Misogyny in The Handmaid’s Tale and the Wrinkled American Dream
February 12, 2008
by Nicolette Westfall
Imagine you are oh, say, 28, and your boyfriend is, say, 81, and you have come to the realization that in just a few short years (when you turn 35 or thereabouts), your biological clock is going to slow down,
Offred, an enslaved woman, presents an opposite to Holly in her apprehension about having sex with a much older male, the only similarities between the two women being that they are both enslaved to misogynist men who are well past their productive prime. While Commander Fred is able to mechanically get off without the aid of drugs (116), Hefner admittedly relies on Viagra
Regardless of ability to breed, both misogynists, Fred and Hefner, have an endless supply of flesh, which leaves little time for worrying about the trivial lives of their women. On Holly’s desperation to have a baby with him, Hefner, notes
Being a misogynist can be a lot of work, as both men indicate. Hefner admits to focusing a bit more on a few select women rather than many by slimming down his “herd” to please
Fred justifies the
It isn’t that Hefner and Fred don’t care about their sex objects; it’s just that, as Fred admits to Offred, men naturally need a variety of women. Instead of making them wear different dresses in the pre-Gilead period, powerful men simply possess more than one woman (298). Offred and Holly can’t argue against the very nature of the misogynist man.
Works Cited
Atwood, Margaret, The Handmaid’s Tale.
If Only This Writer Spoke Italian
February 11, 2008
by Karen Harrington
Magari!
Magari (mah-gah-ree) is a common Italian expression meaning If only! Yes, yes, it’s true. I’m still a bit heady about my recent trip to Italy. Can you blame me? The food. The scenery. The language. So to keep the vacation spirit going, I cook, I look at photos and I speak a handful of Italian phrases to my girls during the day. Language is the food every writer loves to devour after all. Learning expressions that convey so much meaning and enthusiasm into a single word, well, that is one of the reasons I love to write.
I don’t know about you, but some sentences, leave me gob-smacked. I study them. I re-read them. I write them in my notebook. And after reading the following gems, I thought, Magari!
“So long as she sat at that machine concentrating on the straights and flushes and jackpots, she didn’t have to think about the money she wasn’t making at the antique mall, the expensive new mahogany bed where she and Lyle slept facing away from each other.”
Will Allison, What You Have Left
“My conscience is clear, but that doesn’t make me innocent.”
Paul, I Corinthians 4:4
“The terrible day dissipates in the pleasurable haze of memory.”
Laura Fraser, An Italian Affair
“Ransom Hill had fallen hopelessly in love with his own wife.”
David Payne, Back to Wando Passo
“It will be years before she begins to feel the shadow of hopelessness falling over her pained attempts to drive her life somewhere interesting; years before she begins to sense time biting at her heels.”
Kelly Braffet, Last Seen Leaving
And here’s a little Valentine’s present for you. More common Italian expressions I find useful in my everyday life with two curious toddlers and two sneaky Labradors.
Il mio tesoro (My darling)
Ti ama (I love you)
Mamma mia! (My goodness!)
Che bello! (How lovely!)
Uffa! (Aargh!)
Mi raccomando! (Please, I beg you!)
Che ne so! (How should I know?)
Ti sta bene! (Serves you right!)
Non te la prendere! (Don’t get so upset!)
Che macello! (What a mess!)
Non mi va! (I don’t feel like it!)
Karen Harrington is the author of JANEOLOGY (April 2008); the story of one man’s struggle to understand his wife and her sudden descent into madness.
www.karenharringtonbooks.com
Hair Flips Artist Diane Jacobs’ Perception of the World
February 8, 2008
by Shana Thornton-Morris
People are repulsed by and obsessed with hair. We worry with it, manipulate it, punish it, alter it, style it, redesign again and again, cry as a result of its unruliness, and use it as a measuring stick by which to judge others.
In her artist’s statement, Diane Jacobs, a visual artist from Portland, Oregon, braids the cultural superstitions surrounding human hair alongside the controlling act of forcefully shaving a person’s head for incarceration. After shaving her head in Italy in 1993, Diane began noticing other women with bald heads and the stigma placed on a person’s hair depending on their cultural background. She said that she felt “liberated” as a result of losing her locks, and began to notice the implications of hair types and styles as well as the racial and ethnic stigmas of hair.
As a self-proclaimed book artist, Diane’s artwork began with explorations in typeface and derogatory words used against women. Through her interviews with women about derogatory words used as slurs against them or that they had hurled toward other women, Diane encountered different perceptions for words. After weaving strands of paper into a bra, panties, and wigs that were printed with derogatory words, her work “unconsciously” underwent a metamorphosis to include hair as well as transparent or reflective globes and spheres symbolic of thought and ideologies. She asked friends for hair and used her own, adding an element of the exceptionally personal and intimate to her installations and mixed media images. In a recent lecture, Diane said, “I use hair because I am interested in the texture and the color range. It comes from a person, a personal intimate place. It’s loaded and I like that.” And later she said, “Using text in my work just made me think about what I was trying to say more.”
While she continues to print typeface for her installations and images, the hair tells its own stories. As Diane writes on her website, hair is encoded with an individual’s DNA. Receiving hair from people with various ethnic and racial backgrounds, Diane saw a reflection of the world within the different colors on an individual strand of hair. She discovered the stories of generations. People who intentionally cut their hair for Diane’s art entrust her with their personal histories as well as the DNA history of their families. Even strangers feel compelled to mail her chunks, braids, clips, curls of their hair. She works with an undying lineage of former comb-overs, perms, pigtails, french braids, cornrows, bobs, layers, buns, and mohawks.
Certain religious doctrines project spiritual and/or personal power onto a person’s hair and refuse to cut their divine locks (Diane mentions Rastafarians, Sikhs, and Hasidic Jews on her website). Still, some Christian fundamentalist groups, like Pentecostals, forbid women to cut their hair. Diane has sewn stars and diamonds with individual strands of hair. Those symbols reflect the diverse points of view concerning hair. It is trash under the feet of women at the beauty parlor, a sacred locket pressed into a photo album or keepsake box, a magical charm, spiritual power, and a controlled growth. The absence of it can be an oppressive humiliation, a self-conscious blemish, and an act of transformation. The process of transformation materializes in Diane’s work.
After George Bush’s controversial first election, Diane created a small book of hand-made paper (shredded New York Times and LA Times were used to make the paper) and hair. She called it “The Hairy Times” in order to show the manipulation and confusion of the major media outlets within the United States. “The Hairy Times”, and her work following it, questions political perceptions.
While her online gallery contains images of the majority of her work, I was able to see three of her pieces in person at Austin Peay State University in Clarksville, TN, where she is currently one of six artists from Portland, Oregon, with work on display in the exhibition, “Six Points.”
Global Inversion, 2008, 7′ x 5′, felt and human hair, acrylic ball
In the piece “Global Inversion”, Diane sewed hair into the image of an inverted world map on a 7′x5′ piece of felt. Hanging in front of the map is a small reflective globe (reminds me of a smooth, bald head), through which the map appears right-side-up (due to the flipped reflection, the globe has a map of hair). Her image reveals the small personal way that we often encounter views of the outside world. Often, the world apart from ourselves and our own culture appears upside down or backwards. Diane said that world change requires a major transformation. Her work searches for a point of unification while giving voice to divisive opinions or ways of looking at an object as well as the world.
Inspired by the book “Abolition Democracy” by Angela Davis, the portfolio “REP-HAIR-ATION” uses text, images, and hair to display a definition of incarceration, illustrating how the US penal system is designed as a continuation of the institution of slavery. Diane gives voice to the separation felt by children of inmates. With a perception for dual meanings, one page of the portfolio shows two pairs of scissors and an unfinished, unraveling braid that has been snipped away from the scalp—a reminder of the identity loss behind repetitious steel bars as well as the children who have been cut off from their parents.
Diane Jacob’s work is conditioned in dual meanings: the intimate and the public. From the derogatory to the sacred, Diane combs out spaces that entangle viewers in their perception of women, hair, and world change. The people who give hair to Diane allow her to make a collective, political statement through the use of a personal medium.
Shana Thornton-Morris reads about, researches, and explores her curiosities. She also blogs frequently at http://storytimeout.blogspot.com/
North America’s Obsession with Babies and The Handmaid’s Tale
February 5, 2008
Hollywood is awash in babies, from the recently birthed (Helena Bonham Carter and Nicole Ritchie) to many, many others. Adoption advocates Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie may be in that precious way again, if industry wide commentary on Angelina’s multi-coloured “sack” gown and the possibility of twins is any indication. One guaranteed high profile pregnancy is highlighted by the “delighted” Gwen Stefani family, as they rejoice over the anticipated arrival of their second child sometime later this year. Added to the swelling joy is music celeb Dixie Chick Martie Maguire, who notes that’s she’s “very excited” . Not to be forgotten, Fred Savage and his wife, Jennifer Stone, are pregnant again, and want everybody to know it! Lesser known celebs, like Mary Lynn Rajskub, are expecting. Even younger Hollyrude celebrities like courageous Jamie Lynne Spears are baking up offspring. Last, but not least, celebrity Arkansas breeding couple Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar spewed forth their 17th child in August, and immediately noted their eager anticipation in conceiving number 18. The positive outlook on pregnancy is mirrored with recent Hollywood films such as Knocked Up, Waitress, Bella, and Juno.The joyous list goes on. However, in Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale, and elsewhere in present day society, there are scores of women who are desperately busy trying to conceive in order to lay claim to biological (or surrogate) motherhood. In Gilead, women are so hungry for babies that the heroine, Offred, describes scenes in which women size up each other’s bellies, noting that jealousy can often get pregnant women killed. Offred’s very survival depends on whether or not she can breed successfully. Acceptable children in pre-Gilead America are so scarce that Offred recalls a memory of someone stealing her young daughter from her grocery cart. The eager anticipation of a household pregnancy is so powerful that Offred’s master’s Wife encourages her to illegally sleep with a man (Nick) other than the polygamous Commander. The anxiety Offred and the other breeders (handmaids) suffer as they wait to successfully conceive is a mere echo of women across the industrialized world today who can’t breed without assistance, but who are, nonetheless, determined (at any cost) to do so. The temptation of a baby, as Elizabeth Ruth notes, is akin to a candy dangling in front of women’s noses. She deals with the trauma of callous fertility clinic physicians who coldly treat her like a number. From costly fertility drugs (second mortgage, anyone?), to winging it, she and her partner try everything until they finally conceive and carry beyond the first trimester. Ruth’s negative experiences are highlighted by the exploitation of other couples in pursuing pregnancy. Dr. Charles Rodeck, head of fetal medicine at London University College Hospital, notes that for clinics, it is not so much about patient care as it is competition for clients, and the resulting lack of information they receive. Women such as Ruth and IVF patients are willing to spend diaper bags full of money on any treatment they are lead to believe is effective. Regardless of whether a woman is pregnant, trying, or not even remotely considering the possibility, the temptation is everywhere in today’s American baby boom propaganda. Likewise, in pregnant women show off, and those waiting for the same glory get the privilege of riding in the birth mobile to witness the wondrous birthing event of a fellow handmaiden . In present day America, even the mere thought of the “love of ruffles and lace” is enough to send Michelle Duggar into an orgasm about conceiving yet again.
For Duggar and Hollywood women, there is a consumer plus to expecting—they can shop until their waters break. Newsday recently reported that J. Lo, you’re average mother-to-be, is buying little things like sleigh cribs and silk sheet sets. If women think shopping is exciting pre-pregnancy, imagine searching for the perfect personalized embroidered crib sets! The glamorous task of buying Baby everything He or She needs (or Them, if you’re even more blessed) is furthered by such acts as Elizabeth Hasselbeck giving all members of The View’s audience their very own “Celebrity Bump Bag,” (which is valued at $1,500+ and contains brand named Baby lines). Glam consumption starts with Baby! The current cultural trend, if Hollyrude is any example, according to Virginia Rutter, is that making reproductive choices appears to be quite effortless. The only real worry is deciding over which designer diaper bag to buy.
It isn’t just Celeb moms and moms-to-be that are creating a rose-colored pregnancy lens through which the rest of us salivate on. “Babies” is one of People Magazine’s Top Ten news categories. We, the consumers, are lapping up the rabbit Hollywood baby bump.
While the far Christian right currently relies on such seemingly innocent Hollywood movies and celebrities to place an ultra-distorted view of pregnancy and all of its realities, it has a much darker ace up its sleeve. The lack of education and access to contraceptives and other methods indicates that America is headed down the path to excessive breeding. Approximately 750,000 American teens will conceive in 2008. Goodman has stated that abstinence only education, to the tune of $1 billion, just doesn’t work. Lack of education coupled with skewed information is a disastrous combination. Some women blame abortion for drug problems and most other women’s psychological issues, and Christians like Rhonda Arias encourage carrying through with unplanned pregnancies instead of considering the alternatives. Compared to Europe,
Following right along in the view that abortion is responsible for an assortment of women’s ills, men who want more control over the female body, have chimed in with a new attack. Men like Jason Baier adds his two cents by claiming that men suffer from a variety of gripping psychological problems and addictions that stem directly from the act of abortion. Though there is no valid research proving that men are severely traumatized by abortion, these men continue on in the movement to dissuade women from having that choice. Contrary to these male assertions, Post-Abortion Syndrome is not a recognized disorder, nor does male sadness and regret concerning abortion translate into life-paralyzing devastation. Whether women choose to abort or keep the unborn is often influenced by accessibility to different services, not male paralysis. Ann Friedman notes that abortion providers have been dropping in numbers for the past 2 decades, and while it has leveled off somewhat, numbers are still declining. Although some doctors provide medical abortions, these numbers are small.
With all signs pointing towards more pregnancies in
In the meantime, Offred is washed and groomed by her womenfolk, as if she is a “prize pig.” She is treated minimally better than the other women because of her breeding potential. Danita J. Dodson compares her to the colonized African-American slave woman—once she is incapable of producing offspring, she will be disposed of, or sent to the colonies as free labour until her body wears out. Bringing the comparison up to date, the woman that comes to mind is Michelle Duggar, who doesn’t get time off from breeding; she is enslaved to the far right’s belief that good Christian women must breed as much as possible to create warriors in the fight against evil (any one who isn’t an upper class white male Christian). Unlike Offred, though, Dugger and other aging women out there will find use in assisting their children in raising grandchildren; somebody has to do the thankless job.
If
One Night, Three Parties…Keep the Change
February 4, 2008
by Diane Saarinen
The line up of events on the evening of January 31 caused me to temporarily abandon my shut-in status and get out of the house for once. And who could blame me?
Jessica Valenti, Feministing.com
I started off the night by joining in a Happy Hour/Roe v. Wade Anniversary Extravaganza hosted by none other than the fabulous ladies of the Feministing blog. Although I only was present for the first hour of the bash, it was off to a great start — the punch flowed freely while can’t-eat-just-one frosted cupcakes tempted the partygoers. And the next morning I awoke to this story in the New York Times which also featured a pic of executive editor Jessica Valenti taken the night before. Hope to see the ladies again for their next happy hour!
Ceres Gallery folks
Next stop on my itinerary was an opening at the Ceres Gallery. A program of the New York Feminist Art Institute, the non-for-profit artist-run organization Ceres is dedicated to the promotion of contemporary women in the arts. The current exhibition, Ornery Abstraction, honors original member Helen Stockton with works by abstract artists. Throughout the duration of this show, classrooms are invited to come for a workshop explaining and exploring abstract art, which is free but requires registration.
Downtown Groove
Last but not least, the Council of Literary Magazines and Presses (of which Her Circle Ezine is a member) hosted a shindig in their offices to celebrate the Association of Writers & Writing Programs conference and bookfair in New York City. (Have I mentioned yet that all these events were in NYC? Well, if I didn’t – I’m doing so now.) The invitation promised “a toast and a twirl,” and while there was plenty of champagne, I can guarantee you there was no twirling. As this photo illustrates the premises were packed which meant once you found a spot, you were with fair certainty rooted there – with all those around you effectively becoming quite the captive audience. Cool! Exactly the right atmosphere to tell all about our upcoming International Women’s Day Virtual Festival.
Actually, I think I left my heart in Venice
February 4, 2008
by Karen Harrington
Venice is sinking, but that is not the only reason you should rush there at the next possible opportunity. Most women have a sense that
The highlights of the trip were many, but foremost had to be sharing the trip with two of my best girlfriends – an art lover and a photographer.
Why
I was there with my husband last April. I fell in love with the city not only for its place in history, but for its beautiful decay, for its sun-washed colors and watery landscape. No one structure is the same color from canal to roof, but rather, a wonderful blend of shades, cracks and layers. Sort of like your favorite girlfriends. So, I felt my heart ache as the airport shuttle dragged me away from the city. As fate would have it, when I returned home my first ever advance check was in the mailbox. Not wanting this incredible earning to go for anything mundane, I searched for a trip that would match both the joy I felt at becoming published and the amount of the check itself. Okay, so I had more joy than money. Still, I found I could afford a celebration. What I found was four nights in off season, cold and foggy
While there we three walked for hours each day without any real goal in mind. Sure, we wanted to visit St. Mark’s Basillica, feed scores of fat pigeons and have a bellini at Harry’s Bar (a five ounce bellini that will cost you your entire Starbuck’s budget for a week and have you exclaiming “Euro-kidding me!” when you get the bill). Alas, we left the rest of our walking to our sense of wanderlust. Okay, so this strategy gets you lost again and again. We searched for the Rialto Market for a ridiculously long amount of time, asking directions of countless kind Venetians and one Frenchman who merely said, “Don’t you have a map?!”. So you can understand it when I tell you we felt like we’d hit the Holy Grail when we finally stumbled upon the not so lovely fish stench permeating the market.
But we were there. We found it. We walked through its maze of multi-colored produce stands and seafood. After finding it, the city seemed to acknowledge our perseverance and directed us along its uncrowded, foggy streets with greater patience. (Or maybe we just stopped trying to find anything on purpose.)
We found other great places to leave behind our Euros. We ate the best bruschetta and pasta aglio lio e peperoncino (spaghetti with olive oil and peppers). We discovered Limoncello. We saw the same painter twice in one day as he moved his easel from one part of the city to another presumably to take advantage of the light. We spent an hour inside a mask shop trying on tens of sublime and sexy masks, leaving our faces glittery for the rest of the day. And in a nod to
So women, go with your girlfriends! Men, take your women! Let me be your blogeteering ambassador. Allow me to share my photo album until you do have the opportunity to visit La Serenissima yourself.
Ciao!
Karen Harrington is the author of JANEOLOGY, a debut novel Booklist calls a fascinating mix of legal thriller and compelling character study.
One World Cafe Virtual Reading Series - Diana Ferrus
February 3, 2008
Diana Ferrus is a writer and performance poet. Her poem, “I have come to take you home - a tribute to Sarah Baartman” was instrumental in the return of the 19th century figure’s remains to her home in South Africa. Ferrus was born in 1953 in Worcester, 100 km from Cape Town, a town known for its vineyards and wine. She completed her secondary education at Esselen Park High School in Worcester and her tertiary education at the University of the Western Cape, where she currently works as an administrator in the Department of Industrial Psychology.Ferrus has attended several literature festivals internationally, including the International Poetry Festival in North and South Korea in 2005. She received two awards for her work, including one from the Department of Arts and Culture for her work with grassroots women writers. In addition, she established her own little publishing house and hopes to publish writers who would not normally be published by mainstream publishers. Ferrus published her first Afrikaans poetry collection, “Ons Komvandaan,” and co-edited “Slaan vir my ‘n masker, Vader,” a book on fathers. She released a CD of storytelling with musical accompaniment. Her next publication will be an English collection of poetry entitled,”I have come to take you home.
Daddy
Roots
Journeys
Tribute to Sarah Bartman
Writer’s Workshop: Allow Yourself Time to Create
February 3, 2008
Workshop with Waverly Fitzgerald, writing coach and author of Slow Time: Recovering the Natural Rhythm of Life.
Saturday, March 8th
12:00 pm PST/3:00pm EST
Do you have difficulty setting priorities? Do you dream of finding ways to put yourself – and your art – first? Seattle-based writing coach Waverly Fitzgerald gives demonstrations and exercises so you can set your plans and goals, while honoring your own commitment to yourself. Using her own brand of organic time management – or “slow time” – Waverly also teaches the difference between natural and artificial time, and how to align the creative rhythms to nature’s own flow.
Participation is limited. Registration required for this free virtual workshop. To attend contact us via email at events@hercircleezine.com.
Visit Waverly online at www.waverlyfitzgerald.com. To learn more about her book, Slow Time: Recovering the Natural Rhythm of Life, visit www.schooloftheseasons.com.

Missed the workshop? Not a problem. We’ve got the instant replay here.
One World Cafe Virtual Reading Series - Jonida Beqo
February 3, 2008

Jonida Beqo, a.k.a. Gypsee Yo, is a native of Tirana, Albania, currently residing in Atlanta, Georgia. She received her B.A. in Theatre from the University of Alabama in Birmingham, where she founded Lighthouse Productions, an independent theatre company dedicated to original works that educate about and empower communities in crisis. In 2003 the American College Theatre Festival and the Kennedy Center for the Arts recognized Jonida’s one-woman show “The Women I Know” with the Dell’Arte Diversity Award. She has published in magazines and anthologies such as Mehr Licht! Java Monkey Speaks Anthology, Pedestal Magazine, as well as in a series of periodicals in Albanian. Jonida is the author of three poetry collections in her native tongue, and of four audio CD collections in English, including her bestsellers Kitchensinkdrama, and Firstborn Daughters. As Gypsee Yo , she performs internationally as a spoken word artist, and has competed in slams worldwide, including National Poetry Slam 2006 and 2007, Individual World Poetry Slam 2006, and the first ever Women of the World Poetry Slam 2008. Jonida is a devoted wife, a doting mother, and a passionate teacher. www.gypseeyo.com



