dreamvancouver.ca
or contact us at
budget_talks@hotmail.com