Talking Visions: Multicultural Feminism in a Transnational Age

Bys: Ella Habiba Shohat and Lisa Phillips

Book Overview

A multivoiced collection of essays and images grounded in a relational feminism of diverse communities.

This multivoiced collection of essays and images presents the perspectives of activists, scholars, artists, and curators from a broad range of constituencies. Challenging traditional disciplinary and cultural boundaries, the book moves beyond any unified feminist historical narrative to present a "relational" feminism of diverse...

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0262692619
• ISBN13: 9780262692618
• Release Date: February 2001
• Publisher: Mit Press
• Length: 596 Pages
• Weight: 3.75 lbs.
• Dimensions: 1.4" x 7.0" x 9.5"
• Age Range: 18 years and up
• Grade Range: Postsecondary and higher

Customer Reviews

Feminist foreign policy for the new century

Technically this work (like many other women's studies collections) is sociologically based, but attempts to be interdisciplinary for appearances sake. After using this book for a previous semester, I also venture public policy is an entirely accurate additional field for this work.No, this work does not have the seemingly requisite tables and charts in so many more conventional public service books (of all subcategories) and the artwork interspersed throughout may throw people off who have arrived in search of intentionally more traditional academic graphic aids, but they enhance the book's overall presentation of very important (and difficult) issues. Since it's inception, feminism has attempted to speak for women in general, but has instead too often inadvertently degenerated into self-promotion of relatively privileged white middle-class, heterosexual and non-disabled women who at least have one identification to attempt fallback onto when confronted with the painful reality of discrimination. The majority of the world's women however do not have such protections, hence magnifying their struggles in unimaginable ways. Unlike this Bridge Called my Back (1981) and other 'second wave' classics which inadvertently focused on American based women, this anthology also takes the further step of examining such communities outside of the United States and Western Europe. Evidenced by the 1995 Fifth International UN women's conference in Beijing, real and permanent women's liberation only occurs when intended programs and laws are culturally sensitive and appropriate models as opposed to the 'one-size must fit all' models previously (and some would argue currently proposed) by other western feminists. Specifically, Isabelle R. Gunning (pp. 203-224) argues Female Genital Mutilation is not simply a pattern of male-on-female violence designed to torture women for the fun of it, but often a procedure that other women and girls (despite the inevitable risks and complications) encourage each other to undergo for fear of isolation and stigmatization. Consequently, the best alternatives to eradicating these same procedures would both explain the health risks experienced by women are directly connected to FGM and search for alternative ceremonies that could be performed instead as a way of symbolizing those same women's transition into adulthood and imparting values of respect and monogamy (this time, explicitly for both genders).Also intriguing (given the U.S.'s recent history of involvement in the region) is Mervat F. Hatem's (pp. 369-390) Middle Eastern feminism essay. Theoretically, both the increased racial consciousness of journalists (many of whom cut their proverbial teeth in the tumultuous sixties covering the emergent civil rights movement) and a general (if grudging recognition) of sexism prevents the occurrences, but 'liberal' westerners continue to freely engage in the binary portrayal of the Middle East as a totally backwards land for women, also