I’m a teacher’s assistant for an undergraduate course at New York University called, “What is Islam?” The other day in class, my professor asked the students whether or not the Qur’an is considered a “book”. Fraught with anxiety over inheriting such a problematic scholarly tradition of defining and delineating what “religion” is, I kept quiet. While my professor was aiming more for something sounding like, “a book is read, while the Qur’an is recited,” I kept thinking about the physicality and sacrality of the Qur’an (among other authoritative religious texts) and the way it is handled, revered, preserved, loved, an constantly under interpretation. It was about a week later when news broke out that U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan were guilty of burning several copies of the Qur’an on their military base, followed by an unfortunate slew of casualties including at least 30 Afghan deaths and five US soldiers. Continue reading “Beyond “Liberal” Female Piety or “Women Read the Qur’an Too” by Amy Levin”
Category: Women’s Agency
A FEMINIST TAOIST VOICE PART 2: MY DIALOGUE WITH ELISA FON, ACUPUNCTURIST, TAOIST, FEMINIST AND FRIEND by Sara Frykenberg
Taoism is a philosophy that, for me, has been around so long because it is meant to move and change with society…
Acupuncturist, healer and friend, Elisa Fon and I began a discussion of Taoism and feminism in Part 1 of this interview. Elisa defined her vision of feminism and Taoism, explained Taoism’s relational and yet, individual emphasis on what is particular in each of our experiences and considered the basic relationship of yang and yin. Part 2 picks up where she and I left off, returning to the discussion of yin, yang and supposed dualisms.
Sara: I was wondering if you could talk a little about the complementarity of yin and yang?
Elisa: In Taoism any type of imbalance should be adjusted. So any major abundance or deficiency of yin or yang would be considered unhealthy. Yin and yang are interrelated: without one aspect of this relationship the other couldn’t exist. Day comes and it brings certain dynamic energy with it: the light is transformed to energy for plants. But night is equally valuable, the nurturing yin, where things fall asleep, heal themselves and prepare to go forward again in the morning. They are considered mutually interchangeable too. If you had an over excess of yin at some point it would actually become yang. It’s a fluid cycle. Like we see in the yin/yang Taiji symbol, there is yin found within yang and yang within yin at all times. Continue reading “A FEMINIST TAOIST VOICE PART 2: MY DIALOGUE WITH ELISA FON, ACUPUNCTURIST, TAOIST, FEMINIST AND FRIEND by Sara Frykenberg”
Hagar: A Portrait of a Victim of Domestic Violence and Rape
This week Twitter has been a flurry with information for victims of domestic violence and rape. This ranges from the U.S. redefinition of rape to include men to Nigeria’s first anti-rape toll free hotline for women. There is even a male movement to stand against rape. This problem is an ongoing issue, one that shows no sign of diminishing or going away. According to Amnesty International, one in three women worldwide have been beaten, coerced into sex, or otherwise abused and their abuser is normally someone they know. As I contemplate this very difficult issue, I am reminded of the Biblical Hagar in Genesis 16. The story of Hagar and Sarai is abundant
in ethical situations that draw in the reader and presents complex issues that can be very troublesome. If you take the text hermeneutically, through an ideological examination in its English translation, we have an Egyptian woman, who is also referred to as slave or concubine, forced to engage into sex with her owner’s husband for producing an heir. Here the abuser is a woman with a docile and obedient husband portrayed by Abram. What can we glean from such a story for today’s battered women? Hope or horrific defeat? Continue reading “Hagar: A Portrait of a Victim of Domestic Violence and Rape”
Body, Nature, Ancestors by Carol P. Christ
Some years ago, womanist theologian Karen Baker–Fletcher asked about ancestors following a lecture I gave on the body and nature. I have since come to realize that ancestors are a missing link between the two: we cannot speak adequately of embodiment and interdependence in the web of life without recognizing the ancestors whose lives made ours possible. Our mothers quite literally gave us our bodies. All of our ancestors gave us their genes. Care and callousness with origins going back longer than conscious memory was imprinted on the psyches of our parents and grandparents and transmitted to us. All of our ancestors give us connections to place. While many black people in America can recite oral histories that begin with slavery in the United States, I come from a family where stories of origin for the most part were not valued or told. Both of my father’s parents lost their fathers when they were very young, and my father, who was raised Catholic at a time when Catholics were discriminated against, preferred to think of our family as “American now.” Like the hero of the film Lost in America, most members of my family dreamed of “melting right into that pot.” In the process we lost stories we need to help us to understand ourselves and the complex realities that “becoming American” involved. Continue reading “Body, Nature, Ancestors by Carol P. Christ”
Participating in Beauty Culture
“I…liked how we were neither dogmatic in our judgments (i.e., no one played the role of feminist fashion police), nor laissez-faire in thinking that ‘anything goes’—after all, feminists were the ones who had popularized the slogan the ‘personal is political.'”
At the most recent Society of Christian Ethics annual meeting, I got into an impromptu late night discussion with several women friends about why some of us participate in “beauty culture” and how we feel as feminist Christian ethicists and moral theologians about our decisions. Each of us shared why we have chosen to wear make-up (or not), keep up with fashion (or not), dye our hair grey to mask the signs of aging (or not), or put in the effort to maintain a certain physique (or not). We also addressed what role our own mothers and larger communities have played in our decision-making processes.
Since it is certainly not my place to reveal what others disclosed behind closed doors over wine, let me expand upon a few things I shared that night. Continue reading “Participating in Beauty Culture”
The Land of the (Not Quite) Free: Women and Religion Behind Bars by Amy Levin
The sun was setting on an early Friday evening in October 2008 as I pulled into the parking lot of the Iowa Correctional Institute for Women, a maximum level security prison housing nearly 700 inmates. Though the serene drive on Iowa’s main highway lasted a mere 40 minutes from Grinnell to Mitchellville, my co-teacher and I felt worlds away from our tiny utopian bubble of books and booze. As we gathered our teaching materials for a course we designed called “Feminist Playwriting,” we made sure not to bring in any contraband, one of the many precautions given during our orientation for students participating in Grinnell Liberal Arts in Prison, a program created in 2003 that allows students to design liberal arts courses in either a men or women’s Iowa prison. My experience interacting with an incredible roomful of women, some who would suffer behind bars for the rest of their lives, was needless to say a life changing experience. That semester ignited a fire in me for prison rights, which recently has manifested in a concern for the nexus of religion and prison. Continue reading “The Land of the (Not Quite) Free: Women and Religion Behind Bars by Amy Levin”
Son of Man: An Updated Gospel Story of Jesus Set in South Africa by Michele Stopera Freyhauf
January 12, 2012
Son of Man is an updated story of the life of Jesus set in the fictional State of Judea that is modern day South Africa – complete with warlords and child soldiers. It could easily be mistaken for modern day Rwanda or Darfur with its modern issues and political overtones. Roger Ebert stated, “The secret of the movie is that it doesn’t strain to draw parallels with current world events – because it doesn’t have to.” The director draws parallels between the gospels and 21st century Africa. According to Dartford-May, “we wanted to look at the Gospels as if they were written by spin doctors and to strip that away and look at the truth.” The director “captures the rhythms of African life in both rural settings and sprawling townships.” “Feather-clad young angels offer an eerie echo and reminder of Africa’s lost generations.”
The movie also sticks with what Eric Snider calls “Traditional African trial music, dance, and costumes” as a type of worship or or allusion to Jesus’ godhood. Judea is in flux; warlords and corruption take center stage. Poverty, violence, and oppression affect the all of the people. The key idea is that Jesus is a freedom fighter – one that fights injustice and oppression. The director does not emphasize “Jesus’ divinity so much as his leadership, good sense and compassion.” Jesus is not violent and his followers, most of whom were former child soldiers, are encouraged to respond non-violently, which goes against their upbringing and training. Continue reading “Son of Man: An Updated Gospel Story of Jesus Set in South Africa by Michele Stopera Freyhauf”
It is the Best of Times. It is the Worst of Times: An Athlete Looks at Her Life and Title IX By Paula McGee
I expect 2012 to be a great year. Not only do I plan on graduating in May with a Ph.D., but I will also receive one of highest honors in sports. On Sunday, February 19, 2012 in the USC Galen Center during halftime of the USC and UCLA women’s basketball game, USC will retire the jerseys of my twin sister and I. Most people in my women’s studies and theology world do not really know that I have a twin sister, nor do they fully appreciate that about twenty-five years ago, my sister and I played on one of the most prominent teams in women’s basketball and in women’s sports. We won two back-to-back national championships in 1983 and 1984. We were also the first NCAA national champions (previous women’s teams were American Intercollegiate Association for Women (AIAW) championships). My sister and I played with Cynthia Cooper and Cheryl Miller. Our team was one the first women’s teams to get mainstream acceptance in the larger sports world. We were not just “girls” that happened to play a sport; we were “real” athletes. We received the same media attention and acceptance of any sports team during that period.
Most of my feminist friends—the preachers, scholars, and theologians—have no idea of what it means for a university to retire a jersey. In the sports world, retiring an athlete’s jersey means that no other person in that sport will ever wear that number at that university. The retired athletic jersey hangs in the rafters of the sports facility forever. This honor for an athlete is synonymous to a scholar receiving a named endowed chair in the academy. What is exciting for me is that my jersey will not only be hanging with my sister’s—that alone would be enough to celebrate. USC is one of the few institutions in the country in which the majority of the retired jerseys are the jerseys of women: Cheryl Miller, Lisa Leslie, Cynthia Cooper, and now Pam and Paula McGee. Cheryl and Cynthia are also members of the Naismith Hall of Fame, and Lisa is sure to join them with that honor very soon. Continue reading “It is the Best of Times. It is the Worst of Times: An Athlete Looks at Her Life and Title IX By Paula McGee”
Feminist Music By Gina Messina-Dysert
Last week Caroline Kline shared the article “Feminist Films” and discussed the Bechdel Test as a way to identify whether or not a film is feminist. It left me wondering – can we identify music as feminist in the same way? Music generally does not offer dialogue between two women. But there are instances where we find two women singing together about feminist issues like the 80’s classic “Sisters are Doin’ it for Themselves.” There are also women singing about or to women, like Juliana Hatfield’s “My Sister.” And there is music that acknowledges women’s struggles as women like Ani Difranco’s “I’m No Heroine,” No Doubt’s “I’m Just a Girl,” and Pink’s “Stupid Girls”. But is this the only way to identify feminist music? Continue reading “Feminist Music By Gina Messina-Dysert”
Women Blogging Thealogy By Gina Messina-Dysert
In Rebirth of the Goddess: Finding Meaning in Feminist Spirituality, Carol Christ offers a thealogy that is grounded in embodied thinking and begins with personal experience. She explains that experience is “embodied, relational, communal, social, and historical” (p. 37), and that experiences of the Goddess are shaped and inspired by the experiences of others. Consequently her thealogy, in addition to being personal, is also communal.
According to Christ, the “voices of women are a lifeline” (Rebirth of the Goddess, p. 41), a sentiment that has been loudly echoed by women in blogging communities. Although some may claim that a blog is nothing more than an online diary, it is a powerful tool that offers individuals the opportunity to express their thoughts and experiences in a public forum; blogging gives a voice to anyone who wants it. Recent statistics have Continue reading “Women Blogging Thealogy By Gina Messina-Dysert”
Feminism and Religion 