blogging life

Just off the plane from a fabulous trip to Atlanta for the National Women’s Studies Association Conference.  Thought I’d share my opening remarks from Girl w/Pen’s session, “Gone Virtual: Opportunities and Challenges for Feminist Scholar-Bloggers.”  Thanks to everyone who came and participated in the Roundtable, and to those who weren’t able to be there, I hope these postings help!

It’s an honor to be here in real space with these women with whom I share a platform virtually.  A bit about the history of Girl w/Pen: In 2007, when my first book (Only Child) came out, and then my second (Sisterhood, Interrupted), I started a blog.  It’s mission morphed as I did, becoming eventually a group platform designed to “bridge feminist research and popular reality.”  Today, we are a collaborative blog of 10 scholar-bloggers across disciplines–all of them what I would call “engaged scholars,” women who are not only modeling something important for their students (namely, engagement in a more public form of dialogue) but reinventing what it means to be a feminist scholar along the way.  They’re going to share with you how blogging for a larger audience impacts their research, their writing, and their teaching, and how collaborative blogging can serve broader feminist goals.

But first, a quick comment about why it’s particularly interesting and important to be blogging NOW.  The blogosphere is remaking the media.  It’s part of media, sure, but it’s also proactively shaping, often, what becomes news.  I’ve recently teamed up with The OpEd Project and have been teaching seminars with them.  A big part of what we talk about there is women’s imperative to contribute to public forums and public debate given our woeful underrepresentation in the nation–indeed, the world’s–most public and prominent thought leadership forums.

How many of you blog?  How many of the rest of you would like to blog but feel you have no time to?

My hope, by the end of our session this morning, after hearing what these scholar-bloggers next to me have to say about it all, is that the question becomes not how can I possibly add blogging to my already packed life but how can I not.

Panelist introductions:

Heather Hewett is an Assistant Professor of English and Women’s Studies.  Her work has been published in a range of academic and popular venues, including Women’s Studies Quarterly, Women’s Review of Books, Brain, Child, and in several edited collections, including Chick Lit: The New Woman’s Fiction. She writes and edits the “Global Mama” column for GWP.

Veronica I. Arreola is the assistant director of the Center for Research on Women and Gender and the director of the Women in Science and Engineering program at the University of Illinois at Chicago. A veteran blogger, her own blog, Viva la Feminista, is where she discusses the intersection between feminism and motherhood. She holds a bachelors degree in Biological Sciences and a masters in Public Administration, both with concentrations in Gender and Women’s Studies. She began work on her Ph.D. in Public Administration last year.  She writes the Science Grrl column at GWP.

Alison Piepmeier directs the Women’s and Gender Studies Program at the College of Charleston, where she’s an associate professor of English.  Her most recent book is Girl Zines:  Making Media, Doing Feminism (NYU Press, 2009).  She’s a member of the NWSA Governing Council.  She writes the Body Language column at GWP.

Allison Kimmich has led the National Women’s Studies Association since 2004.  Most recently she has guided the Association’s Teagle-grant funded research on women’s studies and civic engagement.  She holds a PhD in women’s studies from Emory University.  She writes the Girl Talk column for Girl w/Pen.

Kyla Bender-Baird is a Doctoral Student at the CUNY Graduate Center where she focuses on sociology of gender, embodiment, and the law.  Her book, Transgender Employment Experiences, was released this fall by SUNY Press.  Prior to returning to graduate school, Kyla worked at the National Council for Research on Women where she served as the managing editor of their blog (among other things).

And I’m Deborah Siegel. (Bio and all that stuff at www.deborahsiegel.net)

A quick note about how the blog itself works: We’re each “editors” and welcome guest posts that fall under the broad rubic of our particular columns.  We also welcome guest posts on other topics as well.  (See the guidelines, and use our contact form to get in touch with our fellow blogger and webmaster Avory Faucette!)

FROM THE HANDOUT…

CHECK OUT PANELISTS’ COLUMNS AND SAMPLE POSTS
SCIENCE GRRL / Veronica Arreola Can We Whistle Stereotypes Away?
BODY POLITIC  / Kyla Bender-Baird Love Your (NonNormative) Body – a dialogue with Kyla and Avory
GLOBAL MAMA / Heather Hewett Maternal Health, One Year Later
GIRL TALK  / Allison Kimmich The Other Sex Talk
BODY LANGUAGE / Alison Piepmeier High Expectations
MAMA W/PEN  / Deborah Siegel Midlife Mama Asks Whether We’re All Too Isolated to Fight the Pink-v.-Blue Battle Outside Our Homes

OTHER VENUES WHERE GIRL W/PENNERS BLOG
Baxter Sez
Ms. Magazine Blog
The Pink & Blue Diaries
Viva la Feminista
The Real Deal

On Thursday 6/23 at 1-2pm ET, I’m hosting one of my favorite authors for a frank conversation about writing/life integrity on She Writes Radio from 1-2pm ET.  Here’s a description, and how to join in, plus a tweet — thanks for any help the word!

Recalibrating Writing/Life Balance in a Digital World: A Conversation with Dani Shapiro and Deborah Siegel (6/23, 1-2pm ET)

Bestselling author Dani Shapiro and Girl w/Pen’s Deborah Siegel contemplate the precarious balance of being a writer while living this social media-filled life.  How do you carve out time when Facebook and email beckon? Does your outer atmosphere reflect your inner writerly needs? Listen for thoughts from two wired authors, both currently between books, on the quest for quiet.

Listen online at: http://www.blogtalkradio.com/s_w/2011/06/23/recalibrating-writinglife-balance-in-a-digital-world

Hope to “see” some of ya’ll there!

We were interested to read Pamela Paul’s list of academic blogs, “Big Blog on Campus,” in The New York Times Education Life section this last Sunday.  We felt her list of seven blogs that have achieved “blogosphere fame” didn’t reflect the much wider diversity of academic voices that populate the blogosphere.  In fact, with the exception of one female blogger and one collective blog, the rest on the list are penned by white men.  In the spirit of expanding this list, we are starting a list of academic blogs (not just feminist blogs).  This is very much a work-in-progress; please let us know about others in the comments!

Feminist Law Professors

Sociological Images

Mama PhD

The Feminist Wire

Tenured Radical

Scholar as Citizen

This post is crossposted at She Writes.

This month I was a nominee in Babble’s Moms with Clout contest.  In the end, Sausage Mama won, not me.  But the whole enchilada got me thinking: What is “clout”?  And why do so many women have trouble owning theirs?

My dictionary defines clout as “power and influence.”  Synonyms include “pull,” “authority,” “sway,” and “weight.”  In the public sphere, traditionally, clout has been gendered male.  To an overwhelming degree, it still is.  (See the depressing stats here.) Women, however, are mixing it up.  At social networks like She Writes, where authors promote one another and not just ourselves, at game-changing initiatives like The OpEd Project, where established thought leaders help fellow female experts embrace their expertise and get heard, “clout” is being redefined as something more communally achieved.  But even in the push for collaborative clout, and particularly among women, the tension between the one and the many remains.

I know this tension personally.  I experienced it this past month as I emailed my friends to ask for their vote, then opted against posting the request at She Writes or at my group blog,Girl w/Pen.  It just didn’t seem Girl w/Pen-y (or She Writes-y) to promote myself just for the sake of winning an iPad 2 (the prize).  I meticulously checked to see if any other of the 30+ nominees were She Writes members, so that I could shout us out collectively, as my colleagues in leadership at She Writes and I agreed that that would be the right way to do it.  But since they weren’t, I let it go.

In the end, I mildly regretted not saying something about it in the forums available to me—forums, heck, I’ve helped create.  I admit: I wanted that iPad!  I would have put it to good use, downloading e-books and apps and learning about the new forms all our books might take as I work toward my new project (The Pink and Blue Diaries).  But as early as day 2 or 3 of the contest, I quickly learned that I didn’t want it that bad.  Just as I couldn’t bring myself to harass my non-She Writes friends and followers more than once (ok, twice), I felt that promoting myself here for commercial gain would compromise the spirit of the community.  It felt like a conflict of interest, you know?

And that, exactly, is the problem.  Not just my problem, but women’s more generally I fear.  Are women collaborative, at times, to a fault?  In putting the community above ourselves, are we losing out on opportunities to enhance not merely our pocketbooks but our careers?  After all, winning a contest like this one is not just about winning an iPad.  To say you’ve won a contest breeds…clout.

And why should we care about clout?  Love it or hate it, fact is if you want to be a successful writer these days, clout matters.  It’s no longer the merit of our work but the reach of our platform that gets us the goodies.  Clout has been a social media buzzword for “influencer” or “community leader” for a while, but interestingly, now it’s also a website, complete with metrics and scores.  Klout.com measures “overall online influence” through an algorithm that determines exactly how much influence someone has over their social networks.  In a Klout score, numbers mean nothing; “true” influence means more.  (Come on, you know you want to, so go for it: check your Klout score here.) Will publishers start looking up our clout scores, like they look up our previous book’s sales in Book Scan?  Who knows.

In the meantime, I am not alone in my hesitation.  But nor do I necessarily think that’s a good thing.  In an article for a Canadian parenting site, top blogger Ann Douglas explores the dark–or rather, the ambivalent side–of making the top “mommyblogger” lists, while Catherine Connors of Her Bad Mother notes in a post at her own blog that top blogger and clout lists can be a source of bad feeling in the mom community, leaving those not listed feeling badly.  “I think, to that extent, they’re a little problematic,” Connors says, then adds: “I think it’s interesting that we worry about…whether feelings get hurt and the community spirit gets undermined—when this kind of discussion would be pretty much unthinkable in almost any other sphere.  Does anyone talk about Forbes business rankings making men feel bad?”

Um, no.

And that brings me back to my main concern: I was flattered to be nominated in Babble’s “Moms with Clout” contest.  In the end, I couldn’t do what it takes.  I find it interesting—and problematic—that I am so comfortable writing this post after the contest is over, revealing my ambivalence, but wasn’t comfortable asking for your vote.  Either I am being too ladylike, or simply not woman enough.

Attention GWPenners in the NYC Area: Join me, She Writes, and The OpEd Project for a joint Happy Hour in Manhattan on Sat. April 16! And for a break from all that clout-making and clout-sharing, come recharge at the mini-retreat I’m leading for writing mamas with Christina Baker Kline on May 21 in Brooklyn.

Yes, I’m still here!  The twins turned 1 last week and it’s time for me to re-enter.

A quick list of what’s been catching my attention of late:

Rita Aren’s blog, Surrender Dorothy (I’m way hooked)

Stephanie Coontz’s commentary, “Why Mad Men is TV’s Most Feminist Show”, in the Washington Post

The SPARK Summit and social media extravaganza, where I signed books sitting next to Jean Kilbourne, author most recently of So Sexy So Soon and one of my all-time feminist heroines, met her daughter the fabulous Claudia Lux (hire her, people!), and got to catch up with organizer Deb Tolman, who is a one-woman powerhouse herself

Robyn Silverman’s Good Girls Don’t Get Fat: How Weight Obsession is Messing Up Our Girls and How We can Help Them Thrive Despite It

Girls Write Now.  Always.

Responses to She Writes’ Domestic Violence Awareness Month writing prompt

What’s been catching yours?

The GWP collective seeks an additional blogger to add to our lineup who can also function as our webmaster.

The ideal candidate is organized, self-motivated, tech savvy, and familiar with WordPress; has a great idea for a monthly column to add to our column pool; is excited about feminism and media; and is ready to serve as a hub.  This is a unique opportunity for an emerging or established blogger to gain additional web/communication/organizational skills and work experience at the intersection of academia and the blogosphere as part of a highly visible (so we are told!) feminist blog.

Webmaster/blogger duties entail:

• responding to reader queries that come in through the “contact” form (the majority of which are either requests to be included on GWP’s blogroll, or press releases); forwarding relevant press releases to the relevant GWP blogger
• updating GWP’s blogroll
• letting an author or organization know when her/his book or study has been mentioned or reviewed and sending her/him the link to the post
• tweeting links to posts, posting on FB, Digg, other relevant social media and social bookmarking sites
• dealing with any tech issues that come up for GWP’s crew of 10 bloggers
• adding new books by GWP’s bloggers to the sidebar and the “Our Books” page
• serving as a point person for GWP bloggers for anything else that comes up
• recruiting a new regular blogger or two here and there when current bloggers rotate out; setting up said new blogger with a bio page and showing them the ropes

GWP is a collective.  We all do it for the love.  To continue to thrive, we need a substitute for me, at present, as its hub.  If interested in the position, please contact me at deborah@shewrites.com with a brief note about why you are the right fit, and a pitch for your column.  Candidates will be interviewed by phone by a current GWP blogger.  And please, if you know someone who you think would be a good match for this position, pass it on!

I know I know — memes are so…2008.  But humor me here as I try a little experiment at She Writes. I’d love it if you, GwP readers and bloggers, would help me create a meme (blogger tag, for those not yet in the know). Here’s how it works:

If you have a blog out there in the universe (and if not, you can always use your blog on your She Writes profile page if you’ve joined), post an answer to this question: “Who are the women in your life who exemplify the traits of a modern heroine, and why?”

Then, tag as many other bloggers as you wish to do the same. Please include a link to the She Writes mainpage (www.shewrites.com) somewhere in your post. And it’d be GREAT if you’d post the url to YOUR post in comments over at MY post about it today at She Writes (http://www.shewrites.com/profiles/blogs/she-writes-on-fridays-the).  That way, we can all find you.  Does this make sense?!

Ok, here we go.  I’ll start.

1. My friend, Purse Pundit, and She Writes Advisory Board Member Jacki Zehner, because she gives so generously of her time, treasure, and talent to make a difference in this world–and because she is secretly Wonder Woman, for reals
2. My comrade in arms, feministing’s Courtney Martin, because she moves beyond the comfort zone and writes with moxie
3. My sister by proxy Rebecca London, because she models the integration of motherhood and professional identity in a way that’s nothing short of heroic
4. My friend, and fellow Girl w/Penner, Virginia Rutter, because she taught me–and continues to teach me–the psychology of abundance
5. My colleague, and fellow Girl w/Penner, Alison Peipmeier, because she went into and is recovering from brain surgery with so much wit and bravery it knocks my socks off, daily (case in point: see her latest, below)

Your turn. And I’d be so very grateful if you’d pass it on!

For my (new!) regular column over at She Writes, called She Writes on Fridays (because “she’s” trying, really really trying), I wrote a very Mama w/Pen-ish post, which I wanted to share here.  In “Through the Maternal Looking Glass,” I struggle with the inevitable question: is “mommy blogging” narcissistic?  Of wider interest? Neither? Both?

Sayeth fellow GwP blogger Natalie Wilson in comments over there: “The “new momism” documented by Susan Douglas is alive and well. We are supposed to be do-it-all supermoms consumed with our children. Yet, dare we blog/write about this and we are narcissists. Post-feminist society my foot. Adrienne Rich is rolling in her grave..”

And sayeth my partner in crime over at She Writes Kamy Wicoff: Bad writing is narcissistic. The narcissist fails to observe the telling details; fails to achieve the clarity and compassionate attention which characterize the writing that moves us and changes us. Are male coming-of-age stories, so ubiquitous in our literature, narcissistic by definition, simply because of the perspective from which they are told? Diminishing women who write simply because they write about motherhood is indefensible — the deeper question, I think, is whether writing that takes place in nearly real time, a kind of continuous unedited “feed” from a person’s latest experience to a written form shared with the world, can be GOOD or not. If it’s good, I’m in. If it’s not, I’m out.

What sayeth YOU?

(Photo cred: We Picture This)

In January, tragedy struck the Los Angeles suburb of Manhattan Beach.

Investigators believe that 24-year-old Michael Nolin killed his girlfriend, 22-year-old Danielle Hagbery, because Hagbery was breaking up with him. Apparently, Nolin then committed suicide.

This murder-suicide story is tragic all the way around. We hear about situations like this all the time. But while the details of this case might still be fuzzy, one thing is for sure: The report published in The Daily Breeze perpetuates the worst of victim-blaming and misguidedly frames the issues.

The story headline reads:

Police believe romantic break-up fueled Manhattan Beach killings.

But romance and break-ups don’t cause murder. Violence and aggression do. Let’s revise and edit, shall we?

An accurate story headline would read:

Police believe violent aggression fueled Manhattan Beach killings.

But the problem doesn’t end with the headline. The article quotes Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department’s Lt. Dan Rosenberg who provides so-called tips to women on preventing their own assault.

I would insert a snarky “yawn” if the issue wasn’t so absolutely critical!

Daily Breeze reporters Larry Altman and Andrea Woodhouse quote Los Angeles Sheriff Department’s Lt. Dan Rosenberg as saying:

“Danielle Hagbery’s death should serve as a warning to other young women that they need to look out for themselves — such as not going to the boyfriend’s home — when a relationship goes sour.

“This is one more tragic end of a dating relationship where these young women should be aware of it,” Rosenberg said. “Ladies need to be vigilant when things go sideways with boyfriends.”

Seriously. Really?

I’m willing to accept that Lt. Rosenberg was well-intentioned but seriously misguided. And, if so, then Altman and Woodhouse are complicit in their equally misguided decision to include these “tips” in their article.

Badly informed comments such as Rosenberg’s perpetuate a serious problem: Blaming the victim for her own death. This profoundly shifts the attention from the real issue. Presuming it’s true that boyfriend Michael Nolin killed Hagbery before turning a gun on himself, the warning must not be directed toward victims.

Ladies don’t need to be vigilant. Murderers need to not kill.

If this was in fact an instance of “one more tragic end of a dating relationship,” then men need to be aware of their own potential for violence and prevent it from happening. The best way to end violence is for the violent person to stop. Prevention is the real solution.

On February 1, 2010 I sent a letter of concern to eight Daily Breeze editors and reporters, and to the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Department. This letter called out the newspaper and the sheriff for what violence-prevention educator Jackson Katz calls linguistic shape shifting, where language obscures men’s responsibility for violence.

The letter of concern includes signatures from authors, professors, public speakers, advocates, and community activists, experts across the country who work in preventing gender-based violence and sexual assault.

The letter concludes by offering support: “There are plenty of community-based resources and educational materials on the subject of preventing male violence against women. Please do not hesitate to be in touch if you would like to avail yourself to our services and resources.”

To date, not one of the individuals or agencies receiving this letter have replied. The silence is deafening.

GET IT WHILE IT’S HOT: Demystify the blogosphere with GWP’s very own Courtney E. Martin. Attend the live online event TOMORROW or order the download to enjoy any old time! Register here, at She Writes.

Here’s the full court description (pun intented!):

What distinguishes a blog from a website? How do you find a blog that deals with your particular passions and interests? What is proper etiquette for getting bloggers’ attention and/or participating in the blog conversation? This workshop for beginners demystifies blogs once and for all, breaking down both the basic anatomy of a blog (blog roll, categories, comments, etc.) and the landscape of the larger blogosphere. Participants will walk away with a clear understanding of how to find blogs that interest them or pertain to their field, search for particular issues and experts within the new media landscape, and operate with savvy in the blogosphere—using blogs for research, promotion, and platform building.
Stay tuned for Part II, in which Courtney will demystify starting a blog and finding content to keep it fresh and attract traffic.

Courtney E. Martin is a writer, speaker, and consultant based in Brooklyn, New York. She is the author of three books, including the award-winning Perfect Girls, Starving Daughters: How the Quest for Perfection is Harming Young Women (Penguin, 2007). She is also a Senior Correspondent for The American Prospect and an editor at Feministing.com, the most widely read feminist publication in the world. She has appeared on most major media outlets, including The O’Reilly Factor, CNN, and GoodMorning America, and won numerous awards and fellowships for her writing and activism. Courtney is happy to coach both individuals and organizations in blog and book proposal development, new media outreach, and engaging young people. She also loves facilitating panels, developing conferences, and speaking on topics such as feminism, intergenerational dialogue, activism, youth culture, politics, and writing.