Pam’s Comments (group member since Dec 29, 2016)

Pam’s comments from the Our Shared Shelf group.

Jinkies! I'm late. Sorry everyone.

Day 14 of Women's History Month:

Baya Algerian artist

In 1947, when artist Baya Mahieddine was just 16 years old, she painted a radical image of a woman. Not just any woman, but a goddess-queen whose ovaries were marked by flamboyant birds and whose vulva was represented by a red-winged butterfly. Her crown was tall and swathed with flowers, and her gaze authoritative. She stared directly at the viewer with large, piercing eyes. Baya’s works depict exuberant scenes of women or nature. And there are no men.

This is significant because, until the last decade or so, Baya’s work had been defined (like so many women artists of her generation) by her relationships with the men who surrounded her. Historically, she’s been written about most often as an outsider, child artist discovered by the Parisian modernist art dealer Aimé Maeght and taken under the professional wing of superstar intellectuals and artists of the mid-20th century, like André Breton, Jean Dubuffet, and Pablo Picasso.

Baya was born Fatma Haddad in 1931, in a small, Muslim town in French-occupied Algeria. She was orphaned at a young age, and throughout her youth shuffled between the homes of various relatives. Eventually, in 1942, she was adopted by a French intellectual and art collector, Marguerite Camina Benhoura (Baya’s grandmother was Benhoura’s maid). As the story goes, Benhoura was taken by the young girl, in no small part due to the “fascinating small animals and strange female figures” she made out of dirt and sand.

Eyes are a focal point across nearly all of of Baya’s oeuvre. According to Boas, and other scholars like the Algerian writer Assia Djebar, they are also a key to understanding the artist’s artistic intentions. In their view, Baya’s depiction of the large, uncovered eye—or the “liberated eye,” as Djebar has described it—represents a reversal of the male gaze, a prominent element of Western figurative art in the artist’s time.
For Djebar, the stylistic (and potentially conceptual) choice also points to a liberation from the sexism inherent in the Muslim society in which Baya was raised. “Baya’s woman is equipped with a giant eye, which, agape, avidly desires flowers, fruits, sounds of lutes and guitars,” she wrote in a 1985 essay, reproduced in the exhibition catalogue. “Baya, the first in a chain of sequestered women, whose blindfold has, all of a sudden, fallen to the ground,” she continues.

While Baya’s subjects exude a liberated energy, some critics have noted that the artist herself remained manipulated and shackled by patriarchal forces throughout her life. At the age 20 Baya married celebrated Andalusian composer Mahyeddine Mahfoudh in 1953. He’s credited with inspiring many of the instruments that appear in her works, as well as what many people see as the melodious and harmonious atmosphere that her works seems to evoke.

One year following her marriage to Mahfoudh, Baya stopped painting, only returning to her artistic practice in the late 1960s. The reasons attributed to this break vary; some say it was to show solidarity with the revolution in Algeria, others that it was to raise her children. Whatever her reasons, the hiatus was temporary. From the 1960s on she continued to create works until the end of her life.

It was within her work that Baya found freedom. The world she painted, after all, is one where women assert their individuality and are free from the men who attempt to brand them with labels, keep them inside the home, or hold them back in any way. “If I change my paintings, I will no longer be Baya,” the artist said in 1991, after her husband died and she’d returned to painting. “When I paint, I am happy and I am in another world.”

https://www.artsy.net/article/artsy-e...

https://theculturetrip.com/africa/alg...

Day 13 of Women's International Month

Theresa Kachindamoto Malawi Chief, nicknamed the Terminator

Chief Kachindamoto is known for her fierce leadership in annulling over 1,500 child marriages and sending girls back to school in Dedza district, in the central region of Malawi. Malawi has one of the world’s highest rates of child marriage, with half its girls married before the age of 18 and teen pregnancies contributing to 20-30 per cent of maternal deaths in the country. The practice of child marriage robs girls of their childhood and education opportunities, condemning them to a vicious cycle of poverty. In Malawi, only 45 per cent of girls remain in school past the eighth grade.

Realising that she couldn't change the traditionally set mentality of parents, Kachindamoto instead changed the law.

She got her 50 sub-chiefs to sign an agreement to abolish early marriage under customary law, and annul any existing unions in her area of authority.

When she learned that child marriages were still taking place in some areas, she fired four male chiefs responsible for these areas. They returned months later to tell her that all marriages had been undone. After sending people to verify this, she hired the chiefs back.

Over the past three years, Kachindamoto has broken up more than 1500 marriages, and sent all of the children involved back to school.

The new law in Malawi took 12 years to pass, but now codifies practice. The amendment aligns the Constitution with the 2015 Marriage, Divorce and Family Relations Act enacted by the Parliament. UN Women played a pivotal role in lobbying for an end to the discriminatory practice, working with the government, as well as civil society representatives and traditional leaders, like Kachindamoto.

“Now that the law has passed, we are relying on the Government and key stakeholders, like UN Women, to ensure its implementation,” said Chief Kachindamoto. “Another important step for us is to sensitize the community, girls and boys on this new amendment, so that they know that it is now illegal to marry off children before the age of 18,” she added.

Kachindamoto is excited about continuing her advocacy to sensitize the community about the new law.

https://www.aljazeera.com/amp/indepth...

http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/storie...
(Check out Watson's visit with the Terminator)

Pippa wrote: "As a life-long member of the LGBTQ+, I've learned that "supporter" doesn't always equate to "ally". The only people who can give you the title of ally are the people who you are supporting - and genuinely, consistently supporting. .."

Good point.

I'll amend my statements above to reflect this truth. Thank you for calling me on it.

Will do. Thanks!

Give me about a day, then feel free to delete this thread.

Day 12 of Women's History Month:

Amanirenas Warrior, Queen of Sudan

Amanirenas (full name Amnirense qore li kdwe li, meaning Ameniras, Qore and Kandake) was the ruler of the Kingdom of Kush, which is modern-day Sudan, from ca. 40 BC–10 BC. Amanirenas, who lost an eye in battle, was a strong and fierce ruler who did not cower to the Roman Empire. Because of this, she is one of the kingdom’s most well-known leaders.

Amanirenas knew, after the defeat of Cleopatra and Marc Antony in Egypt, that Kush was next on the Roman list of conquests, and so, her kingdom struck the Romans while they were distracted.

She helped launch the initial attack in Egypt while Aelius Gallus (the Roman prefect of Egypt) was away from the country. Amanirenas and her son, Akinidad successfully defeated the Roman forces in both Syene and Philae. After returning to Kush with an array of different spoils of war including a bronze statue of Emperor Augustus.

Numerous back and forth fights happened until negotiations for peace concluded in 21/20 BC with it being favorable to the Kushites. Amanirenas’s kingdom was both too stubborn for Rome to continue to battle and harder to reach without so much as a river that lead them to strong hold after stronghold.

Kush the nation died out around 400 yrs later. In 1914 archaeologists started to look into their ancient culture and found one of the best preserved head of an Augustus statue ever found that had it's eyes intact. According to the archaeologists, the statues was buried under neath the throne. So that whenever the Queen or the other rulers sat, they were literally walking their enemies head.

Remember, history is often written by the conqueror. Very little is known about the people that were able to stave off Roman rule.

https://www.rejectedprincesses.com/pr...
https://www.historyofroyalwomen.com/t...

Adding to the list is PFLAG or the community for Parents, Families and Friends of the LGBTQIA community.

It's a great resource with 400+ chapter network that "provides confidential peer support, education and advocacy in communities in nearly all 50 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico. Our 200,000+ members and supporters cross multiple generations of American families in major urban centers, small cities, and rural areas. PFLAG has been saving lives, strengthening families, changing hearts, minds and laws since 1972. Our family and ally voice is integral to advancing equality." Https://pflag.org/

Find a chapter near you! https://pflag.org/
And for non US allies: https://pflag.org/intlfamilygroups

Thank you so very much Vern! These are very helpful.

Day 11 of Women's History Month:

Feryal Özel Turkish Astrophysicist, one of the Top 20 thinkers of our time

Özel is on par with Eisenstein and Hawking as one of the greatest minds of our time.

Her research interests encompass the physics of neutron stars and black holes and the formation of galaxies in the early universe. She studies the properties of matter and radiation under the most extreme physical conditions in the cosmos to expand our understanding of physics in new realms.

As a Radcliffe fellow, Özel developed the methods necessary to handle and analyze large data sets that will be obtained with current and future telescopes from radio to X-ray wavelengths. Her aim was to apply Doppler tomography and indirect imaging techniques to construct the first surface maps of neutron stars and high-resolution images of black-hole horizons.

Dr. Ozel has served on a large number of advisory committees for NASA and the National Science Foundation, including the NASA Astrophysics 30-year Roadmap and the Chandra X-ray Telescope Users Committee. Was a CERN research fellow. She frequently appears in TV documentaries on PBS, the History Channel, and CNN International as well as in many scientific articles in the popular press. She has also been a spokesperson for the Louis Vuitton’s Women’s Literacy Campaign in the Middle East. She also likes to compete in Olympic-distance triathlons.

She currently leads the NASA'S Lynx X-ray observatory team. Lynx is an observatory designed to address these science pillars will make a difference in all areas of astronomical research, from Solar system objects to the Epoch of Reionization. Moreover, the scientific landscape of the 2030s will look very different from what it is today. Lynx is designed to look past these far horizons, and open unseen discovery space. It is one of the four NASA Strategic Mission concepts under consideration by the 2020 Decadal Survey.

http://www.tassausa.org/Newsroom/2013...
https://www.lynxobservatory.com/team

Maybe not more reading... but definitely more learning!

Jin Xing was recognized last year in my Women's History Month representative from China.

A Chinese ballerina, modern dancer, choreographer, actress, and owner of the contemporary dance company Shanghai Jin Xing Dance Theatre. Jin was one of the first few transgender women in China to receive the government's approval to undergo a sex change, and she is also one of the first few transgender women to be officially recognized as a woman by the Chinese government.

Any blurbs about her, don't do her story justice. At the age of 9 she served in the People's Republic of China military as a dancer, taking the rank of colonel before opening her own dance company and undergoing her operations.

Today, not only is she out as a trans-gendered woman, but she has her own TV show that brings in more than 100 million viewers each show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jiv9p...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rUuqp...

Day 10 Women's History Month 2019

Anbara Salam Khalidi Lebanese Feminist, Author, and Translator

"I invite my readers to join me as I travel the thorny road traveled…by women of my generation who sought knowledge, dignity and self-respect." This sentence appears in the Prologue of Anbara Salam Khalidi’s memoirs. In 1978 she published her memoir, later translated to English under the title ‘Memoirs of an Early Arab Feminist.’ Her autobiography concisely retells a momentous period in Arab history, from the fall of the Ottoman Empire throughout most of the twentieth century. In it Khalidi elaborated on the negative effects of the activities performed by Ottoman ruler of Syria at that time, Jamal Pasha, on her family and childhood. A whole chapter in her memoir is pertaining to Jamal Pasha the Bloodthirsty, titled ‘’Jamal Pasha and his Crimes’’

This from a woman who grew up during a time when attitudes to women in Lebanon were poor: when Anbara published a front-page article in a newspaper on the topic of the first Arab Conference of 1913, many argued that it could not have been written by a woman; although some maintained that it could have been written by a woman – as long as she had a man’s help!

Khalidi was a pioneer in almost everything she had ever done. She was a bold intellectual woman who was never afraid to express her opinion in public and ready at any time to defend her stances. In 1915, Anbara formed a society called The Awakening of the Young Arabic Woman which helped girls finance their education. She also was one of the founding members of the Society for Women’s Renaissance.

In 1927, she was the first Muslim woman in Lebanon to desert the veil in public during a lecture at the American University of Beirut.

She was the first translator to translate Homer's master piece ‘’Odyssey’’ into Arabic. Khalidi was also the first to translate ‘’Aeneid’’ written by Virgil to Arabic.


Memoirs of an Early Arab Feminist: The Life and Activism of Anbara Salam Khalidi

http://sister-hood.com/sister-hood-st...

Well... we could always schedule an OSS UK Meet up at the theater. A follow up to the fun pub crawl last year.... fun discussion after...

just say-ing.... :P

Anyone interesting in seeing Captain Marvel?

And if you have seen in remember to use the spoiler tags! < spoiler > < / spoiler > (removing spaces)

commenting to dust off this thread given the book we are reading now.


Any additional thoughts?

commenting to dust this thread off in light of the new book this month...

Conundrum
As Morris documented in her memoir Conundrum, she began taking oestrogens to feminise her body in 1964. In 1972, she had sex reassignment surgery in Morocco. Sex reassignment surgeon Georges Burou did the surgery, since doctors in Britain refused to allow the procedure unless Morris and Tuckniss divorced, something Morris was not prepared to do at the time.

Adding this as I went back through the archives and found the article Ross posted.

https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/...

commenting as a way of dusting this off and bringing it out of the archives given the book we are reading this month

Day 9 Women's History Month 2019

Afnan Ali Jordan Innovator, Entrepreneur

Afnan Ali is an engineer who is passionate about entrepreneurship, technology, and education. With that, she founded Eureka, a scientific program which is specialized in teaching children about innovation and engineering. Ali had a spectacular idea for Eureka and that was to teach children the basic concepts of engineering and invention so they can transform their own ideas into products and services that will help the economy and the region.

Ali won first place for the research award at the Arab Robotics Competition, as well as several prizes in entrepreneurship and technology. She received some international training courses in the same fields in Luxembourg, Bahrain, and Sweden.

The entrepreneur represented Jordan in several international conferences and programs such as the fifth World Youth Congress–Turkey in 2010, "One Young World Summit" in Zürich in 2011, TechWomen in California in the same year, Arab Turkish Youth Summit, in Turkey, also in 2011, and finally She Program in Sweden the following year.

It first started as an offline academy in 2014, offering its services to over 500 students, before opening a branch in the governorate of Aqaba and expanding outside of Jordan.

Eureka currently offers two main programs, the Little Innovators and the Bright Innovators one, each targeted towards a different age group.
- The Little Innovators program is tailored for six to 10-year-olds, and consists of six levels: first and second level Robotics, Mechanical Engineering, Advanced Mechanical Engineering, Pneumatics and Renewable Energy.

- The Bright Innovators program, which caters to students between 11 and 16 years of age, consists of 10 levels: Robotics, Electrical Engineering, Electronics, Electronics Advanced, Robotics Advanced, Renewable Energy, Mobile Applications, Innovation and Entrepreneurship and a final graduation project, along with a business plan.

The academy has so far been the recipient of 10 local and international awards through its participation in various tech innovation competitions.

http://www.jordantimes.com/news/local...

http://www.scenearabia.com/Money/Game...

As-salāmu ʿalaykum Khaola, I'm so sorry you are going through that. The level of hatred being directed at you.

Are their any resources or places that can help you? Community centers or a CAIR group in France. (I'm in the US- Council on American Islamic Relations https://www.cairchicago.org/

Maybe the:
Musulmans de France, formerly Union des organisations islamiques

Or
ETUDIANTS MUSULMANS DE FRANCE

Signed!

Day 8: Women's History Month 2019

Savitribai Jyotirao Phule, Indian Activist and Poet "Mother of Indian Feminism"

Savitribai Jyotirao Phule was a prominent Indian social reformer, educationist and poet who played an instrumental role in women education and empowerment during the nineteenth century.

Counted among few literate women of those times, Savitribai is credited for founding the first girl’s school in Pune in Bhide Wada becaming the first female teacher in India (1848). She took great effort towards educating and emancipating child widows, campaigned against child marriage and sati pratha, and advocated for widow remarriage.

Savitribai Phule was a trailblazer in providing education for ostracized portions of society. A leading figure of Maharashtra’s social reform movement, she is considered an icon of Dalit Mang caste along with likes of B. R. Ambedkar and Annabhau Sathe. She campaigned against untouchability and worked actively in abolishing caste and gender based discrimination.

She went on to establish a shelter (1864) for destitute women and played a crucial role in grooming her husband's Jyotirao Phule’s pioneering institution, Satyashodhak Samaj, (1873) that fought for equality of all classes. possibly the first ever infanticide prohibition home founded in India. It was set up so that pregnant Brahmin widows and rape victims can deliver their children in a safe and secure place thus preventing the killing of widows as well as reducing the rate of infanticide.

In 1874, Jyotirao and Savitribai, who were otherwise issueless, went on to adopt a child from a Brahmin widow called Kashibai thus sending a strong message to the progressive people of the society. The adopted son, Yashavantrao, grew up to become a doctor.

https://artsandculture.google.com/exh...