WMC News & Features
Honoring Helen Thomas
In the wake of veteran reporter Helen Thomas's resignation from the White House Press Corps after her controversial comments, photojournalist Jenny Warburg and urban educational leader Linda Belans honor Thomas's trailblazing career as a journalist.
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Indian Muslim Women: Excluded from Indian Feminism?
In India, the Dar-ul-Uloom's (an Islamic school propagating Sunni Islam in India) recently declared a new fatwa which states that it is un-Islamic for women to work with men and talk to them. The fatw...
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Belgian Burqa Ban
I just read an article about the vote in Belgium that led to a nationwide ban of wearing burqas in public.
On one hand, I can see where people who are for the ban are coming from. The burqa does have...
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Coming of Age
I have always thought the Jewish coming of age ritual for a girl was a Bat Mitzvah, the grasp of the Torah in ceremoniously manicured hands a rite of passage. Rachel Papo's photographs show me that th...
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The Headscarf
Right. Islam and feminism. What's the deal? I really don't know. I do appreciate the religion, though, as a lapsed Muslim, I'm probably not the best person to talk about this.
Still, I think I'm qual...
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it's funny cuz it's true...?
Apparently, there’s a whole range of animated sketches about Jordanians (and Arabs in general) up on Youtube. Now, I’m not saying they’re not humorous at all—a lot of people think they’re absolutely h...
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August 10, 2009 | Helen H |
Feminism,
International
'Til Death?
Marriage over here (in Jordan)—it’s been bothering me ever since I first started to understand it. This doesn’t happen with everyone, but it’s the way most religious or conservative families go about ...
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Assiya Rafiq is my hero
Assiya Rafiq of Pakistan was sold at 16 by a female family friend to two criminals who were related to prominent politicians. The men beat and raped her for the next year, un...
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Gender Equality and Religion: Using the Burqa Ban as a Jumping-Off Point
A little over a month ago, The Huffington Post put up an Associated Press article entitled “Sarkozy: Burqas Are ‘Not Welcome’ In France.” The gist of the article was that French President Nicolas Sar...
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July 22, 2009 | Helen H |
Feminism,
International
From the other side of the globe
I’m fifteen, and I live all the way in Amman, Jordan. I do get a lot of, “Jordan? Is that, like, behind California?” but that’s not the point. Jordan is a Middle-Eastern country—“Wow. Do you rid...
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July 14, 2009 | Baykan O |
Feminism,
International
The Social Politics of Young Turkish Women
Being that I am ethnically Turkish, to grasp precisely what the "Western" view of its social attitude toward women is, poses a number of difficulties. In casual conversation, people are far more comfo...
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July 07, 2009 | Becka W |
Feminism,
International
A Persepolis Reality
The hot, sunny days of summer always remind me of what it was like to be a kid – scrapes on my knees, no school, that familiar sound of the ice cream truck, sand in between my toes, shorts, tank tops,...
WMC News & Features
July 02, 2009 | Sahar Driver |
International
Movement or Revolution? Learning From Developments in Iran
Yesterday in Iran, presidential challenger Mir Hossein Mousavi called the government illegitimate and asked for protests to continue. Iranian-American commentator Sahar Driver tells us that, whatever happens in the near future, the reform movement has already achieved significant gains.
WMC News & Features
Obscure Beginnings to Justice for Abeer
While most of the country was focused on the election aftermath, former U.S. soldier Steven D. Green was quietly arraigned today at a U.S. courthouse in Louisville, Kentucky, three blocks from the Show n’ Tell Lounge advertising “girls, girls, girls.”
WMC News & Features
Military Justice System Fails One More Victim of Sexual Violence
The life stories of Jessica Brakey and Abeer Al-Janabi unfold a half a world apart. Yet the former Air Force Academy cadet and the dead Iraqi girl are both powerful symbols of women’s experience of sexual assault. The legal tales of both are curiously juxtaposed this fall in the military’s sprawling criminal justice system.