As last year wrapped up, Emma Watson was named Feminist Celebrity of 2014 by Ms. Foundation For Women, in partnership with Cosmopolitan.com. With her UN speech last fall, she added her name to a growing list of celebrities who have either declared themselves feminists, had some kind of feminist epiphany, or have said something tangentially…
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Sarah Goussé’s Miss Bouzy-Rouge is basically the show you’d get if you distilled cabaret. If you asked my philistine brain what cabaret actually is, I’d probably murmur something about Paris in the forties, glamorous costumes, strong voices, crude humour and alcohol. That is what I got. Sarah Goussé was never without a glass in-hand during…
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She is the sensational Diva of Afghanistan and the only female artist/activist of Afghanistan with over 300,000 fans on Facebook. A multiple award winning artist, Aryana Sayeed is one of the rare singers that only performs live in her concerts. Her outstanding performances, her fight for women’s rights, and her beauty have won millions of…
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In February this year, artist Julie Garran set herself a simple challenge. Post one photograph online, every day. As an experienced photographer, social media wasn’t something Julie had used in her practice. The project expanded, and became a large exhibition, A Photo Every Day, presented at PhotoAccess, Canberra in October. Julie’s project reveals how…
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Channel Ten’s new political drama Party Tricks opens with an uncomfortably familiar scenario: a public controversy surrounding comments made about a female politician who doesn’t have children. In this case, though, it wasn’t former Prime Minister Julia Gillard they were talking about— it was Kate Ballard, the fictional Premier of Victoria played by Asher Keddie…
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Sick to death of horror movie clichés like the helpless girl who gets axed to death by a crazed lunatic? Here are some alternative horror films that are both feminist friendly and loads of fun. Keep that Halloween-feeling going all the way till Christmas. Carrie (1976, dir. Brian De Palma) Brian De Palma’s original Carrie…
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After revealing that I’m bisexual, I’m often asked three questions: “Do you think it’s a phase?”; “But… who do you prefer?”; and, “Have you and/or will you have a threesome?” (To be fair, this question is usually served with a drink, spilled on my dress.) Regardless of whether they’re asked by drunk strangers or a…
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Have you ever had a sexual fantasy that you wanted to see portrayed on film? With all the adult entertainment out there, it can be difficult to find something that takes your fancy while still being female-friendly. Erika Lust, founder of XConfessions, sees a growing need for adult entertainment for people outside porn’s usual target…
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[WARNING: This article contains spoilers for the film Gone Girl. Read on at your own risk. -Editor] Female villains in film, if well executed, make for interesting, complex and credible characters. As audiences, we do not see enough of them. Recently, a film adaptation of Gillian Flynn’s best-selling novel Gone Girl was released in theatres…
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Conversations surrounding the over-arching and increasingly redactive term Feminism in panel or group style setting, can tend to be focused on picking apart semantic terminology and deciphering the ideology’s dogmatic past. It can be frustrating when one is looking for more tangible answers to proposed prompts, in this case the intersection of binary concepts…
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Political journo and TV presenter Annabel Crabb’s has investigated women, men and domestic expectations in her new book, The Wife Drought. In an Adelaide event earlier this week, Crabb discussed the themes in her book in her characteristically witty manner. Here’s what I learnt. The reason why there aren’t many women in parliament is because…
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This past Friday I found myself in Newcastle’s Royal Exchange with a room full of people who applauded a woman for refusing her partner sex when he said, ‘You don’t have to be a feminist in the bedroom.’ The woman was a member of the audience for the National Young Writers Festival’s event, Fucking while…
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Emma Watson becoming a UN Women Goodwill Ambassador conjured a cheer of “Hooray Hermione!” in my mind. While she has well and truly established herself as a talented actor in roles since the Harry Potter franchise came to an end, she will always be Hermione to me, and I believe Hermione would be cheering Emma…
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Transparent, Amazon’s newest comedy-drama, is, on its face, about a family. It follows the daily lives of the Pfeffermans at their most mundane; they go to the mall, they get their kids ready for school, they go on dates with rabbis. Throughout the course of its ten-episode first season, however, Transparent reveals itself to be about…
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