Traditional Women Research Articles

Poles Apart? Eileen Duggan and Katherine Mansfield

At first glance, there might seem to be few connections between Katherine Mansfield and her younger contemporary, Eileen Duggan, despite occasional critical efforts to link them within a tradition of women’s writing in New Zealand. The differences between the two women, in their lives and in their writing, are striking. In spite of those marked differences, Duggan wrote about Mansfield on a number of occasions and with considerable sympathy. One interesting connection between the two can be found in their youthful responses to two remote and controversial Polish figures – the writer Stanislaw Wyspianski and the Marxist revolutionary Rosa Luxemburg. In this article, I consider Mansfield’s “To Stanislaw Wyspianski” and Duggan’s “Rosa Luxemburg”, noting the very different circumstances of their composition, and suggesting what might have appealed to each of the poets in the subjects they chose to write about.

A Study of the Baiga Women's Tradition of Tattoos, Modernization of this Art and Situation of Tattoo Industry in India

The Polynesian term "Ta," which signifies hitting something, or the Tahitian word "tatau," according to some anthropologists, may be the source of the word "tattoo." It is "to mark something." Since before the start of the Christian era (CE), tattooing—a kind of bodily modification—has been ingrained in the cultures of many indigenous tribes worldwide. It is also demonstrated by anthropological evidence of various tattoo designs from various cultures that tattooing originated independently in many parts of the world. For various tribes across the nation, getting tattoos has always been an essential aspect of daily life. Tattoos are considered an essential component of the culture and history of the Baiga tribe's women. With the tribal people of Central India, tattooing, sometimes referred to locally as "Godna," is a common form of body art that has deep cultural significance. In this work, the importance of tattoo culture among the women of the Baiga tribe in central India is discussed and examined. This study aims to provide an overview of the Baiga tribe the Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups (PVTGs) of Central India. It also explains the tattooing process, from the development of the indelible ink to the tattoo artist's application of the ink into the skin's dermis layer. At present, this art has been modernized to a great extent and the tattoo industry has become a major identity all over the world. At the same time, it has spread to many states in India as well. There are immense possibilities of development in this field in the future.

Formations of Feminist Strike: Connecting Diverse Practices, Contexts, and Geographies

This introduction to the special issue on Feminist Strike takes up the question of what remains marginalized and overlooked within dominant discourses on contemporary feminist protests. Drawing on experiences of and approaches to feminist refusal that involve questions of labour, we propose the ways in which conceptualizations of feminist strike can be employed as a lens to build a conversation between different practices, scales, and geographies, particularly across postcolonial and postsocialist contexts. Through a reading of Aliki Saragas’s film Strike a Rock (2017) about the women living around the Marikana miners’ settlement in the aftermath of a major strike, we explore how notions of feminist strike can be expanded by situating Black women’s struggles in South Africa within a long tradition of women’s resistance and showing how political resistance is bound to questions of reproductive work. To understand the intersection of postsocialist, post-conflict, and (pre-)Europeanization transformations, we consider the case of a large-scale strike and public demonstrations against the bankruptcy of the Croatian shipyard Uljanik that took place in 2018 and 2019. Our perspectives on the Marikana and the Uljanik strikes show how women in both places practise a politics of refusal and resistance against ruination, violence, and defeat. In the last section, we summarize the contents of the articles that comprise the special issue.

“What Is a Man?”: Disability, Domesticity, and Imperialism in Flannery O’Connor’s “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”

ABSTRACT Following the mode of cultural studies, this essay focuses on Flannery O’Connor’s “The Life You Save May Be Your Own”, a story that has been understudied, for her delineation of masculinity in the post-war United States. Reading the male protagonist’s question “what is a man?” as the American symptom after the global war, this essay reveals the complexity of the key trope of masculinity and its intersections with the unfair power structures in three aspects, namely ableism, sexism, and imperialism. It first examines the dialectic between the individual definition and the public opinion concerning the masculinity of a physically disabled man and unravels the hostility hidden under the veil of hospitality. Then it shows the historical reasons for the seemingly perpetual tension between the male and domesticity in this story, mainly including the American eugenics movement and conventional gender roles. Finally, situating the story in the tradition of women’s writing, in which discourses of domesticity relate to politics frequently, it argues the male’s misplaced obligation for the boy allegorises the United States’ encounter with the global world, in which it tries to play a responsible part as a masculine adult.

Preservation of Indigenous Women's Traditions and Behavior Within The Framework of Cultural Relativism in Indigenous Communities (A Study of Empirical Approaches in Legal Anthropology)

Customs and values within Indigenous communities form the basis of customary behavior in understanding human conduct, particularly in the context of Balinese indigenous women's behavior as guardians of tradition in an empirical approach to legal anthropology. This means that the legal norms used to observe the behaviors of Balinese indigenous women as custodians of indigenous traditions within the frame of cultural relativism represent legal realities apparent in legal situations or any legal events that genuinely occur within the indigenous community, as manifestations of the indigenous women's behaviors in preserving sacred traditions. This is based on an empirical approach to Legal Anthropology. Whether acknowledged or not by the indigenous community, the empirical approach to cultural relativism fundamentally holds a social and cultural value system that can serve as the social capital of the nation. The community's attitudes and behaviors rooted in tradition are guided by values believed to be true, exemplifying the traditional values and cultures passed down through generations and perceived as instruments for social control and religious values that guide human life, manifesting the preservation of local cultural relativism among the local indigenous community. Indigenous communities in these regions become the focal research site with the hope of safeguarding traditional values as a reinforcement of customary practices, the culture, and the traditions of the local indigenous community, which embody the manifestation of protected local wisdom governed by regional customary laws. The methodological approach utilized involves the Empirical Approach of Legal Anthropology linked with the theory of cultural relativism, leading to the conclusion that the approach involves field observations, interviews with research informants, and analyzing primary, secondary, and tertiary data sources through the lens of cultural relativism concerning the behaviors of indigenous women based on an empirical approach within the context of indigenous customary law.

The Traditional Women’s Shirt from the Heritage of the Museum of History and Ethnography of Bălți Municipality

The present article presents two women’s shirts from the collections of the Museum of History and Ethnography of Bălți municipality, namely the pleated neck shirt with separate „altița” and the straight shirt with placket. The research of the traditional women’s shirts selected for this study, by describing the cloth and cut, the arrangement of the ornaments on the shirts and the embroidery and assembly techniques, is intended to be a contribution to reaffirming the importance of each piece of traditional wear in the museum’s collections in the recovery of regional specificity and knowledge of the diversity of traditional shirt models, from the point of view of raw material, manufacturing techniques and ornamentation. In the same way, we aim to contribute to the common effort to rediscover the potential of the women’s shirt and to ensure a better promotion in the environment of the general public.

Collaborative Governance: Efforts to Re-functionalize the Youtefa Bay Women's Forest Area Based on Local Wisdom

The importance of governance collaboration as an effort to restore the function of the Youtefa Bay mangrove forest area which is not only as a disaster controller, but as a source of community life, managed from generation to generation with its local wisdom. The method used is library research. Where data comes from various literatures, by conducting text and discourse analysis. The results of this study indicate that the existence of mangrove forests on the coast of Youtefa Bay, Papua, is not only limited to disaster management, but is like a mother who gives life. Mangrove forests have become part of the community's customs. There is a division of territory to work; men earn a living at sea, and women are given mangrove forests as a local food source. Mangrove forests became a private space for women. Forest was later named "Women's Forest" in the local language called Tonotwiyat. Aside from being a source of food, it has become a tradition for women to be responsible for protecting and caring for the forest so that it remains sustainable. However, this tradition began to erode along with the times. Developments that are not environmentally friendly and waste that pollutes the forest are part of the fading of women's traditions of caring for the mangrove ecosystem. Rehabilitation of mangrove forest areas affected by development is one of the efforts made by the government. Efforts to preserve mangrove forest areas are not only the task of the government. However, it must be carried out collaboratively with the government, community, NGOs, and the private sector. The collaborative governance approach as an effort to restore the function of mangrove forests can be carried out by prioritizing the local wisdom values ​​of the community. This collaboration is here to answer the lack of resources of each actor.

A woman's tradition? Quantifying gender difference in the Child ballads

AbstractWhile the major ballad‐collecting efforts of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were largely carried out by men, the academic discourse surrounding ballads gendered traditional balladry—orally transmitted narrative poetry—as a woman's tradition. Subsequent ballad scholarship of the twentieth century perpetuated the antiquarian notion of a specifically female ballad tradition, and yet it has remained unclear whether and how this women's tradition should be considered distinct from, for example, a male ballad tradition. This study suggests that a quantitative approach can be used to investigate the question of difference in women's and men's ballad repertoires in the period spanning the mid‐eighteenth century to the close of the nineteenth. Employing Linguistic Inquiry Word Count (LIWC) software to examine the definitive ballad anthology—the Child collection—this study finds that the notion of a woman's tradition goes beyond stereotypical notions of repertoires gendered by genre; women's ballads are instead found to be characterised by distinctive linguistic patterns that convey a strong focus on female subjectivity.

The Cultural Habits and Traditions During Pregnancy and After Childbirth of the Banjar Tribe in South Kalimantan: Semi-Qualitative Descriptive

Inequality is reflected in the high differences in maternal mortality rates in several countries. Health information is often inaccessible for some communities because the differences in the needs of different women and their families were not accounted for. This becomes a communication barrier between healthcare providers and families in selecting and making emergency decisions that may arise during pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum. This study aimed to describe the habits and traditions of women during pregnancy and after birth in maternal health care. The method used is the descriptive semi-qualitative method with a case study approach. The research sample consisted of four Banjarese postpartum mothers with no complications from the third trimester of pregnancy until delivery. The results showed that the four research subjects carried out the prevailing traditional customs, including self-perception, services received from officers, places, and types of care, taboos about food and medicine, advice on food and medicine and rituals of safety ceremonies and prayers together with maternal health services from midwives and nurses. The findings of our study confirmed that the Banjar people are accustomed to using cultural traditions that apply to their families and communities, including who makes decisions about what health services and which facilities they need as long as they are available and affordable in the area.
 Keywords: Culture and Habits, Pregnancy and Childbirth, Banjarese Tribe

Banjarese Cultural Traditions During Pregnancy and After Childbirth in South Kalimantan: A Semi-Qualitative Descriptive

The matter of inequality in context of health status is reflected in the high differences in maternal mortality rates in several countries. Often health information is ignored because of differences in understanding the needs of women and their families. This becomes a communication barrier between health care providers and families in selecting and making emergency decisions that may arise during pregnancy, childbirth, and the puerperium. This study aims to describe the habits and traditions of women during pregnancy and after childbirth in maternal health care. This research uses descriptive analysis method with a case study approach. The study sample consisted of four postpartum mothers with criteria of normal conditions without complications since the third trimester of pregnancy, and the similarity of Banjar ethnic characteristics. The illustration of the results shows that four research subjects carried out the habits of the prevailing tradition, including self-perception; services received from attendants, places and types of care; taboo on food and medicine; suggestion about food and medicine; and rituals in the form of ceremonies and salvation prayers together with maternal health care from midwives, nurses at midwife clinics and Puskesmas. Our research findings confirm that Banjar people are accustomed to using cultural traditions that are integrated into their families and communities and health care services in available and affordable facilities in the area.

‘Cat Person’: Essayism, virality and the digital future of short fiction

The digital revolution has brought back to the fore questions about the health of the short story. Short fiction scholars have for some time now been considering the possibilities that post-book and online spaces might open for the short story form and its popularity among readers. Despite this, when Kristen Roupenian’s New Yorker short story ‘Cat Person’ went viral late in 2017, critics of the genre paid virtually no attention to it. This article sets out to correct this on the premise that studying the ‘Cat Person’ phenomenon can help us refine our understanding of the behaviour and potential of short stories in digital spheres. It focuses, to explore this, on the fact that Roupenian’s text was received as an essay, rather than a short story, by many of its first readers, and accounts for this miscategorization in two different yet interlinked ways. First, it situates the piece in a tradition of women’s storytelling that has long been blurring the line between fiction and non-fiction. And second, it examines the reception of ‘Cat Person’ in the context of social media platforms that promote personal and reality-based modes of expression and communication. The article concludes by conceptualizing a connection between non-fictional interpretations of the story and its virality. Such link complicates accounts about the amenability of short fiction to online environments, suggesting that a story’s capacity to relinquish its identity as such and take on functions of the essay genre might play a key role in determining its performance online.

İnce Memed romanında ve Kalevala destanında kadınlık ve annelik tasviri

Over the last few years there have been alterations in the construction of gender, particularly for women. The concepts of sex and gender are divided with sex remaining biological, and gender becoming constructed. The depiction of the ideal woman as passive, faithful, and obedient thus changed. As the gender issue reforms, motherhood has also begun to be questioned due to its association with the female sex. Women who meet these requirements are labelled “good” mothers, while those who do not are “bad”. Such changes in gender and motherhood led to the distinct characterization of women in daily life and these women began to be portrayed in literature with a special emphasis on their newly constructed female images. Novels and plays that display the changing face of motherhood with careless, nasty and irresponsible mothers have also appeared. However, there are still literary works that represent a more traditional woman and mother. In literature, even the representation of traditional womanhood and motherhood differs since some writers use these women to reveal their weakness, oppression, and vulnerability while others use their literary ability to exhibit how a traditional woman and mother can be strong, dedicated and compassionate to her children. Elias Lönnrot, a well-known literary figure in Finland, with his epic compilation of national folklore, The Kalevala, and Yashar Kemal, one of the most noteworthy authors of Turkish literature, with his renowned Memed, My Hawk, unveil entirely divergent attitudes towards the identities of “woman” and “mother”. The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how Kemal portrays womanhood and motherhood positively in Memed, My Hawk, while Lönnrot flaunts a dismissive viewpoint in The Kalevala. Analysis of these two masterpieces from disparate authors and epochs shows their distinctiveness in consideration of the Anatolian and Finnish cultures.

Queer Korea

Queer Korea

SALOME NOLEGA DAVID: PROGRESSIVE AND TRANSFORMATIVE FEMINIST LEADER OF WESTERN PROVINCE; 1932-1985

The focus of this article is to reconstruct the history of a Luhya Woman –Salome Nolega David as a progressive and transformative leader of western Kenya. With the advent of the first Friends African Mission (hereafter FAM) station at Kaimosi, in 1902, Education was handy in winning more converts to this new religion. The women traditions and culture had first to be transformed, through acceptance of western cultural attributes. Consequently, FAM missionaries offered education opportunities of the sons and daughters of the first generation believers to enable them be employed in secular sectors such as medical services, education service, industrial and agricultural sector, as an approach for reinforcing evangelization and expanding their area of influence. It is due to this; the Friends Church’s secular policy, its formulation, implementation and impact on the education in the Luhya that is the subject of this study. Anecdotal evidence indicate members of the Friends Church are to found all over the country today. Unfortunately, the contributions of the daughters of the first and second generation adherents of F.A.M to the growth and transformation in education among the Luhya of old Vihiga district has not been realized. In recognition of this fact, the article addresses the pertinent issues Salome Nolega David found herself agitating for among the Luhya of western Kenya. Indeed, much of the material for the article was derived from unpublished theses, oral interviews and secondary sources which addressed the role of Nolega David among the Friends Church affiliates. Other sources included, written source of information on the Friends Church is the East African Yearly Meeting (hereafter EAYM) records preserved at Kaimosi and those from The Kenya National Archives (hereafter KNA).

Intertextual Agōnes in Archaic Greek Epic: Penelope vs. the Catalogue of Women

Abstract Archaic Greek epic exhibits a pervasive eristic intertextuality, repeatedly positioning its heroes and itself against pre-existing traditions. In this article, I focus on a specific case study from the Odyssey: Homer’s agonistic relationship with the Catalogue of Women tradition. Hesiodic-style catalogue poetry has long been recognized as an important intertext for the Nekyia of Odyssey 11, but here I explore a more sustained dialogue across the whole poem. Through an ongoing agōn that sets Odysseus’s wife against catalogic women, Homer establishes the pre-eminence of his heroine and—by extension—the supremacy of his own poem.

Mergawe: A Picture of Changing Women's Tradition

This research focuses on women's efforts in placing themselves in the right position. In the midst of changing times that are so fast and open, women are faced with a feeling of dilemma. On the one hand, women are limited by traditions that always place them in the domestic sphere, which is commonly known as konco wingking. On the other hand, changing times or modernization has given women the freedom to enter the public sphere. Through moderation of the tradition, women in Paciran have managed to get out of their dilemma. They can maintain their traditions and identity as Javanese women and can create new traditions by accepting them as workers. Tradition moderation has also changed the meaning and view of the konco wingking tradition, which so far has only been considered a "place of origin" with its domestic role; macak, masak, manak, but also a "place of return" the tradition that becomes the foothold of women's life in viewing social reality; community, and family. This research was conducted on women working nguplik in a village in Paciran, Lamongan, East Java. Nguplik is the job of separating the ripe crab shell or skin from the meat to be sold and processed into food and cosmetics. Nguplik is carried out by individuals and or a group of women. This study uses a qualitative method with a case study approach, with the data collection process using interviews and observations. To analyze the data we used the theory of cultural sociology. The finding of this research is the acceptance of women as workers.

Women Writing the American Artist in Novels of Development from 1850–1932: The Artist Embodied

Women Writing the American Artist in Novels of Development from 1850–1932: The Artist Embodied

FEMINISME : SEBUAH KOMUNIKASI SPIRITUALITAS MENUJU PENGUATAN SISTEM SOSIAL

Discourse on feminism can be seen in the struggle of a woman named Hajar. As the mother of the Prophets, Hajar helped support the foundation of civilization framed by Ismail, her son, as a form of social movement wrapped in spiritual awareness, that all forms of racism, feudalism and domination of capital, will disappear in the power of God. This is enshrined in the Hajj ritual, jogging between the hills of Safa and Marwah. Hajar is a historical cultural capital that is represented from class consciousness, which must be accumulated for future civilizations. That is why in an effort to explore these events, the meaning of symbols is needed, according to the model used in history. Meanwhile, the German female philosopher, Hannah Arendt said that there was an important change in the map of human civilization as a result of the 19th century European spirit which eroded and destroyed the structure of the nation's self, regarding the nation state. He highlighted the racism and imperialism of the century which combined a number of forces that were destructive to the public spheres of explanation for their own sake. Ironically, Indonesian women are actually indoctrinated that Western women's traditions are the best. This paper offers how the trend of feminism in Indonesia.

EROTICS AS A BRANCH OF PHILOSOPHY

The figure and discourse of Diotima of Mantinea in Plato’s Symposium had a decisive influence on the Western tradition of women’s thought and on the foundation of a “hidden” branch of philosophy: Erotics, that is, the philosophical consideration of love, sexuality, gender identity, interpersonal relationships and particularly relationships of philia such as friendship. Although Erotics was not established as one of the canonical subdivisions of philosophy, numerous texts and theories prove its existence from antiquity to the present day. Diotima and other female philosophers make it clear that the Western tradition of women’s thought maintained a constant interest in the issues of Erotics. Making Erotics visible as a branch of philosophy situates the contributions of women thinkers in the philosophical canon, thereby transforming it.

Behind the veil of the zenana: Cornelia Sorabji and the colonial heritage of the trapped housewife

ABSTRACT This essay argues that second wave feminist accounts of the trapped housewife type, who must remain inside the house, consumed with domestic drudgery, derive from a colonial precedent. Many second wave writers relied on Orientalist metaphors and anecdotes in order to dramatize their theses of global patriarchal oppression. My essay reframes this bibliography by centering the neglected work of modernist-era Indian writer and activist Cornelia Sorabji. As an Anglophile and defender of empire, Sorabji fails many of the terms of a valorized feminist recovery. However, her writing suggests a clear precedent for the Orientalized housewife type later adopted by second wave feminists. In addition, she appropriates a white feminist literary persona to new, modern results: she is an intermediary to women living in purdah in pre-Independence India. Because she shares the heritage and language of these confined housewives, she can chronicle their lives with nuance and ambivalence. Ultimately, Sorabji inaugurates a tradition of women who have evoked modernity for themselves by differentiating themselves from a cloistered, racialized throng.