UPDATE: 31/07/14

Websites & Current Topics: 
I have previously chosen several websites I will be using to assist me in my EPQ research. I am looking at them individually this week to get a feel for the websites and types of information/sources they will give me. 

Today I have looked at the following: 

FBomb - thefbomb.org

This is a website that I have chosen because I believe it reflects contemporary feminism and the third wave of feminism. In its ‘about’ page it explains that the website is ‘loud, proud, sarcastic and passionate… everything young feminists are today’. This website is purely opinions, but it is a great way of keeping up to date with the current issues of feminism and also the current attitudes of women involved in feminism.

Latest post/s:

1) ‘Why Todd Akin Still Matters’

(Todd Akin:

During that interview the congressman and U.S. Senate candidate was asked whether abortion should be allowed in the case of rape.

Akin’s response was that it was his understanding from doctors that it’s rare for someone to become pregnant from rape.  He said, “The female body has ways to try and shut that whole thing down.”

He went on to say that punishment should be on the rapist and not the child.  Democrats started circulating his comment after the show aired citing statistics regarding rape and pregnancy.)

- An article about rape culture (something I am interested in looking into and believe is a huge issue for feminists)

- Highlights that one in five women have been sexually assaulted, and that 3/100 rapists end up in prison (American statistics)

- One in five women have been sexually assaulted in UK, 60% conviction of rapists UK

- Sexual Offence review - England & Wales

- Article speaks of the importance of learning political candidates opinions on women's health/violence/equality, believes there is not enough focus & that as voters, we have the right to know candidates/parties opinions on sexual assault policies. (A google search shows no evidence of UK’s leading political parties’ stances on these issues)

- Notes that opinions on rape reflect their opinions about women.

- Global rape statistics:

- 35% women worldwide have experienced sexual violence

- Article on why sexual violence is more of a womens issue (in response to ‘men experience it too’)

- #Jadapose: social networking & sexism

- Jada was at a party, allegedly had her drink spiked, fell unconscious, was stripped naked and raped. Pictures of her went viral and many began to mock the position she was in - it became a trend on twitter.

Feministing - feministing.com

This is a website that is hot on current affairs within feminism, and articles are all very well cited and supported. There are articles on a variety of issues and I believe this will support me well in keeping up to date with contemporary feminism as well as giving me useful sources for my work..

Latest post/s:

There have been no women of colour protagonists in top grossing sci-fi and fantasy films

- 14% of protagonists in top grossing films have been female

This post on the lack of representation in film for women of colour/women in general, led me to look into this further.

I found the following:

- 30.8% of speaking characters are women

- Average ratio of male to female actors is 2.5:1

- Roughly a third of female speaking characters are shown in sexually revealing attire / partially naked.

It showed the extreme lack of equality within an industry as huge and as competitive as the film industry.

I also joined the mailing this for this website, enabling me to keep up to date.

Two articles on the first page of this website are to do with rape/sexual violence, as with Fbomb, so this suggests to me that it is a big topic for contemporary feminists.

UPDATE: 26/07/14

Experts, texts and areas of interest: 

The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used Against Women’ by Naomi Wolf

Amazon description: ‘In the struggle for women's equality, there is one subject still shrouded in silence - women's compulsive pursuit of beauty. The myth of female beauty challenges every woman, every day of her life.

Naomi Wolf exposes the tyranny of the beauty myth through the ages and its oppressive function today, in the home and at work, in literature and the media, in relationships between men and women, between women and women. With pertinent and intelligent examples, she confronts the beauty industry and its advertising and uncovers the reasons why women are consumed by this destructive obsession.’

- I have chosen this book as I think it will provide a great background for speaking on feminism and why it is still relevant and necessary. This book was published in 1990, so is significantly outdated and not contemporary, but I believe that the core of the book and the issues it raises will still be relevant to my EPQ question.

‘Full Frontal Feminism’ by Jessica Valenti

Amazon description: ‘Feminism isn't dead. It just isn't very cool anymore. Enter Full Frontal Feminism, a book that embodies the forward-looking messages that author Jessica Valenti propagates on her popular website, Feministing. com. Covering a range of topics, including pop culture, health, reproductive rights, violence, education, relationships, and more, Valenti provides young women a primer on why feminism matters. Valenti knows better than anyone that young women need a smart-ass book that deals with real-life issues in a style they can relate to. No rehashing the same old issues. No belaboring where today's young women have gone wrong. Feminism should be something young women feel comfortable with, something they can own. Full Frontal Feminism is sending out the message to readers yeah, you're feminists, and that's actually pretty frigging cool.’

- I have chosen this book because it is fairly contemporary (2007), and it appears to cover a lot of issues within feminism which are still being tackled right now. It also seems that this book will try to reinforce the fact that feminism is relevant - therefore directly giving a lot of information on my EPQ question.

‘The Equality Illusion’ by Kat Banyard

Amazon Description: ‘In The Equality Illusion, 'the most influential young feminist in the country' (Guardian) and UK Feminista founder Kat Banyard argues passionately and articulately that feminism continues to be one of the most urgent and relevant social justice campaigns today.

Women have made huge strides in equality over the last century. And yet:

Women working full-time in the UK are paid on average 17% less an hour than men

1 in 3 women worldwide has been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused because of her gender

Of parliamentary seats across the globe only 15% are held by women and fewer than 20% of UK MPs are women

96% of executive directors of the UK's top hundred companies are men

Structuring the book around a normal day, Banyard sets out the major issues for twenty-first century feminism, from work and education to sex, relationships and having children. She draws on her own campaigning experience as well as academic research and dozens of her own interviews. The book also includes information on how to get involved in grassroots action.’ (2011)

Experts:

Laura Bates - Founder of Everyday Sexism project, feminism writer for The Guardian, and author of the book ‘Everyday Sexism’

Contact: laura@everydaysexism.com

Lori Adelman - Executive Director of feministing.com

Contact: lori@feministing.com

Kat Banyard - Director of UKFeminista and author of The Equality Illusion

Contact: katbanyard@yahoo.co.uk

Kat Lazo - Feminist Vlogger, gave a TED talk on feminism

Contact: http://www.katlazo.com/contact/

Marianne Schnall - Founder of Feminist.com and feminist author

From my initial research into feminism (http://laurenwakeling.blogspot.co.uk/2014/04/update-10514-initial-research.html) areas I think I am most interested in are the following:

Violence against women/rape culture: This involves domestic abuse, sexual harassment, rape. Rape culture also known as victim blaming. This is a large issue in contemporary society.

Representation in the media: Women being portrayed as the inferior sex, female characters having less speaking or major roles, female characters used only as love interests or being quickly killed off, the lack of complex characters. There are also less female news reporters, issues such as page 3 and ‘lads magazines’, further, the amount of coverage that women's issues receive in the media and the use of women as sex objects in advertising.

Everyday Sexism: This is important to contemporary sexism, as it illustrates the behaviours that have been normalised in society but are occurring everyday. Researching into this will reinforce the relevance of contemporary feminism.

Women and work: Gender gap in pay, the amount of women in top business roles, treatment of women in the workplace, all issues that are very current and important in progressing with equality.

UPDATE: 22/07/14

WEEK ONE OF RESEARCH: DAY ONE
My research plan for this week is as follows: This week I need to do all of my background research on feminism. I need to discover which experts I would like to contact, read into different types of feminism, choose texts I would like to use for research, and discover which areas of feminism I am most interested in.


Today: I have looked researched the different types of feminism and the history of feminism. I have used a google search, using several articles and sources for each part of my research in order to maximise reliability of information.

Sources used:

The three waves of feminism USA article

Three waves of feminism 2

RED = USA specific article (but all information does relate to the UK waves of feminism)

British Feminism History Timeline - use for dates on legislation and large events

Pioneers of feminism:

• Sappho - Ancient Greece (570BC)
• Hildegard of Bingen - Medieval
• Christine de Pisan
• Olympes de Gouge
• Mary Wollstonecraft
• Jane Austen

First Wave Feminism:

• Late 19th to early 20th century
• Goal: open up opportunities for women
• Focus on suffrage
• Formally began with rally at Seneca Falls convention 1848 (300 men and women rallied for equality of men and women)
• Generally propelled by middle class white women
• Suffragettes/suffragists trying to gain the vote
• Legal inequalities

Second Wave Feminism:

• Began 1960s carried on to 1990s
• A radical movement
• Sexuality and reproductive rights were dominant issues
• Goal: Pass equal rights amendment to the constitution (social equality regardless of sex)
• Very theoretical movement - Marxism and psycho-analytical theory
• Drew in many different types of women
• Social and cultural inequalities
• Still happening in some countries

Third Wave Feminism:

• Began mid 90s
• Dismantled many social constructs - slut, bitch, heteronormativity, sexuality, body
• Use of the internet
• Global and multi-cultural movement
• Combat issues such as women’s influence in politics, female stereotypes and media portrayal of women

Sources:

http://web.viu.ca/vaugeois/courses/trmt_153/feminism.htm

http://bitchmagazine.org/article/everything-about-feminism-you-wanted-to-know-but-were-afraid-to-ask

http://www.uah.edu/woolf/feminism_kinds.htm

Branches of feminism:

• All branches agree on three key things: equal rights & opportunities for women, all recognise that women are oppressed and exploited by virtue of being women, all organise to make change

Liberal Feminism:

• Views discrimination on women unjust as deprives of equal opportunities
• Do not think oppression of women is due to capitalism, do not seek to overthrow governmental system
• Concerned with rectifying the discrimination that grows out of socialisation
• Works within structure of mainstream society to bring women into that structure

Social Feminism:

• Aims to integrate issues of gender and class - bring together patriarchy and capitalism
• Targets state/government as site of ‘patriarchal capitalist’ power
• Struggles for women's control of reproduction

Radical Feminism:

• Rejects liberal feminisms willingness to work in the frame of current society
• Womens oppression is viewed as the fundamental oppression
• Sees sexism as the root of other issues such as class hatred, racism, ageism, war
• See the world as men controlling womens bodies, believe women need a women only space where they can nurture each other, gain control over their bodies and develop a women culture
• Main issues have been violence against women (rape, sexual harassment, incest, pornography, domestic violence)

UPDATE: 8/7/14

Upon meeting with my EPQ mentor, we prioritized the areas that I need to research and decided on a rough amount of time to spend on the research per week. It was decided that I would do around 2 hours research, 3 nights per week, for between 6 and 8 weeks.

I have now created my planning review, a screenshot of it can be seen below.

The link to the google document is here.

UPDATE

Areas I am interested in that are relevant to contemporary society:

• Violence against women/rape culture
• Representation in the media
• 'Everyday sexism'
• Women and work

Research I need to do: A research plan needs to be made, but this is a rough outline

• Contact experts - will contact many and see if any are willing to speak to me. For example, Laura Bates, writers from various feminism websites, etc.
• Read some texts - ‘The Beauty Myth: How Images of Beauty Are Used Against Women’ by Naomi Wolf,  ‘Full Frontal Feminism’ by Jessica Valenti
• Find some statistics - for example, the 2013 gender gap report
• Use websites to keep up with current issues and developments (fbomb, feministing, rookie, f-word, UKfeminista)
• Use of videos & speeches - TED talks
• Possibility of surveying people on their attitudes towards women/feminism