I recently learned about this new(ish) NYC feminist network called Paradigm Shift. They do meet-ups, open mics, and more. And they’re throwing a party to celebrate women here in NYC on March 1 from 6:30pm to 3:00am (with a drumming circle at 5:30pm) at Cattyshack Brooklyn. For more info about the event and the org, check out the website.

Rebecca London, Ph.D., is Director of Research at Stanford University’s John W. Gardner Center for Youth and Their Communities. Rebecca lives on California’s central coast with her husband and two school-age daughters. She’s frequently quoted in the press as an expert on poverty, youth, and working motherhood. Here she is! -GWP

The New York Times reported last Monday that people who lack health insurance tend to receive cancer diagnoses later in the stages of their illness, making treatment more costly and survival less likely (“Study Finds Cancer Diagnosis Linked to Insurance”). This finding, though horrific, is fairly predictable given previous research on health insurance coverage. Numerous studies have shown that lack of health insurance can be detrimental because uninsured patients tend to not receive regular or preventive care, their undiagnosed or under-medicated conditions thrive in the absence of such care, and when medical crisis escalates, they find their way into the emergency room and subject to exorbitant medical bills.

What is unusual – indeed frightening – about the study reported in the Times is that the findings apply not only to those with no insurance, but also to those who are insured by Medicaid, the health insurance program for poor adults and children. Medicaid should work like private health insurance, offering its subscribers access to preventive and acute-need health care on a timely and low-cost basis. However, it is well known that Medicaid reimbursement rates to doctors are lower than reimbursements from private insurers, and come with a tremendous amount of bureaucratic paperwork. Many medical professionals opt to not provide treatment to those covered by the program simply because it is not cost effective to do so.

The result: expanding inequality in access to health care with truly dire health consequences.

In this election year, any politician who tells us that universal health care is not needed to fix the U.S. health care crisis is avoiding a painful truth. Expanding Medicaid is not an option if we want to ensure health care access to everyone. We need to look back to the dark days of Hillary’s universal health care plan failure and critically analyze what happened with it in order to create a fresh version that will be palatable to policymakers and the public. Maybe a decade later, we’re ready to make a critical move.

This just came my way — though the deadline for submissions is March 1, so if you’re interested, better hop to (or ask for an extension):

* Thinking of joining a nunnery?
* Feeling asexual and just want to cuddle?
* Swinging and loving it?

We want to see/hear/read your stories! Audio stories are great, too. CDs may accompany the anthology.

SEND YOUR CREATIONS TO THE FORTHCOMING ANTHOLOGY:

“Desire: A Girl’s Guide to Dreaming – Queer Women of Color Writing Critically on the Erotic” (working title)

We invite people to share their experiences and thoughts on sex, lust, love, relationship, desire, the erotic, being stone, being poly. How do you envision, enact, do sex? And not. This anthology is about opening up language, story, healing.

Is it okay to ask your queer of color fam to cuddle, without it being sexual? What does it mean to touch and connect with people without wanting sex, without it being sexual? What is erotic? How is it lived by queer women of color? If people are looking for liberation in their bodies, in their shared connection with people, what does that look like? What does queer sex feel like, taste like, dream like? What if you could dream your way out of survivor, into thriving, into living and creating intentional relationships that heal, rather than sting, love and push through all the bifurcations of our lived lives. How do you touch your way out of colonization, how do touching and connection become a way of resisting colonization and objectification, and healing from rape, assault, sexual abuse, physical abuse? What language is used? What words are created? When we are in desire, the articulation of the possible, how do we free ourselves, how are we already free where we see traps? Where are you, finally, free? In desire, are you free?

A sense of humor is a must in all relationships; we seek levity and gravity, fun, light energy that is also deep, connected, and profound. Funny stories, essays, and work with a twist all welcome. Send beautiful words, art, funny anecdotes, poetry, images, stills of performances to desireanthology@yahoo.com. The deadline for sending work is 1 March 2008. If you desire a land address for mailing work, contact us at the above e-mail address.

We look forward to hearing from you,
Pak Soo Na and Sherisse Alvarez

This kills.

Favorite quotes: “She’s a bitch. I’m a bitch. Get used to it.” “Bitches get stuff done.” “Bitch is the new black!” (You gotta see it in context to not be offended. I personally found it v. funny!)

Ellen Goodman had an interesting column last Friday (“The Female Style — Modeled By a Man”) in which she notes that Hillary Clinton has become “the tough guy in the race” and Barack Obama “the Oprah candidate.”

As Goodman explains, “He was the quality circle man, the uniter-not-divider, the person who believes we can talk to anyone, even our enemies. He finely honed a language usually associated with women’s voices.” She quotes political science professor Kathleen Dolan, who sees Obama as “the embodiment of the gentle, collaborative style without threatening his masculine side.” Dolan adds, “He’s being more feminine than she can be. She is in a much tighter box.”

Goodman offers a brief history of leadership studies and concludes with a provocative question: “So, has the women’s movement made life easier? For another man?”

I spoke to Goodman for her piece but she didn’t end up quoting me. I wish I could have referred her to both Renee Cramer and J.K. Gayle, who were having a similar conversation here on GWP, while I was off feeding sheep!

In his astute response to Renee’s post, J.K. Gayle shares some great links, which I wanted to share with everyone here. Comments J.K.:

Karlyn Kohrs Campbell, the world’s greatest scholar on womanly discourse and on presidential rhetoric, has conceded (to some of us at a conference recently) that Barack Obama is using feminist rhetoric. Kohrs Campbell is the one who wrote that famous “Hating Hillary” article a while back, in which she looked at the rhetorics of hate around Clinton. (I asked if she thought Toni Morrison, who endorses Obama, could fairly call him, if elected, “our first woman president.” Kohrs Campbell, who likes the idea of a true woman president sooner rather than later, replies: “yes, you could call him a ‘womanly’ presidential candidate.”)

In a related post, Hugo Schwyzer offers “A few notes on feminism, symbols, and youthful Obamophilia.”

(Ellen, ask me again, and I will refer you to GWP readers!)

I’m excited to share that in April, I’ll be teaming up with journalist Alissa Quart (author of Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers and Hothouse Kids: The Dilemma of the Gifted Child) for a two-session on-site intensive on personal writing (essay writing, blogging, and more!) — offered through the Woodhull Institute for Ethical Leadership.

FINDING YOUR SUBJECT, FINDING YOUR VOICE: A Seminar in Personal Nonfiction

When: Sunday, April 13 at 11 am – 3pm, April 17 at 6 pm – 9 pm.
Where: New York City
To see more details and RSVP, click here, call 6464350837, or email ldavis@woodhull.org.

And here’s our course description:

So many of us want to put our ideas or personal experiences down on paper, but don’t know how to find our medium or shape our raw material into stories. In two intensive sessions, we will seek to find the topic, style and genre for that which we most wish to express. We will start by asking ourselves questions about what we have experienced in our lives. What’s notable about us and what are we experts in? What are our motives for writing? What specific goal are we hoping to achieve by writing about our lives? After taking a hard look at our interests, work and life experiences, we will figure out whether they will intersect with an audience, what sort of audience, and how to position our ideas and ourselves in order to reach that audience. With this accomplished, we will build out our best article, essay, blog, or book ideas. By the end of the class, each student will have either a story pitch, an outline for a short article or an oped, a start on a personal essay, or an idea for a book or a blog. These written frames will serve as the culmination of our in-class exercises, group conversations, and at-home writing in between the two sessions.

In order to get a better sense of voice, story and topic in non-fiction, we will read a selection of modern essay writers (among them Joan Didion’s Goodbye To All That, a selection from Alexandra Fuller’s Don’t Let’s Go To The Dogs Tonight, a Mary McCarthy personal essay etcetera). In order to get a better sense of blog personae, content, and voice, we will look together at range of blogs with strong personal voices and discuss. For those who decide to create their own blogs as a means of personal expression, we will create them on-site, along with names and domains, learning about blog style, purpose, and community along the way. We will discuss how blog writing differs and overlaps with more traditional forms of personal writing as well.

It’s almost March, and to kick off Women’s History Month, this Saturday at 2pm I’ll be doing a fireside chat at the Alice Paul Institute in Mount Laurel, NJ. If in the South Jersey area, please stop by!

The Institute is housed at Paulsdale, Alice Paul’s birthplace and family home – a remarkable place. There will be hot chocolate 🙂

More info, and to register, click here.

This is my baby cousin, Lia, with a pen, and making her cyberspace debut. I just couldn’t resist.

(Got a picture of a girl with pen you’d like me to post? Send it my way!)

Attention historians: Glamour Magazine is seeking suggestions for “the greatest Mother-Daughter duos of all time” for their Mother’s Day issue. Any takers?

Nobel awardees Marie and Irene Curie and literary giants Mary Wallstonecraft and Mary Shelly already top their list. But what of great queens and stateswomen? Heroines and pioneers? Inventors and moguls? Literati. Artistas. Revolutionaries. … . and so on. They’re looking for mothers-daughters famed in their own right — who may have worked together or inspired (or even infuriated) each other.

If you’ve got a suggestion, please send your name and email (to be queried with similar women’s history questions in the future!) to Jessica Seigel at JS@jessicaseigel.com.

(Photo is Anna Magnani & Marisa Pavan playing mother and daughter in the 1955 film, Rose Tattoo. Clearly my head is still in movieland, coming off the Oscars last night. Kate Hudson and Goldie Hawn, anyone?)

A hearty THANK YOU to all you awesome guest posters last week! And to Urbanartiste, Pop Feminist, J.K. Gayle, and others for their comments. I can’t tell you how amazing it was to be out in rural Wyoming without interweb connection and know that GWP was chugging away! So many people responded to my request for guest posts, I’ll be posting the rest during this coming week.

Meanwhile, this here’s a pic of the sheep ranch where my father and I were staying. I attended my first 4-H Club meeting. I rode with the rancher, who is also a friend, on his horse-drawn sleigh to feed the sheep. I’m trying to find their website to share — will circle back with that soon!