Tag: Feminism

HOW YOUNG WE WERE!  Celebrating 40 Years of Ms. Magazine and the Movement

By Suzanne Braun Levine,
Ms. Editor, 1972- 1988

I was interviewed recently for an article about the early days of Ms. magazine, which is about to be forty years old. Soon after that I was interviewed for an article about Our Bodies, Our Selves which was first published around the same time. When thinking about those days and looking at some photographs, my first thought is How Young We Were! And my second is How Brave We Were! Now I have another thought: How Lucky We Were! to be there.

“I’m Not a Feminist But…..”

I was so touched by the note and poem I received from my friend Sean Strub – a feminist in good standing as well as a major AIDS activist – that I want to share it. He found the poem when he was going through his mother’s papers after she died recently. The short story he mentions, The Yellow Wallpaper, is a feminist classic, written in 1892; about a woman who is kept housebound by her husband and slowly goes mad.

Sean’s mother’s aversion to the word “feminist” is an example of the familiar “I’m not a feminist, but……” syndrome – a woman who walks the walk but doesn’t feel comfortable with the talk. It is clear to me – and to her son – that Janey was a feminist in spirit, which is where it counts. — Suzanne Braun Levine

Bathing Suits, Bikinis and Our Bodies!

By Suzanne Braun Levine

Recently I came upon a photograph of myself in my first bikini (it was really a two-piece, compared to what goes as a bikini these days) and I was struck by how good I looked. That thought lasted about two minutes until I realized that when that picture was taken, I thought I looked fat and bulky; I was not happy to be looked at. Then I realized that I feel the same way today. Fat and bulky. Plus, wrinkled and saggy. What a waste, I thought, not feeling good about my body back then. And just as much of a waste feeling ashamed of it now.

SELF- INVENTION – The Bond Among Women of All Generations

By Suzanne Braun Levine

One thing about being an older mother is that you are constantly reminded of the truism that age doesn’t really describe the shape of a person’s life. Nor does our place on the family tree, the generation we are assigned to at birth. When my daughter was born I was 44, old enough to be her grandmother. When she went to school, I was old enough to be her teachers’ (and her friends parents’) mother. At the same time my contemporaries had long since forgotten about coping with babies and young children – they were on to the joys of grandchildren. My most meaningful cohort was other women with children my children’s age, but not my age themselves.

“PIECING” by Robin Morgan –
A Gift for Mother’s Day

By Robin Morgan, “Upstairs in the
Garden: Poems Selected and New,”
1990.

“Sometimes you don’t have no control over the way things are. Hail ruins the crops, or fire burns you out. And then you’re just given so much to work with in a life and you have to do the best you can with what you got. That’s what piecing is. The materials is passed on to you, or is all you can afford. But the way you put them together is your business. You can put them in any order you like. Piecing is orderly.”

— An anonymous woman quoted in The Quilters: Women and Domestic Art

Mother’s Day Is For Daughters Too.

By Suzanne Braun Levine

I have always thought of Mother’s Day as a celebration of my mother, the Main Mom in the family. I made plans designed to please her and honor her on her Day. Eight months ago she died, and so this year, for the first time, I am the last mom standing. It is a weird feeling to have the day to myself, especially when my inclination is to spend it missing her. Yet when I think of the two of us as mothers, I see the…

EXCLUSIVE From Tahrir Square: The City in the Field

By Nawal El Saadawi

Translated and edited by
Robin Morgan

Egyptian feminist Nawal El Saadawi embraces a younger generation determined to achieve the revolutionary goals to which she and others have devoted their lives.

COURTNEY MARTIN: A New Generation of Activists

Over coffee on a winter afternoon, I spoke with Courtney Martin for Encore.org about how to go about making the world a better place.

Courtney Martin is the author of “Do It Anyway: The New Generation of Activists.” She speaks to her generation in her writings and her blogs on Feministing.com (“young feminists blogging, organizing, kicking ass”). And she speaks about her generation to older activists who are trying to figure out where all the political flowers have gone.