All blog posts published in November 2008 - Shameless Magazine - your daily dose of fresh feminism for girls and trans youth

All posts published in November 2008

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- Arts
- Bibliothèque
- DIY
- Event Listings
expozine Montreal!

November 26, 2008 • Anna Leventhal

Have I mentioned how much I love Cat and Girl? Oh yes, I believe I have. The webcomic by Dorothy Gambrell never ceases to be a balm for my overcaffeinated, neurotically self-analytic, black-humoured, Babysitters-Club-loving soul.

Whoa, it's a countercultural comic about counterculture that I'm using to advertise counterculture. The mind boggleth.

Okay, but the real point of this post is to let you know that YOUR SOUL TOO can be soothed by such products of minds depraved and genius, in material form no less! Montreal’s annual zine fair, Expozine, is happening this weekend, for two whole days of photocopied, silkscreened, stapled, hand-bound, sketched out and jittery madness. 200+ tables of independent bookworks, comics, art, crafts, posters, clothes, buttons, and snacks. Plus I’ll be there tabling with Invisible Publishing, where I’ll be flogging my book, along with books by such Shameless luminaries as Stacey May Fowles and Thea Lim.

Crucial deets:

Saturday and Sunday November 29th and 30th, 12 - 6
5035 St. Dominique between St. Joseph and Laurier (Metro Laurier)
FREE ADMISSION (take that, Toronto!)
- All About Shameless
Vote for Shameless at the Canadian Blog Awards!

November 25, 2008 • Megan Griffith-Greene

We’ve been nominated for the Best Feminist Blog category of the Canadian Blog Awards!

Show us some love!
- All About Shameless
- Event Listings
It’s official: It’s time for a shameless dance party!

November 25, 2008 • Stacey May Fowles

Shameless magazine will be hosting an all ages feminist dance party at the Gladstone Melody Bar in Toronto on December 10! We’re doing so in partnership with the fabulous Granny Boots.

Featuring the fantastic DJ styings of DJ Winnie, DJ Nolan Natasha, and DJ HollyRock!

Shameless and Granny Boots!
Wed Dec 10th from 7:30-10pmish
Gladstone Melody Bar
1214 Queen St West

(Brought to you by the Gladstone Hotel and Chelsey Licht-a-Womyn, Granny Boots is FREE weekly entertainment for queers. If you love to be home by 11pm or like to party hard till midnight, this night’s for you. Every Week is Different! Email chelsey.lichtman@gmail.com if you wanna host a Granny Boots!)
- Geek Chic
- In My Opinion...
Did people get this worked up about rollerskates?

November 25, 2008 • Mir Verburg

For those of us involved in youth media or technology, the last few weeks have been all about the results of a 3.3 million dollar research project, funded by the MacArthur Foundation called Kids’ Informal Learning with Digital Media: An Ethnographic Investigation of Innovative Knowledge Culture. The project was carried out by investigators at the University of Southern California and the University of California, Berkeley. The purpose of the research? To discover and learn about what young people are doing when they hang out online, doing what researchers like to call “informal learning” and what the rest of us usually refer to as “playing”, “hanging out” and, if we have an assignment due, “wasting time”. During this study dozens of research projects looked at teenagers’ use of MySpace, YouTube, Neopets, gaming sites and more.

Mamas, don’t let your babies grow up to be Luddites is the Globe and Mail‘s take on the research. For a more nuanced discussion, here is a video of Mizuko Ito, lead author of the study, talking about the findings.

(more inside…)
- Miscellaneous
- Race and Racism
Squaw is still Square

November 25, 2008 • Elle E.

What’s in a name? Well, in the case of BC’s Square Lake, a bunch of racism, sexism and half-assed attempts to change.

Sign showing peeling stickers covering what was “Squaw Lake.” (The Tyee)

Over at The Tyee James Ward has been exploring the use of the word Squaw as a place name in BC Parks. He first wrote about it in March, and then again last week. Unfortunately, eight months later, nothing much has changed.

For those who don’t know, “squaw” is a bastardized pronunciation and spelling of the beautiful Algonquin word iskwew (pronounced es-kway-ew), which simply means woman. But somewhere along the way, as multilingual Turtle Island was forced to become mainly English-speaking, “squaw” became the ugly, common term used to refer to an Aboriginal woman, regardless of her indigenous heritage.
- James Ward, The Tyee, March/08

(more inside…)
- Event Listings
Step One: Dress Up. Step Two: Dance Slow.

November 25, 2008 • piKe krpan

Our friends at Worn Journal are launching their new issue #7 this Saturday November 29 in Toronto with style, as per usual!

The new issue includes articles on mannequin history, global fashion, luxury branding, and spandex!

You may remember Shameless reviewer Erin Elliott had this to say about Worn’s issue #5 in an older print issue of Shameless:

Discovering Montreal’s Worn Fashion Journal is as refreshing as trading in sweaty wool socks for liberating flip flops on the first day of spring. Worn aims to “discover what is of lasting value about clothing and style” by wandering through a walk-in closet’s worth of ideas about fashion and art. The history of Toile de Jouy - those 18th century scenes printed on your Grandma’s bedspread - reveals rich stories hidden in plain sight. Between Countess di Castiglione scandalous self-portraits in the 1800’s and Elsa Schiaparelli’s shoe-shaped hats that rocked the 1920’s, Worn writers showcase female fashion rebels that put L.A.M.B. to shame. In “The F Word” Emily Raine asks “If I’m a feminist, then why can’t I dress like a girl?” This inspiring magazine has a clear answer: You can.

The launch event is a winter formal slow dance which is all-ages and queer-friendly. It will take place at Dovercourt House (805 Dovercourt Rd, Toronto), a lovely dance studio decked with crepe paper streamers, balloons and mirror ball. You get a dancecard to reserve a special tune and Resident Dancers for any shy boys and girls. There is also a photographer to take date and non-date photos to remember the night (and outfits) by.

Doors open at 9:00pm. Entrance cost is $10 and includes a dancecard and Issue 7 of Worn Fashion Journal.

For more queer fashion inspiration, check out the photos after the jump!

(more inside…)
2-Spirits Toronto Fundraiser tonight!

November 25, 2008 • Jessica Yee

2-Spirited People of the 1st Nation proudly presents:
The Bold and the Brave
NishaLicious DRAG SHOW and FUNDRAISER

No cover charge, donations are kindly accepted.

Date: Nov. 25. 2008
Where: George’s Play, 504 Church Street, Toronto
Time: 9pm – 11pm

ALL PROCEEDS WILL SUPPORT THE ABORIGINAL PEOPLE LIVING WITH HIV/AIDS FUND

For more information, please contact: springwater@2spirits.com
- News Flash
Women’s Studies grad auctions off her V-card

November 24, 2008 • Jenna Owsianik

Who would have thought a 22 year-old with a Bachelor’s degree in Women’s Studies would be selling her virginity? Who knows, but almost everyone has an opinion about it as her story is being gobbled up by the mainstream media.

Appearing on The Tyra Show under the pseudonym Natalie Dylan, the young woman explains why she’s willing to finance her graduate degree by putting her flower on the market. Natalie, sitting alongside her sister, says, “We are doing premature research for our thesis project and we wanted to study the dichotomous nature between virginity and prostitution.” The sisters describe Natalie’s act as individually empowering, even one of feminism, because she can choose prostitution as a viable and safe option.

In response the concepts of “female empowerment” and “feminism” have since been debated among society, sex workers and feminists.

(more inside…)
- Body Politics
- News Flash
We need to watch this…

November 24, 2008 • Jessica Yee

The antis are at it again, coming up with their totally inaccurate and conflicting, supposedly “all-encompassing” polls for craziness.

From the ultra-scary LifeSiteNews:

A new Environics poll shows a majority of Canadians want legal protection for the unborn child at some point before birth. This is consistent with survey results over the past seven years.

Canada remains the only country in the developed word with no legal limits on abortion throughout all 9 months of pregnancy. Yet, almost 6 in 10 respondents support legal protection for unborn children at some point before birth. Only 33% support the current situation of protection only after birth. Once again, women polled showed far more support for protection from conception on than men did: 33% versus 24%.
Where the hell are they getting their numbers from? Oh that’s right, Life Canada produced the poll, so you KNOW they’re asking objective questions. Not.
Love and Sex with the Medina Collective

November 24, 2008 • piKe krpan

Have you heard of this amazing collective? Big up to the Medina Collective, an organization “dedicated to empowering young women of colour to challenge mass media messages by exploring hip hop, pop culture, media and education. Through activism, art, and access to the ivory tower, Medina provides young women with the tools they need to challenge the status quo.”

The group provides university-level courses (without the associated university-level cost!!) to young women aged 19-30 in the Toronto area.

Their most recent writing retreat (which just passed on November 29 and 30) is a build-up to their Philosophy of Love and Sex course in January 2009.
Legendary B-Girl Pioneers Asia One, Aruna, Lady Champ, Rockfella, Laneski and Aik at B-Girl Be Women's Hip Hop Exhibit & Summit 2006. (Mural by Too Fly and Photo by Martha Cooper.)

The course will explore hip hop, sexuality and gender and will focus on why many women of colour do not, cannot and will not identify with many of the images associated with women in today’s hip hop culture.

The January course, offered in conjunction with Ryerson University, is “pay what you can” and is for university credit! For registration, contact Tonika at tonika.morgan@gmail.com.

If you have already had access to university education, there are still ways for you to be involved. Contact Tonika for details!