When Stephanie Staal first read The Feminine Mystique in college, she found it "a mildly interesting relic from another era." But more than a decade later, as a married stay-at-home mom in the suburbs, Staal rediscovered Betty Friedan's classic work -- and was surprised how much she identified with the laments and misgivings of 1950s housewives. She set out on a quest: to reenroll at Barnard and re-read the great books she had first encountered as an undergrad. From the banishment of Eve to Judith Butler's Gender Trouble, Staal explores the significance of each of these classic tales by and of women, highlighting the relevance these ideas still have today. This process leads Staal to find the self she thought she had lost -- curious and ambitious, zany and critical -- and inspires new understandings of her relationships with her husband, her mother, and her daughter.
#1 INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER • “A landmark manifesto" (The New York Times) that's a revelatory, inspiring call to action and a blueprint for individual growth that will empower women around the world to achieve their full potential. In her famed TED talk, Sheryl Sandberg described how women unintentionally hold themselves back in their careers. Her talk, which has been viewed more than eleven million times, encouraged women to “sit at the table,” seek challenges, take risks, and pursue their goals with gusto. Lean In continues that conversation, combining personal anecdotes, hard data, and compelling research to change the conversation from what women can’t do to what they can. Sandberg, COO of Meta (previously called Facebook) from 2008-2022, provides practical advice on negotiation techniques, mentorship, and building a satisfying career. She describes specific steps women can take to combine professional achievement with personal fulfillment, and demonstrates how men can benefit by supporting women both in the workplace and at home.
Blazingly intelligent, wickedly funny, and piercingly honest, a memoir that captures the perils and pleasures of girlhood, womanhood, and life itself. “One of my favorite books of the last few years.” —Cheryl Strayed “Sentence for sentence, a more pleasure-yielding midlife memoir is hard to think of.” —The Atlantic At mid-life, Claire Dederer developed a sudden yearning for jailbreak. In this exuberant memoir, she reflects on two periods in her life uncannily similar in their emotional intensity: her present experience as a middle-aged mom in the grip of unruly and mysterious new hungers, and her recollections of herself as a teenager.
Women write about their experiences of loving music that doesn’t love them back – a feminist 'guilty pleasures'.e - a kind of feminist guilty pleasures. In the majority of mainstream writing and discussions on music, women appear purely in relation to men as muses, groupies or fangirls, with our own experiences, ideas and arguments dismissed or ignored. But this hasn’t stopped generations of women from loving, being moved by and critically appreciating music, even – and sometimes especially – when we feel we shouldn’t. Under My Thumb: Songs that Hate Women and the Women Who Love Them is a study of misogyny in music through the eyes of women. It brings together stories from journalists, critics, musicians and fans about artists or songs we love (or used to love) despite their questionable or troubling gender politics, and looks at how these issues interact with race, class and sexuality. As much celebration as critique, this collection explores the joys, tensions, contradictions and complexities of women loving music – however that music may feel about them. Featuring: murder ballads, country, metal, hip hop, emo, indie, Phil Spector, David Bowie, Guns N’ Roses, 2Pac, the Rolling Stones, Bob Dylan, AC/DC, Elvis Costello, Jarvis Cocker, Kanye West, Swans, Eminem, Jay-Z, Taylor Swift, Combichrist and many more.
One of the New York Post's Top 10 Career Books of 2012 and a Booklist Top 10 Business Book DO YOU WORK WITH A MEAN GIRL? A woman’s field guide to the new frontier of professional development—working with other women Women-to-women relationships in the workplace are . . . complicated. When they’re good, they’re great. But when they’re bad, they can ruin your day, your week—even your year. Packed with proven advice from two of today’s leading experts in workplace relationships, this one-of-a-kind guide gives women the tools they need to navigate difficult situations unique to women-to-women relationships—whether with a boss, a colleague, a client, or an employee. Have you dealt with a woman in the workplace who: “Accidentally” excludes you from important meetings? Seems intent on taking you down professionally? Gossips about you with other coworkers? Makes you look bad by missing deadlines? Forms a “pack” of mean girls to make your life miserable? Mean Girls at Work isn’t just about surviving difficult situations. It’s about transforming a toxic relationship into one that benefits and supports both of you. This book is also for women who engage in mean behavior . . . but don’t know it. After all, who hasn’t gossiped about a female coworker? Who hasn’t rolled her eyes in the presence of a woman she doesn’t like? Who hasn’t scanned another woman head to toe—which is just a nonverbal way of saying, “You’ve just been judged”? The authors provide invaluable advice to the more subtle ways of being mean—even if they’re not intended. With a workforce composed of a higher percentage of women than ever, workplace dynamics have changed. Crowley and Elster cover every conceivable scenario, providing critical advice on how to rise above the fray and move forward professionally. Mean Girls at Work is your map to dodging the mines and moving forward in today’s transformed workplace. Praise for Mean Girls at Work “An invaluable suit of armor for surviving nine to five!” —Leil Lowndes, bestselling author of How to Talk to Anyone “If you think the emotional cruelty of comedies like Mean Girls and Heathers doesn’t exist in the real world workplace, think again. In Mean Girls at Work, Katherine Crowley and Kathi Elster valuably chronicle female vs. female predators and offer solid defensive strategies.” —Ann Kreamer, author of It’s Always Personal: Navigating Emotion in the New Workplace “Whether you are in your twenties and just starting your professional career, your midcareer forties, when you are supposed to have figured it out already, or a woman in her fifties or sixties who’s seen it all—this book is a must-read. . . . The authors have finally given women the tools and the sound advice necessary to deal with . . . conflicts that keep us all from succeeding. . . . Carry this book with you to work every day!” —Carolyn Cassin, President, Michigan Women’s Foundation “A must-read for women of all ages in today’s workforce. This book offers what we all need to develop the capacities to endure this ever-changing workplace. We know it is all about relationships and you need the skills outlined in this book to survive and thrive when the Mean Girls attack.” —Kim Harrington, Coordinator, Professional Development and Training, Office of Human Resources, California State University, Sacramento
Outlines an alternative approach for setting boundaries without jeopardizing important relationships, in a guide for women that draws on the insights of celebrities, a former first lady, and two police chiefs to help readers authenticate their true feelings while maintaining their values about caring and generosity. Reprint. 35,000 first printing.
A revolutionary memoir about domestic abuse by the award-winning author of Her Body and Other Parties In the Dream House is Carmen Maria Machado’s engrossing and wildly innovative account of a relationship gone bad, and a bold dissection of the mechanisms and cultural representations of psychological abuse. Tracing the full arc of a harrowing relationship with a charismatic but volatile woman, Machado struggles to make sense of how what happened to her shaped the person she was becoming. And it’s that struggle that gives the book its original structure: each chapter is driven by its own narrative trope—the haunted house, erotica, the bildungsroman—through which Machado holds the events up to the light and examines them from different angles. She looks back at her religious adolescence, unpacks the stereotype of lesbian relationships as safe and utopian, and widens the view with essayistic explorations of the history and reality of abuse in queer relationships. Machado’s dire narrative is leavened with her characteristic wit, playfulness, and openness to inquiry. She casts a critical eye over legal proceedings, fairy tales, Star Trek, and Disney villains, as well as iconic works of film and fiction. The result is a wrenching, riveting book that explodes our ideas about what a memoir can do and be.
A collection of cartoonist Crumb's work, ranging from his earliest comics published in the mid sixties, to work completed in the nineties with his comentaries interspersed thoughout the book.
For any woman who has experienced illness, chronic pain, or endometriosis comes an inspiring memoir advocating for recognition of women's health issues In the fall of 2010, Abby Norman's strong dancer's body dropped forty pounds and gray hairs began to sprout from her temples. She was repeatedly hospitalized in excruciating pain, but the doctors insisted it was a urinary tract infection and sent her home with antibiotics. Unable to get out of bed, much less attend class, Norman dropped out of college and embarked on what would become a years-long journey to discover what was wrong with her. It wasn't until she took matters into her own hands -- securing a job in a hospital and educating herself over lunchtime reading in the medical library -- that she found an accurate diagnosis of endometriosis. In Ask Me About My Uterus, Norman describes what it was like to have her pain dismissed, to be told it was all in her head, only to be taken seriously when she was accompanied by a boyfriend who confirmed that her sexual performance was, indeed, compromised. Putting her own trials into a broader historical, sociocultural, and political context, Norman shows that women's bodies have long been the battleground of a never-ending war for power, control, medical knowledge, and truth. It's time to refute the belief that being a woman is a preexisting condition.