It's a Mad, Mad World.

Just bringing you a wee bit of Mad Men-related self-promotion while I prepare several other posts for the blog. That said, stay tuned in the next week for my thoughts on the films Inception, The Kids Are All Right and (possibly) Salt.

First off, my article, "Feminism in a Mad World," is out in the current issue of Ms. set to hit newsstands August 10th (subscribers should receive or have already received the issue this week). I'll post a brief excerpt here, but you'll have to check out the print version to read the rest:

Set in the tumultuous 1960s and exploring the lives of philandering ad men, discontented housewives and sexualized secretaries, Mad Men may not immediately leap to mind as a great exemplar of feminist television. And yet, since the show emerged as the sleeper hit of 2007, going on to win the Emmy for Outstanding Television Drama two years running, it’s been a hot topic on the feminist blogosphere and around water coolers everywhere, alternately lauded for its strong female characters and criticized for its nostalgic rendering of the halcyon days of sanctioned workplace misogyny.

It’s true that Mad Men doesn’t shy away from the fast-paced, chauvinistic world of 1960s advertising and all that comes with it: the unchecked sexual harassment of pretty secretaries by male executives; housewives with little to do other than raise the children and serve as eye-candy at business dinners; uncensored racism, homophobia and anti-Semitism; and an old-boys-club atmosphere, complete with office drinking, smoking and philandering. But amidst all this homosocial revelry, Mad Men gives us a cadre of women characters who, like Peggy, are multifaceted and prodigiously fleshed-out—a rare treat for a television drama, a genre in which women are often given short-shrift in favor of the male protagonist.

If you just can't wait to think and talk about the intersection of Mad Men and feminism until the Summer 2010 Ms. hits the newsstands, feel free to pop on by the Ms. Blog and comment (please do comment, even if you want to argue with me!) on my review of the season four premiere (it's funny, so much has changed on the show, and yet my opinion of the show and its relationship to feminism hasn't changed that much in the past few years).

And...if you don't feel like reading at all, you can listen to my recent radio interview with Steve Jaxon on KSRO The Drive--again, discussing Mad Men--or catch me on Mary Glenney's Women's Show on Saturday between 10am and noon.

ETA: You can find a recording of my second interview about Mad Men here.

How to Lose Your Virginity: The Interview (Director's Cut)

I recently had the pleasure of interviewing documentary film director Therese Shechter about her new project How to Lose Your Virginity for the Ms. Blog. She was incredibly generous with her time and I'm very excited for the new film. Our full interview is available below:

Aviva: After your 2005 film, I Was a Teenage Feminist, what made you decide to use virginity as the topic of your next project? Was there some sort of defining event—I know in the trailer the defining event seems to be around you wearing white for your wedding—or was this something that you’d been thinking about for a while?

Therese: I’ve been thinking about it since we were editing I Was a Teenage Feminist because we used some old educational “now you are a woman” kind of films and I was really struck by how lame the whole process of educating girls about their bodies and their sexuality has been in the past—especially the ones that taught you hygiene and proper dating so guys wouldn’t think you were the wrong kind of girl. [Laughs] So that kind of stuck in my mind for a while. Then all this news about abstinence-until-marriage programs was coming out and that added to it. Like, what the hell are we teaching people? What are we telling—especially girls—but girls and boys?

We started doing some interviews and the most interesting thing people were talking about to me was issues of virginity. So, if we talk about virginity we can talk about politics and religion and history and economics and popular culture and it became this incredibly large, fascinating topic.

And then I got engaged [laughs] and my other films had been very personal; they’ve grown out of a very personal questioning I had to a larger social issue. I couldn’t find the personal connection to this film and I thought, oh, I’m just going to play it straight and it won’t be a first-person film, and it just wasn’t working because I don’t seem to be able to tell stories unless they’re rooted in my own experience—for better or worse. When I got engaged and we started talking about the wedding, it hit me like a ton of bricks: that I was this 47-year-old woman who was expected to put on this drag show of purity.

A virgin bride?: Shechter at a bridal fitting in New York City*

The other component is that I’ve been doing this blog for two years, The American Virgin, where we cover some of the same topics. I really couldn’t wait for the years it takes to make a film to talk about this stuff so it’s been a great outlet as a way of bringing this discussion up now. I started getting a lot of letters from people who had not yet become sexually active—a lot—for all sorts of different reasons. Some of them were religious, some of them had pretty significant social issues, and others just by circumstance hadn’t found the right partner to become sexually-active. And these were people in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s... There seemed to be a lot of shame and a lot of secrecy attached to that and I started hearing that we were one of the few safe spaces where they could talk about this and not be ridiculed.

I got into this thinking I hate the way young women are being shamed for being sexual people; I never thought about how people were being shamed for being non-sexual people, too. [Laughs] It’s like that double-edged sword; you just cannot win this.

A: Obviously you feel that a personal connection is a central part of your methodology as a filmmaker. Would characterize it as a “personal is political” kind of connection or is it just something that you need to do to invest in a project?

T: There’s a long line of feminist filmmaking that takes that exact thought and builds on it [Shechter later emailed to tell me she was thinking specifically of Joyce Chopra's 1973 documentary Joyce at 34]. So there’s a long tradition of this personal storytelling because it’s like the consciousness-raising groups: You tell your own story and you realize that it’s actually a universal story. It’s not your personal problem, it’s a much larger systemic problem, and understanding that other people are going through something perhaps similar is a really big moment of consciousness-raising and can lead to group action. So, I don’t want to say the feminists invented it [laughs], but that’s a classic feminist thing.

A: Do you feel like virginity and sex are feminist issues as well?

T: I feel like the way our culture approaches it are feminist issues. I feel like the way issues around female sexuality are discussed, I’d say almost anywhere, is a feminist issue. Women are often being told how to behave and what the right way to do something is and the right way to be sexual. When you look at the abstinence-until-marriage movement where they’re using moral shaming and they’re using the worst possible gender stereotypes to make a case for women remaining pure until marriage.

Although that world of pledges and purity balls might seem sort of foreign and confined to a small minority, we're symbolically enacting the same process out at any traditional wedding. The father ritualistically gives his white-clad daughter, along with her implied purity, away to the husband, who makes no statements about his own sexual history. It may be symbolic and the bride may not be a virgin, but we're still embracing the ritual and symbolism as something sweet--as opposed where it comes from which is an ancient patriarchal economic transaction. If that’s not a feminist issue [laughs], I don’t know what is!

There’s a larger issue even in the mainstream world that’s sending messages that girls should behave this way. Chloe Angyal just wrote something for the Christian Science Monitor about this study: a woman comes into a restaurant clearly bruised and a guy comes in after her and is physically threatening her, and they wanted to see who would go and help her.

But the upshot of it was that when this woman was dressed in slightly more revealing clothing—a low-cut blouse, a mini-skirt, high heels, sending the coded message of “I’m a sexual person”—people were less likely to help her.

I don’t think people are openly writing that [sexual people should be devalued] but it seems to be embedded in so much coverage we hear about campus rape and how people are being treated, in the rewards of not having sex for female [film and television] characters and the punishments if they do. That old horror-move trope: the couple has sex and then get killed. That’s changing a little bit, which is refreshing, but there’s still so much of that.

A: Do you think that sort of double standard about sex is something that sex education can help with?

T: I think that the essential problem is telling people what to do. It would be nice if the conversation was somehow shifted to “Some people do this and some people do that and some people like this and some people like that,” which is way more nuanced. And leaving space for whether you’re having sex or not having sex as not the thing that defines you.

Obviously we want to talk about being healthy and safe and especially, especially, about things like consent. Are you having sex because you really want to have sex? Or are you having sex because you think you have to or because someone’s made you? Or you think all your friends are so you should be? And we don’t talk about the consent part of this enough. Are you allowed to say “no” to your boyfriend if he wants to have sex with you? Yes! And if he says he’s going to dump you if you don’t do whatever sexual things he’d like you to do you, you should be okay with being dumped. You’re not there for that service, above and beyond all other things.

I sometimes joke that, well, you’re just not going to be popular for a while, but that’s okay. It’s okay.

A: Eventually you won’t be in high school anymore.

T: Eventually you won’t be in high school anymore; eventually you won’t even be in college anymore and everything will make more sense. It’s not a real comforting thing to say to a 17-year-old. I remember when I was 17 and I wanted a boyfriend and I wanted someone to love me and all of it, so it’s very hard to say, “If you don’t do these things you may not have a boyfriend, but that’s okay.” That’s a really hard thing to say...not just to a girl. But in some ways I admire those people who can say, “Sorry, but, I don’t want to do those things and if that means you don’t want to go out with me, I’m moving on. I’m going to the movies with my girlfriends.”

A: You interviewed a lot of teenagers for this film. Did you get a sense that they still feel like [sex is] a big deal or do you feel that the terms have changed, say, in the past couple decades?

T: It depends on the teenager. Interestingly, the people that I’ve interviewed that are sexually active or very comfortable with the concept of sex, if they are not sexually-active, seem pretty open in talking about it. And the people who are religious who are waiting for religious reasons are also open about talking about how they feel. The people who are not having sex and want to be having sex and are embarrassed do not want to talk to me. I run a lot of stuff on my blog from them, because it’s anonymous. People really want to tell their story and other people want to read that story, but it’s been very hard to get people to talk on camera. I’m negotiating with people right now…how anonymous can I make them. But, you know, I think it’s just kind of too bad, really.

A: While shooting and researching for your film, do you feel like you’ve gleaned more insight into why we have such a bizarre perspective on sex even though it’s everywhere—say, why people are so unwilling to talk about it with you?

T: People are willing to talk about it, but I’m not sure if they’re honestly talking about it. And I think when you say “sex is everywhere,” I think that it is everywhere…in people fantasies. In their imaginations, everyone is having sex but them. Or everyone is having amazing sex but them. And I think that’s a message over and over again. That’s how we sell products. That’s how we sell all kinds of media, and, I think that if people were actually honest about their…I don’t want to hear every detail about someone’s sex life, but I think if people were generally more honest about what the world of sexuality really looked like, I think it would look very different than what we see all around.

A: Was there anything that really surprised you when you were making this film, something you didn’t expect?

T: We shot on the set of Barely Legal, which is a porn franchise run by Hustler and it is a virginity porn franchise. There are no virgins in porn, despite what anybody may claim. [Laughs] These are professional actors being paid to act, let me say that right out front. We were on the set of Barely Legal and we’d spent the day before talking to someone who blogs about porn [Gram Ponante, NSFW link]; he’s actually part of the Fleshbot family, which is Gawker’s adult site. He was awesome and he gave us this really great interview, and I had come into it with some preconceived notions about what being on a porn set might be like.

We got to the Barely Legal set and it was one of the best-run film sets I’ve ever been on and everyone was cool and it was kind of a fun day. And that coupled with the complete surreality of watching people having sex right in front of you [laughs], walking around naked and whatever, I mean that was incredibly weird. But it wasn’t creepy, people were very open, and it was refreshing to spend the day with people who are so comfortable with sex and sexuality. I certainly don’t think that all porn sets are that pleasant, just like not all offices are the same. Working at one insurance office is different from working at another insurance office.

On Barely Legal's set, a wardrobe person displays the virginity franchise's signature white panties.*

It turned out to be one of my favorite shoots in the sense that it was the most interesting to me to be there and just observe it and talk to people. So, I’m reluctant to give you: oh yeah, being on that porn set was great. It’s all in the inflection. But it was fascinating and I didn’t expect that.

The other really surprising thing that I have found is…just the number of people that aren’t sexually-active. The incredible number of people that aren’t sexually-active that pretend they are because they don’t want to be shamed.

A: And because the culture tells us that everyone is, like you said?

T: Yeah, something weird happens. Up until a certain age, you’re not supposed to be sexually-active and then you cross some invisible threshold and suddenly everyone is supposed to be having sex. I think if you get out of college and you still aren’t sexually-active that seems to be the weird taboo-zone. And I have met so many people that aren’t and feel terrible. Not personally feel terrible—they’re making decisions about their lives—but feel terrible culturally. Like, God forbid anyone should find out about this.

And here I thought everyone was having sex.

A: Which I did, too, but I guess that assumption alone is a sign of the cultural backdrop. To wrap up, do you have anything specific that you want to mention that we haven’t talk about yet or any teasers [laughter] you want to give readers for what the film will encompass?

T: Yes, well the question is: what wedding dress will I wear? [Laughs]

A: Ah, yes.

T: Will Therese wear a veil? Will she be walked down the aisle by her parents? I’m sure these are burning issues for your readers! [Laughs]

There is one thing I want to say, which is that I think if you talk to people who think about this stuff a lot, they’ll always tell you virginity is this cultural construct, so let’s dismiss it. The thing is that, it may be a cultural construct but it’s still very, very important to people. I think that the idea of one’s sexual initiation, however you want to describe it, is important and we can’t just toss it out because there’s some issues around it that are problematic.

The other fascinating thing is that when you talk to people who identify as queer—who don’t engage in penis-in-vagina sex, for example—and how they perceive of the concept of virginity, which leaves them completely out of the definition that most people use because it’s a much more nuanced thing. I’ve also talked to people in the asexual community who are like, “This has nothing to do with us. We don’t even want to be called virgins because it’s defining us by whether we’ve had sex or not and we don’t have…it’s not part of our lives. So we don’t want to be defined by something that has nothing to do with us.” That’s also fascinating and makes a lot of sense; I hadn’t thought about it.

A: And even for people who are heterosexual, the definition for “what is sex?” is very different for different people.

T: Yeah, and there’s really no answer to that; there’s no blanket answer where we’re going to write up a virginity manifesto—“We’re all following these rules now”—because it’s too complicated so we can’t do it.

A: You’re raising money to finish editing a rough cut of How to Lose Your Virginity through Kickstarter and you have until July 1st to raise $10,000. And there’s a cocktail party fundraiser for the film in New York City on June 29th. So, besides donating money and telling our friends about the film, what else can readers do to help get this film out there?

T: There are a couple things and only one involves money. The Kickstarter thing is really important. To make an even modest documentary costs about $300,000. And people have been doing stuff for me for free, for really low rates, people have been fantastic. But we cannot, literally can’t do anymore, unless we have cold hard cash, [laughs] because we have to employ an editor full-time. I can’t ask someone to volunteer four months of their life to me, full-time.

So this Kickstarter thing is part of it. And we have to get to this $10,000 goal or we don’t get any of the money that people have pledged, so in the next two weeks, that’s a huge push for us. And I hate asking people for money—I can’t tell you how much. It’s the most detested part of this job, but there you go. Our budget is equal to Tom Cruise’s hair and makeup budget on some other film. And there’s no Hollywood studio asking for a feminist critique of female sexuality in pop culture. [Laughs] They’re just not. So we’re always looking for money. We just can’t ask people to do stuff for free anymore.

The other part of it is that we are looking for subjects. It is very easy for me to find white, Christian young women to talk to me about virginity. It is harder for me to find people who are queer, people of color, trans people. My subject group right now is not diverse enough and it’s something I want to remedy and I know there are people out there from those different communities that could tell their story. And I don’t care what the story is, I just want to hear their story. [If you’re interested in volunteering to be interviewed for Shechter’s film, you can contact her via her website]

A: Is there an expected release date for the film?

T: If we had $30,000 right now, we could have a great rough cut by fall. That means it would then be in the form that people want to see it in order to give us all the finishing money we need.

A: Oh wow. Great.

T: Once you have rough cut, it makes a huge difference. So, yeah, we could have it done this year. The only thing standing in our way is funding, and the funding climate is horrible for everyone. Horrible. So, we’re not taking it personally.

A: Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with me! I'm eagerly awaiting the release of How to Lose Your Virginity.

Our new trailer! "How To Lose Your Virginity" from Trixie Films on Vimeo.

Feminist Blogger Friday: Interview #4 with Jennifer Kesler of The Hathor Legacy

It's the second Friday of the month again, which means it's time for another Feminist Blogger Friday interview. This month, I'm especially pleased to present my interview with Jennifer Kesler. Jennifer runs the collaborative media critique blog The Hathor Legacy, which interrogates film, television, advertising, books, and video games through a feminist/humanist lens. I occasionally blog for Hathor, and I can honestly say that The Hathor Legacy is one of my favorite group blogs (besides FWF, of course). And the comment sections are always fascinating and fired-up! For more information on Hathor, its origins and its mission, click here. For more information about Hathor's founder, tag along below the cut.


1. Jennifer, in The Hathor Legacy’s mission you write that you hope to “create a record of dissenting voices, so the film/tv industry is forced to admit our opinions exist,” and you’ve written a number of posts over the years since the blog’s inception in 2005 about the film industry’s general disregard for female characters, especially as central, independent protagonists. Can you talk a little bit about what made you decide to start a blog and what you get out of Hathor personally and professionally?

I was spending an inordinate amount of time on Stargate forums, arguing about the character of Sam Carter. One day, I was looking for sources to back me up and instead found a blogger arguing that the reason female characters were vapid was that women in real life were vapid. That was the last straw for me. I immediately bought a domain, installed some blogging software and started writing.

What I get out of the site personally is the knowledge that it's not just me. I never believed it was, but starting the site meant putting my money where my mouth is. As far as I'm concerned, it's paid off.

Professionally, Hathor has pushed me to improve my writing and communication skills -- to improve my thinking. It's exposed me to a lot of viewpoints I hadn't considered before, and I've learned much from them.

2. You’ve written a series of posts describing your own experiences as an aspiring screenwriter and why you ultimately left the film industry [see here, here, and here for starters]. What made you want to be a screenwriter in the first place? Do you feel that your creative drive is met elsewhere now? And, by the same token, what inspires you to write—whether for the blog or on other projects?

I believe storytelling is how culture evolves its thinking and gives individuals new ideas to consider. Film was reinforcing the idea that white heterosexual men belong at the center of our culture and everyone else should just orbit them. I thought if film told more stories about women and other so-called minorities, more people would begin to get the idea that every human life is a story potentially worth telling.

I'd really like to get back to writing fiction -- I've actually got two novels outlined and can't find time to start writing them. But for now, the instant gratification of audience feedback that blogging provides is very satisfying.

3. How would you characterize your relationship with feminism? Do you feel it's changed over the four years since you founded Hathor? If so, how and why?

Broadly speaking, feminism is just the belief that women are as worthy as men. But the term feminism also refers to a movement that's caused some pain to women who aren't white, straight and of means. So I've always had mixed feelings about wearing the label. But when writers started joining me on Hathor, many of them were self-identified feminists who criticized the same aspects of the movement that bothered me, and associating with them made me more comfortable with the label.

One of the most disturbing things Hathor has taught me is that all you have to do to get labeled a feminist is publicly state that you think women are okay. Is this such a radical idea that it needs a special term?

4. Great point! One of the things I like about writing for Hathor myself is that nothing, not even the term "feminism," is taken for granted. On that note, when I got involved with your blog, it was through a sort of “help wanted” post, but Hathor also has a long list of other contributors. How did you develop relationships with the women and men who write with you? Did some of your connections spring up organically—i.e. with other bloggers you followed and/or friends—or have people contacted you over the years asking specifically to write for Hathor?

All of the above, actually. At first, the blog had open registration, where people could just sign up and post. Finding their posts on my site was actually how I first met some of the contributors. As the blog got more popular, we had to shut down open registration. Some people asked if they could write for us, others we invited from the blogging community - and then we did the "help wanted" thing a couple of times.

Contributors to Hathor are a pretty varied group, and I've learned a lot from them. The knowledge I've picked up ranges from ideas about privilege and entitlement to the history of fashion and what certain fashions might say about the societies that wore them. But I've also learned by example about various ways of communicating and handling situations that keep things constructive. And when I fail at that, it's really great to have someone else's perspective on what went wrong and how to not let that happen again in the future.

5. You’ve managed to build Hathor into quite an impressive site, with a plethora of contributors and an active, engaged and vocal readership. Do you have any advice for people relatively new to feminist and/or media blogging about how to gain readers and encourage comments? Did anyone give you any great advice when you first got started that you’d like to share?

Get noticed by somebody on LiveJournal who has tons of friends! It’s easier said than done, but social networking sites can totally launch a small blog, so interact with people on them. Participate in forums and on other people’s blogs, and link to your own posts/site when (and only when) relevant. Don’t just drop comments and links everywhere – take the time to get to know the communities a little so you can make a genuine contribution.

Strongly opinionated posts provoke a lot of comments, but I recommend using a lot of qualifying phrases like “as I see it” to avoid the perception you're stating your opinion as fact. We still occasionally screw this up, and believe me, readers let us know it when it happens.

As for people new to feminism, I recommend reading feminist blogs. The people participating at those sites are the people likely to find your site and comment on it, so get to know them and their ideas.

6. Have you had any industry responses (film, television, gaming or publishing) to Hathor? If so, what interactions have you found most rewarding? What sort of impact do you envision Hathor having in regards to its media criticism?

We've had articles quoted in reviews by the CBC, Salon and the Guardian [see here for links], but no one has communicated with us directly, except a few book publishers interested in getting us to review upcoming novels. It may sound strange, but what I really want is for Hathor to get noticed by the mainstream and start a conversation - that's it, just a conversation about the issues we've been talking about for four years, and where the industry should go from here.

7. In a similar vein, what recent film do you think have made strides in the direction of (mainstream) entertainment featuring strong female characters? Can you recommend any films from the last few years that you enjoyed and/or feel really attempted to shatter the hegemony of the white male protagonist?

Ironically, being the webmaster for Hathor has radically reduced the amount of time I can spend watching movies in the past few years. I just watched an independent film called Whalerider that I can't recommend highly enough.

As for older films, there's Dolores Claiborne, A League of Their Own and Ever After. Most of the stuff I find "shattering" is on television.

8. And as for television, what shows are you enjoying right now, and why?

Criminal Minds, because I love the exploration of abnormal psychology, and while it's not really breaking any molds, it does feature some complex female characters both among the regular cast and guest stars. I also love Burn Notice because it's smart and funny, and Sharon Gless’ character actually does break a few molds. Those are the only two current shows I'm watching.

9. I know you’ve got a busy life outside of Hathor. How do you negotiate the demands of your real life and your day job with the demands of running a large blog? Do you see a life of blogging and/or writing full-time in your future?

I negotiate those demands very poorly! My disorganization level is reaching critical mass. Both blogging and writing are extremely low-paying for all but a select few, so I don't see either as a full-time career in my future. But last November, I came up with an idea for a Hathor-related business enterprise I hope to get off the ground this year.

10. That sounds promising. Any exciting plans in the works that you want to share?

My current plan is for Hathor to become part of something bigger, but that's all I'm ready to say about it right now. The blog itself will stay the same.

Well, we'll just have to stay tuned and see what Hathor's got up its sleeve! Jennifer, thanks again!

Feminist Blogger Friday: Interview #3 with author Liz Funk

Come one, come all to the third installment of Fourth Wave's interview series with feminist bloggers and thinkers (the first two interviews can be found here and here and the next will be up April 10th). This month, I interviewed author Liz Funk, a senior at Pace University whose first book, Supergirls Speak Out: Inside the Secret Crisis of Overachieving Girls, just hit the shelves! FWF is thrilled to have Liz join us as part of her virtual book tour (click on the link to to check out other blogs she has and will visit over the month of March). And, as part of the promotion for her new book, I'll be posting contest details tomorrow -- you could win a free copy!

I really enjoyed reading Liz's book--it's informative, engaging and incredibly interesting--and you'll find that some of my interview questions are tailored specifically to the book, which her website describes as follows:

In the tradition of bestsellers, such as Ophelia Speaks and Quarterlife Crisis, Liz Funk’s Supergirls Speak Out sheds a disturbingly bright light on a condition that is spreading quickly from Generation X to Y—and even to little girls. Funk calls this being a “Supergirl,” i.e., a girl who believes that in order to be happy, she must excel at her job or career, have the best grades, wear the coolest clothes, date the best-looking boy, and have the perfect body size.

And now, without further ado, the author of Supergirls Speak Out, Liz Funk.


1. In your book, there seems to be a tension between the term “Supergirl” as a positive qualifier—Supergirls being high-achieving and smart and pretty and wanting to go places—and the Supergirl phenomenon as a negative thing—girls and women who are overachievers, who have a constant need to be perfect at everything, often to their own detriment, and who have an overwhelming and stressful desire to be at the top of their game at all times. And I wonder if, to start off this interview, you could talk a little bit about the connection between the positive and negative aspects of being a Supergirl and how one might negotiate those tensions?

Great question. Overachieving girls themselves aren’t a “secret crisis”—it’s the consequences that accompany overachieving, and achieving for the wrong reasons, that’s the problem. I’ll be the first to say that girls should reach for the stars and go for their dreams; after all, we need go-getter girls if we want more presidential candidates and women in business and women as public intellectuals, et cetera et cetera. The key is, we want young women to aspire for success for the right reasons. If girls are achieving because they’re looking to matter or to feel valuable because they don’t feel like they matter on their own, that’s the problem!

2. Okay, so it's not about achieving, but achieving for the wrong reasons. For your book you interviewed (almost) a hundred girls and women about their experiences, but you also rely on your own experience. And here you are: you’re only 20, you’ve just published your first book, and you’re about the graduate from college; you’ve arguably accomplished more than many people your age! How do you fit yourself into the Supergirl narrative? You’ve mentioned that you’re a “recovering” Supergirl, but what does that mean to you? Do you feel that by “recovering” you’ve overcome some of the negative aspects of being a Supergirl or do you feel it’s something you struggle with on a daily basis?

I truly believe that for any young women to get over being a Supergirl, she needs to have a mental meltdown of some degree and confront why she is working so hard and going so hard on herself. Personally, I had that mental meltdown my junior year of college and was really forced to take a second look at how I was living my life and why I was trying to find myself in my work and how others perceived me. Now I try to make more time for myself and one of my new year’s resolutions was to get more hobbies and to stop being fake—so I’m definitely still a work in progress. I try to be in a constant conversation with myself about whether I’m going too hard on myself, and I work to be mindful and live in the moment and not go into everything with really high expectations. That’s the worst part of being a Supergirl, I think: everything is disappointing. Being a “recovering Supergirl,” who can be open to exploring the wonder of life, is much more fun!

3. So, what made you decide to start researching Supergirls? Was it your own experience? The experience of your friends? A combination of things? And where did you come up with the term itself?

Growing up, I was always observing the girls around me trying to look like perfect 10’s—pretty, talented, smart, charming, desirable—who made this all look easy. However, occasionally the token “perfect girl” in high school or college would have a breakdown, and it would get people talking, saying things like, "Wow, I thought she was perfect." I wanted to look into these girls’ secret lives. And although I didn’t become a full Supergirl until my later years of high school and college, I definitely spent my whole life investing my identity in superficial things, like my weight, and my relationships with guys, and my career. Also, in 2006, Girls’ Inc. released a study called "The Supergirl Dilemma" that found that overwhelming numbers of tween and teen girls felt pressure to be perfect, and Duke University had done a similar study on college women not far before that, so I really wanted to do a broad study of the lives of overachieving young women between the ages of 13 and 30 and see what their lives were like.

4. And once you decided to write about Supergirls, how did you actually take those next steps to negotiate a book contract and set out to do your research? You talk a bit in the book about doing a lot of networking, but can you be a little more specific about what that networking looked like and how you came to meet the right people at the right times?

I moved to Manhattan in September of 2006 and was really determined to meet other women writers, magazine editors, and young authors so I could learn more about how to make a writing career a reality. I was always really proactive about writing to authors who I like and asking them to have coffee or lunch with me, or reaching out to writers whose articles I read regularly in publications I liked. Gloria Feldt, the former president of Planned Parenthood, has a really good saying that has sort of been a guiding light in my career, which is that it never hurts to ask!

5. Great advice! I have a quick question about one your Supergirls, Yolanda, who, at 27, is one of the older women you interview. In reading the book, I didn’t feel that she quite fit the high-anxiety mold occupied by most of your other high school and college-aged subjects. She seemed pretty put-together and had pursuits and hobbies outside of work. Do you think there might be a generational factor for Supergirl-ism—i.e. is it something more prevalent among girls and women who grew up in the 1990s and early 2000s? If so, why do you think that might be?

Yolanda was definitely on the chill side of the Supergirl scale, but I do think that she’s a great example of how overachieving young women can confront the pressure to be extra-sensitive and please everyone, and excel in the professional world. There definitely may be a generational factor—that the younger girls in Generation Y, like my age and younger, are a bit more high-strung than our big sisters—but I also think that it might be a geographic thing. Yolanda went to high school in Austria and college in Canada, so I think that she missed the U.S. hothouse effect, in that we raise our girls to be a bit hyper-active and hyper-sensitive as they pursue their goals. You’re right, though: although Yolanda was really successful and beautiful and charming, I do think that she expressed less aggressive Supergirl traits, because she was older and was comfortable in her skin and had already done a lot of the negotiating and learning about herself and her femininity that younger Supergirls in the office struggle with. And I think she had a lot more confidence than your average Supergirl… but she was still a total wunderkind banker.

6. In your chapter on feminism, you make a comparison to Betty Friedan’s The Feminine Mystique, arguing that the desire of contemporary women to do and be everything mirrors Friedan’s 1950s housewife who supposedly had everything she could ever want but was still discontent. What other aspects of earlier waves and generations of feminism do you feel warrant a second look vis-à-vis contemporary society? How do you, personally, negotiate the past while embracing the future of feminism?

I think feminism is cyclical, and when we don’t fully resolve issues, they come back again in different forms. Personally, I’m rather worried that we haven’t resolved the “raunch culture” issue and the “faux empowerment” issue that a lot of people were talking about a few years ago, especially in 2005, when Ariel Levy’s book, Female Chauvinist Pigs: Women and the Rise of Raunch Culture debuted. I feel like a lot of women dismissed Levy’s argument as condescending and chose to ignore this issue—that young women see their sexuality as currency to be traded for power and validation—and I predict that this problem is only going to boomerang back and get much worse if it’s not confronted. After all, if feminists—who care the most about women!—don’t take this on and have a calm-cool-collected conversation about how women see empowerment, who will? Outside of psychotherapy and Jamba Juice, feminism is the only proven method to help women live happier, healthier lives. Naturally, I’m kidding. A little.

7. As you mention in your book, a lot of young women today resist the feminist label. Do you have any thoughts about why this might be? And did you encounter any resistance around feminism from the girls and women you interviewed?

What’s funny about Generation Y and the Supergirls is that they seem to have no problem with the idea of feminism—most young people who I’ve met are totally open to women having equal rights and equal power, and many girls are eager to talk about the ways that they feel discriminated against and in a disadvantaged position. It’s the word “feminism” that people don’t like. And I really don’t have a solution, other than to encourage the girls who don’t want to use the word “feminism” to keep living feminism. For example, my freshman year of college, one of my friends took down all of the posters that the fraternities and sororities were putting in the dorms and wrote “GREEK LIFE HURTS WOMEN” on them in a big marker and hung them back up—which is a totally radical thing to do—and she didn’t consider herself a feminist. And I think with people like that, rather than arguing with them about the semantics, it’s better to just appreciate the shared sentiment and find commonalities. I mean, it’s sad that girls don’t want to shout “Yay feminism!” from the rooftops, but I’m glad that they are invested in protecting feminism’s legacy, even if they wouldn’t explicitly say that they are.

8. And what made you personally decide to identify as a feminist? Is it something that happened organically or was it a label you took on after some thought and/or trepidation? Do you have a feminist “coming-out” story you’d like to share?

It came about really organically. I first became interested in gender equality in middle school, and in the eighth grade, I did a project on Betty Friedan for social studies class and was like, “Oh, I guess I’m a feminist.” It wasn’t a huge deal or anything, it felt very natural to me. I was twelve, and I actually thought it was kind of cool! At that point in my life, I wanted to be the American ambassador to France, and I knew that I was going to need feminism if I wanted to make that happen. Since then, I’ve changed career goals, but I’m still a feminist.

9. Obviously, over-achieving and perfectionism can become all-consuming, obsessive and difficult-to-abandon pursuits. How do you recommend girls wean themselves away from the need to be a Supergirl? What’s a good place to start?

Young women need to realize their intrinsic worth. They need to figure out why they matter outside what they look like, how others perceive them, and what they’ve accomplished. They need to have a relationship with themselves, where they like listening to their thoughts and spending time alone with themselves, where they don’t berate themselves. Naturally, that’s a huge task to take on, but it starts with giving yourself some free time, spending solitary time by yourself to think and meditate, and treating yourself! A big part of this is cutting down on our use of technology; iPods and PDAs and text messaging are really distracting, and they keep young people from being able to listen to their internal monologues and have downtime during the day. But having that relationship with yourself is how you have a sense of self-worth!

10. Excellent, I always love an excuse to treat myself! So, downtime is essential, and you say that a symptom of being a Supergirl is a constant need for occupation, the unwillingness or inability to relax and just enjoy life. So, as someone who’s “recovered” and advocates taking time off, what do you like to do for fun? What do you find helps you unwind after a busy day of classes or writing? And, last but not least, what are you going to do once you graduate in May?

I watch so much television! I love 30 Rock, How I Met Your Mother, and Arrested Development—I am nearing memorization of the latter. I also love to paint and to read novels and to play the oboe; it took me about two months of daily practicing, but I can play the musical “Spring Awakening” from start-to-finish on the oboe. I’m not sure whether that’s cool or embarrassing. Ha!

I’m not 100% sure what I’m going to do after graduation in May; I know that I’m going to have a pretty chill summer (assuming I pass all my classes; in a truly un-Supergirl move, I have a MAJOR case of senioritis right now)—I want to finish writing the novel I’ve been working on for a year and read lots of books. Then, I think I’m going to move to Los Angeles; “move somewhere warm” is very high on my priority list, and I’m trying to take my own advice from “Supergirls”—taking risks, being unafraid to make mistakes and face trials, and being open to exploring the wonder of my life!

Thanks, Liz, for the great interview. I'm sure we all wish you luck in your future endeavors!



P.S. to FWF readers: Don't forget to check back tomorrow for details on how to win a free copy of Liz's new book!

Women's History Month Interviews over at Womanist Musings

Renee over at Womanist Musings did a great series of interviews with womanist, feminist and queer bloggers in honor of Women's History Month and International Women's Day. I've provided a listing of links to her posts below.

Add to that my interview with Renee from last month and the newest installment in FWF's Feminist Blogger Fridays interview series coming up tomorrow...Three cheers for the diversity of women's voices!

Renee's Interviews...
...with Monica of Transgriot
...with Amanda of Pandagon
...with Loryn of Black Girl Blogging
...with Melissa of Shakesville
...with Hexy of Hexpletive
...with Cara of The Curvature
...with Faith of Acts of Faith in Love and Life
...with Holly of Menstrual Poetry
...with Brownfemipower of flip flopping joy
...and, last but not least, with Octagalore of Astarte's Circus

Enjoy!

Feminist Blogger Fridays #2: Interview with Renee of Womanist Musings

Today, I'm pleased to present to Fourth Wave readers the second interview in our Feminist Blogger Fridays interview series (the first can be found here). This month, I interviewed the intrepid and inspiring Renee who writes prodigiously over at Womanist Musings and just began new blog Tell It WOC Speak. As a great admirer of Renee's courage to tackle controversial subjects and articulate way of handling difficult issues, I'm honored to be able to include our interview as part of the series.

And without further ado...


1. Renee, in your very first post on Womanist Musings—your “Womanist Manifesto”—you establish your blog’s premise in relation to Alice Walker’s term “womanist,” which she describes as comparable to “feminist” the way “purple is to lavender.” That said, where do you see your blog fitting within the vast domain of the feminist/womanist blogosphere?

I think that Womanist Musings is unique in that I am fearless in the topics I choose to take on. I don’t specifically look for something controversial; rather I seek topics that allow me to reify one basic theme – all people matter. I think many blogs get caught up in being hip and rely on catch phrases to draw attention, rather than continually affirming a commitment to all of humanity. Womanism to me speaks not only for all WOC [women of color], but for all of those who know the sting of oppression. Instead of arguing about whether or not something is a feminist/womanist issue, I seek to continually point out that these are human issues because someone somewhere is suffering.

2. So, how would you characterize your relationship to feminism? Can you speak to why you prefer the term “womanist”?

I prefer to identify as a Womanist because I don’t find feminism to be inclusive enough. One example of this would be the murder of Sean Bell. Many feminist blogs were slow to cover this because they could not see how this was a woman’s issue. As a mother of two black sons who worries that one day some police officer will cut short the life of my precious child, this was very much my fight.

My relationship with feminism is stormy at best, simply because I find that it continually ignores issues that are important to WOC and to the poor. In a lot of ways it is a white-led elitist movement that is only interested in promoting the needs of a small section of society. There are many blogs written by WOC and yet none of them could be called a large blog. This is not because we do not have something valid to say but simply because of a failure on the part of feminism to engage with our issues and to value our voices. What ends up happening, is that one or two WOC become token spokeswomen and the rest are largely ignored.

3. Along those lines, during this most recent election, there was a lot debate about race and gender as political identity positions, including constant arguments about whether society oppresses women or people of color more. Personally, I found that line of questioning pretty offensive, but it did speak to the way women and POCs are regarded as separate groups by mainstream culture. As a woman of color, how do you negotiate the race/gender dichotomy? Do you feel torn socially or politically between your race and gender positions, or do you find that this divide has only been constructed by the media and doesn’t impact your day-to-day life?

Personally I refuse to play the oppression Olympics. Both my race and gender play a role in how I am treated. My womanhood and blackness are essential parts of my being and to be asked to choose between the two is highly offensive to me. The desire to split the allegiance of WOC does not stem from an altruistic position. White women want us to identify solely as women, to labour to help them achieve equality with the white male patriarchy and black men continually remind us of our blackness in an attempt to enlist our efforts to help them achieve equality with the white male patriarchy. This is a point I touched on in a post entitled Stuck in the Middle. By asking us to choose, what both white women and black men hope, is that we will be blind to the ways in which we are being used. If black women continue to labour in the service of others, we will never rise above the bottom rung of the race and gender hierarchy.

4. Anyone who’s read anything over at WM knows you’re very passionate about a wide array of issues, from poverty and race to sexism and homophobia. What made you decide to start a blog as opposed to some other form of activism? How do you feel blogging allows you to confront/interrogate problems in the world in a way other venues might not?

I decided to start a blog because of my children. When I brought them into this world, I promised both of them that I would do the best that I could to ensure that they had happy and successful lives. As part of keeping this promise I decided to start a blog so that I could be active about issues that I felt would affect them. Over time it quickly evolved into a place where I would speak out in the cause of justice, as I realized that the interconnectivity of the isms worked to hamper the life chances of many. Since racism is connected to sexism, etc., what might not seem readily relevant quickly became so.

Blogging is a format that allows me to engage with various people that I might not otherwise come into contact with. As the busy mother of two little guys, blogging allows me to divide my time between my activism and taking care of my family.

5. In your first post, but also many times since, you’ve used the phrase “my truth may not be your truth.” I find this particularly compelling as it suggests not only that different people perceive the world differently, but also that “different” does not have to mean “untrue.” Can you say a little more about your philosophy of truths? Do you still sometimes find it difficult to accept the opinions of others if they disagree with you? And how can we (or how do you) differentiate between a “different truth” and just plain wrong?

This falls in line with my belief that our binary modernist mode of thought is damaging on many levels. When we only look at things from one perspective we are necessarily ignoring the ways in which privilege has caused us to read certain situations. My truth is only valid as far as I can not only own my privileges but acknowledge the ways in which I have been socialized to believe that certain thoughts and or ideologies are naturally occurring. The wonderful thing about personal truth is that if we are open to hearing the voices of others and learning, it constantly changes as we grow as human beings.

In terms of someone having a different opinion or perspective, I quite encourage it on the blog. If at some time I have been blind to my own privilege, I expect to be called out. Sometimes it hurts and it is uncomfortable but it is in those times that I realize that perhaps I have not considered the valid experience of others. You know truth when you see it, because it acts on an almost instinctual level. We see so little truth in this life that when actually confronted with it, it has the tendency to cut through the bullshit like a knife.

6. On a related note, you’ve written some pretty contentious posts (and I’m thinking in particular of some of the posts directed at the MRA), which have garnered, in return, some pretty nasty comments and malicious responses on other blogs. One of the things I admire about you and your blog, Renee, is your willingness to speak out regardless of the possible fallout. How do your keep your cool, your integrity and your spirit amidst such occasional vitriol?

I don’t always keep my cool. On more than one occasion I have told the unhusband that had I not paid so much money for my laptop, I would have thrown it across the room reading some of the hateful nonsense people post.

I keep going because every once and a while someone will write me an e-mail thanking me for helping them to see something in a new way. I also will get such a passionate response from a reader to some of the hatred expressed by others, that it is downright inspiring. Most of the regular commenters at Womanist Musings are wonderful, bright, engaging people, and though we may not always agree, their dedication to speaking about the difficult issues with honesty warms my heart.

7. To change the subject slightly, you’ve just started a new blog, Tell It WOC Speak. Can you say a little about what your hopes are for this space and its use?

Tell It WOC speak is a blog I created to host what I hope will be a monthly carnival featuring the work of WOC and our allies. As I said earlier, there are no major blogs written by WOC and it is my hope to rectify that over time. Our work simply does not get the attention that it deserves and this is largely due to racism and sexism. It is my belief that if this is going to change, we need to work with each other and support each other. The carnival is my way of offering support to my sisters and allies that are daily working in the cause of justice.

8. That said, what are your hopes for the future of Womanist Musings? You’ve recently opened the space to guest posts; are there any other changes or expansions you’re planning in the near future? Are you happy with the way the blog is progressing? And do you have any aspirations to collect and publish some of your work?

There is a part of me that is very much considering taking on a few co-bloggers, but Womanist Musings is my baby and being the control freak that I am, I am not sure if I am ready to share my space to that degree. That said I hope to see more guest posts in the future to widen the conversations that are happening. I can only present ideas through my lens and different people with a different frame of reference will see a situation from a completely different point of view.

As a perfectionist I believe that I will always want to improve the blog. Right now my next project is to get a new template and make the blog easier to navigate than it currently is. I hope over the next year to see the readership continue to rise and thus have even more heated debate than we already do.

I do have a side project planned for the summer and that is an e-zine. It is my hope to gather some essays from WOC and our allies and publish them. Once again my goal in doing this is to get people thinking and talking. There are so many issues that we never discuss because we are afraid of offending someone and this leads to stagnation.

It is definitely my hope to get published one day. I love to write and it would be great to see my work in print, but, if not, I know that Womanist Musings provides me with an outlet to not only explore my passions but practice a craft that I love.

9. Well, I'll look forward to that e-zine AND to seeing you in print one day! You say you love to write, so what inspires you? Do you sometimes find yourself fishing for topics or do you feel that you always have a backlog of topics on hand? Also, as a woman with an “unhusband” and two small children, when do you find the time to write so prolifically and articulately about such a wide array of topics?

Actually the readers are really great at forwarding topics to me. There are many times when I have so much to write about in one day, I simply cannot cover it all. Often times as well, my inspiration will come from reading the work of other great feminist/womanist bloggers.

Finding the time to blog can be difficult. There are times days later when I read something I wrote, only to find that it is filled with tiny errors and I can only blame that on blogging with Yo Gabba Gabba or Johnny Test in the background. I try to write when the kids are sleeping but often times I am blogging in my jammies while the boys are watching television. The unhusband is extremely supportive about my blogging. He reads everyday and has occasionally commented, even though he has been cussed out on more than one occasion by my commenters. My family realizes that this is important to me and so each of them in their own way has made an effort to allow me the time and the space to pursue my passion.

10. Something a little less serious to finish up: every once and a while you post about your guilty pleasures. Do you have a current guilty pleasure (or more than one) that completely doesn’t meet your womanist/feminist/humanist expectations but that you love nonetheless? If so, what and why?

I would say that my extreme aversion to physical labour is definitely one of them. I have no problem telling people I’m a girl to opt out of doing anything that is going to make me dirty or sweaty. There is also my well known addiction to reality television. Most of these shows are not woman friendly and I know I should not be watching, but I am simply hooked. I try to justify it as junk food for the brain but really I know better.

Well, I think everyone's allowed a little cerebral junk food now and again. Renee, thank you so much for joining us today. As a loyal reader, I guess I'll see you back over at Womanist Musings now and in the future!

(The next interview will be posted on Friday, March 13. Stay tuned.)

Feminist Blogger Friday #1: Interview with Frau Sally Benz

Good morning, everyone! I'm very excited to announce the start of a new feature here at Fourth Wave. The second Friday of every month, we'll be posting an interview with a feminist blogger. I anticipate it will be an excellent opportunity for FWF readers to learn a little bit about another blogger and help us all appreciate, one blog at a time, the great diversity that is the feminist blogosphere.

Without further ado, I present you the very first in a series of Feminist Blogger Friday Interviews. For today, I've interviewed Frau Sally Benz, creator of Jump off the Bridge and contributor at The Feminist Underground and CHICKS ROCK!.


1. Sally, your blog was one of the first feminist blogs I came across when I started researching for Fourth Wave. I’m not sure now entirely how this transpired, what search terms I used, etc., but for this and other reasons I’m very happy to have you here as my first Feminist Blogger Friday interviewee! What drew you to start your own blog? Did you initially imagine Jump off the Bridge as a personal or public endeavor (or some combination of the two)? And how do you feel it’s developed since?

I had been reading blogs for several months and had started commenting a few months before I started my own blog. But I found myself feeling shut out by a lot of the comment threads on blogs. I also wanted to expand on my thoughts, but had no outlet for that. So I decided to just start my own blog where I could say whatever I wanted and engage people in conversation that way.

I always imagined my blog as a combination of the public and private. My passions are feminism, activism, politics, citizen engagement/participation, etc., so I knew that was what I mainly wanted to talk about. But I also love turning my brain off every so often and just listening to music, or finding recipes, or reading, and I wanted to be able to do that on my blog, too. And because I need an outlet just to keep myself sane and to seek solidarity, I also do often lean towards the personal. It’s been hard to keep a balance at times between all of these elements, but I think so far it has been ok. I hope that in finding more time to write, it’ll be easier to balance these things, while still staying true to my focus on feminism, activism and politics, with other fun things thrown in from time to time.

2. You’re also a contributor over at The Feminist Underground and, recently, at CHICKS ROCK!, a blog off-shoot of The Women’s Mosaic. How did you get involved in The Feminist Underground and The Women’s Mosaic, respectively?

The Feminist Underground was one of the first blogs I found (I think through a comment Habladora wrote somewhere) while I was starting to come up with ideas for my own blog. I loved the energy on there and Habladora is just such an awesome writer, so I was a groupie for a while. I wrote a guest post in response to her call for submissions on feminist definitions, and she had been keeping up with my own blog and commenting here and there. One day she asked me if I wanted to be a contributor over there, and I ecstatically agreed.

For CHICKS ROCK!, it’s a much shorter story. I’ve been working with The Women’s Mosaic for a couple of years now and when they came up with the idea of starting a blog, I ended up becoming the head of that project. I knew about the blogosphere and had a strong sense of TWM’s vision and back then I also had the most time (I have much less free time now). So I’m a contributor, as well as the editor/blog mistress, if you will.

3. Do you think of blogging as work or play? And speaking of work, what’s your day job? Do you have aspirations to someday take up blogging or some form of writing or journalism full-time?

This question made me LOL! Blogging is work and play, depending on when you ask me. It is certainly A LOT of work to write, edit, maintain, troubleshoot, moderate, etc. for one blog, let alone keeping track of three, even while sharing responsibilities on two of them. Sometimes posts just come very easily to me – either because I have a lot of free time, something has sparked a reaction inside of me, I’ve found something of interest, etc. But sometimes I’m struggling just to put sentences together. Writer’s block hits hard, and it’s even harder to deal with that when my work schedule is so unpredictable sometimes.

I work for a women’s rights organization at the moment, and volunteer part-time for The Women’s Mosaic. My responsibilities are a bit all over the place for both, but I like it most days. :-)

I’ve always loved writing and editing and anything having to do with either, but I’ve never considered doing it full-time or professionally. Who knows, though… it’s a new year!

4. Are there some days that you just have no interest in blogging? What do you do to inspire yourself to write?

There are plenty of days when I have no interest whatsoever in blogging. If it’s been a while since I posted on Jump off the Bridge, then I try to at least throw up a video or something to have something on there. I feel guilty otherwise!

Sometimes when I set out to write a post, but don’t know what to write about, I just start reading through news websites and react to whatever I find on there. My guy also sends me links every so often when he sees something he thinks I’ll want to write about. This is usually a good way for me to at least write something substantial, but it doesn’t always work.

5. As we both know, a lot of the work involved in maintaining a blog is cultivating and sustaining readership. Do you have any advice for people relatively new to feminist blogging about how to gain readers and encourage comments on their blog? Did anyone give you any great advice when you first got started that you’d be willing to share?

My number one advice for gaining readers is to comment, comment, and then comment some more on a variety of other blogs. I think a lot of people would say the same thing. If people like what you have to say and/or if they keep seeing your name on comment threads all over the place, they’ll get curious.

Aside from that, the advice I always read is to keep a regular schedule, but I struggle with that as I already said.

I’d also say take advantage of places that promote link love! These are posts where you can link to a few of your own posts with a short description to get traffic & comments on your blog. Womanist Musings does it on Saturdays, Feministe on Sundays, Shakesville on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. We do it on The Feminist Underground and CHICKS ROCK! from time to time as well.

Taking advantage of social networking sites is also good, depending on how comfortable you are on those to start with. Facebook has a Networked Blogs app and you can also create a group or fan page for your blog. Twitter is great for promoting your posts. I’m not a big MySpace fan, but I’m sure people do it on there too and other places.

As far as encouraging comments, I still need help with that one. If you know of any tips, please share. :-)

6. I would have to agree with you about the advice to comment prodigiously yourself, but if I ever learn some secret comment-boosting formula, I'll be sure to share! Now, less about blogging, but more about feminism: how do you embody your feminism in your day-to-day life and/or how is feminism part of your daily life? Can you recall any specific event in your past that made you decide to identify yourself as a feminist or do you feel that feminism has always been a part of who you are?

I work for a women’s rights organization, so that helps me feel feminist-y. The blogosphere is a great way to incorporate feminism into your daily life. Whether it’s questioning the status quo, taking action on issues around the world, or just learning about things people write about, it’s a great way to really work out your feminist muscles.

I also just have conversations with people whenever the opportunity presents itself. I make people question why they don’t call themselves feminists even though they believe in pretty much everything we believe in. I try to break down oppression/privilege to them, and teach them about the struggles women have dealt with throughout history. I’m also a big proponent of including men in the conversation, so I make them see how feminism helps them too.

7. What do you feel is the most important issue facing contemporary feminism?

More than any one particular issue that feminists fight for, I think there is a lack of inspiration and effective strategy amongst feminists. There is not enough focus on grassroots efforts, not enough communication and partnership with people who don’t call themselves feminists (but have similar goals), etc. I think it’s a shame, for example, that people are still so intimidated by feminism. If you ask them what they believe in, they often agree with you about a lot of things, but refuse to call themselves feminists or to work towards the very things they believe in. I think in the future, we need to focus on addressing these things in addition to the issues already in the feminist agenda.

8. Along those lines, do you have a favorite feminist anecdote?

I do have one! I have several actually, but I’ll use the one from my feminism definition post at TheFU:

My guy's aunt could barely say the word "feminist" without getting a look on her face like she just swallowed sour milk. I started asking her questions:

"Do you have a job?"
"Yes."
"Do you believe you should keep the money you make instead of giving it to your father or husband or brother?"
"Of course."
"So you consider yourself pretty independent?"
"Yes."
"Then, I hate to break it to you, but you're probably a feminist."
"No I'm not, just because I keep my own money?"
"Well, there was a time way back when, when women weren't allowed to keep any money or property. Women had to fight to earn that right."
"Really? I never knew that."
"Just like they had to fight for the right to get divorced from abusive men, keep their own children, make their way to the top at their jobs."
"Well, I knew that, but not everybody wants that."
"You're right, but feminism gives you a choice. We didn't have that choice before and now we do. That's why I'm a feminist. I want to keep fighting for all the choices we should have that we don't."

Somewhere around here, my guy came into the convo and said he's a feminist too. This seemed to boggle her mind. We explained that feminism is about men AND women. Sure, we're different. Some differences are biological, some social, some a mixture of the two. But that doesn't mean that gender stereotypes don't hurt us all.

At the end of our little chat, she said "Well...I guess I'm a little bit of a feminist."

9. That's a great story! And now for something completely different: is there anything that you feel particularly fan-girlish about that you could discuss (or blog about) for hours on end with the right audience (a particular television show, a certain band, puppies, politics, etc.)?

I could do this about Harry Potter (hard-freaking-core!). A few others, to a lesser degree: the Beatles’ or Alanis’ music and Disney movies.

10. Speaking of movies, I noticed on your profile page that When Harry Met Sally is one of your favorite movies. It’s one of my favorites, too! What’s your favorite scene?

Woohoo! When Harry Met Sally!! I love every minute of that movie so this is by far the hardest question in this thing. While the orgasm scene is pretty classic stuff, I love the scene when Sally finds out Joe is getting married. Starting with the teary phone call to Harry right up until the hilarious look on Harry’s face after they’ve slept together – it’s BRILLIANT! A close second would be the scene at the Sharper Image when they sing “Surrey with a Fringe on Top” and Helen finds them there. I have to go watch the movie now...

That's all for now folks (and, for the record, my favorite WHMS scene is also the teary phone call bit!). Sally, thank you so much for granting me this interview. To everyone reading this, tune in February 13th for the next installment in this new interview series. In the meantime, I hope you'll continue to join us here at Fourth Wave for posts on myriad other topics, and, if you have any suggestions for people you'd like to interview or if you yourself would like to author a guest post wherein YOU conduct the interview, please don't hesitate to drop me a line (fourthwave[dot]feminism[at]gmail[dot]com).