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Summer update: Join the Hall of Shameless!

August 25, 2011 • Team Shameless

It’s been a great summer for Shameless! We had a really fun launch for issue 17 with lots of awesome bands like Phoenix Pagliacci and Spitfist, and the amazing comedian Mae Martin, and a great yard sale last week that brought out a lot of cool people from the neighbourhood to support the magazine and find some great deals.

We’re looking forward to the Fall, when we launch our fantastic new issue on politics, featuring stories on the many ways we can engage in politics, whether it be voting, running for office, getting involved in your community or being an activist. We look particularly at the politics of Indigenous sovereignty, and women and revolutions in the Middle East and North Africa. We’ve also got a how-to guide to sewing your own book bag, plus tips on finding the coolest plus-sized shops on the continent.

Being a part of Shameless is fun, and we encourage you to get involved, whether it’s through sending us feedback, contributing to the mag or the blog, or signing up for a subscription. We need your help to keep publishing, and one special way you can help is to join the Hall of Shameless!

For as little as $5 per month, you can help us to continue to put Shameless in the hands of young women and trans youth across the country.

As a Hall of Shameless member, you will receive an ongoing subscription to Shameless and free entry to all of our events. More importantly, you will be an integral part of ensuring that Shameless will keep publishing the bold, critical content readers have come to know and love, and will continue to bring a much-needed voice to young women and trans youth across Canada.

You can sign up here.

Don’t take our word for it. See what others have to say:

“As a teenage activist, Shameless was a space where I actually got to see and be inspired by other young feminists. As a twenty something activist - I still find inspiration in the pages of Shameless and pass it on to people whenever I can!”
— Kaley Kennedy, former editorial collective member, Hall Of Shameless member and student activist

“[Shameless] deals with real issues —important stuff — not how to flirt… this is a magazine for real girls.” 
— Shannon, 14, Regina, Saskatchewan

We hope you’ve had a great summer too. Stay tuned for Issue #18 and more amazing Shameless events.
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- Features
Blog note: Women’s Worlds round-ups

July 7, 2011 • Julia Horel

Hi, Shameless readers!

You may have noticed that we’ve posted only one day’s worth of notes and thoughts from the Women’s Worlds conference, still ongoing. This is because your blogger has so many notes and thoughts that I can’t find the time, between workshops, plenary sessions and cultural/entertainment events, to compile my tons of notes into something readable. Stay tuned for notes and thoughts after the conference has ended and I’ve gotten some sleep, and thanks for your patience.

We’d still love to hear thoughts from anyone attending the conference, so please get in touch with me at julia@shamelessmag.com if you’d like to post a guest blog or share some multimedia content.

And if you’re looking for some content to tide you over, check out the plenary session from Day 3: Breaking Barriers (it’s very long, and it is not transcribed or closed-captioned).

Shamelessly,
Blogger Julia
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Hello! From a New Shameless Blogger.

June 13, 2011 • Raisa Bhuiyan

Hi everyone,

My name’s Raisa and I’m bopping and hopping off the walls to have joined the sassy team of bloggers at Shameless!

I’ve been writing short stories about my experiences growing up as a North-Americanized, Midwestern-American-lingo-loving, South-Asian woman for my own personal perks on the back of receipts, flyers, envelopes and half-used hilroy notebook sheets for the past few years. Because of this, blogging comes to me as an amazing extension of that hobby. Except this time, I have the marvelous chance to listen and learn from the thoughts, work and experiences of other writers and artists.

Currently, I find myself on the edge of winding up an undergraduate degree in Political Science and Women’s Studies at York University, which has admittedly impacted the tone and topics of issues I enjoy writing about. With the fantastic forum I’ve been given here at Shameless, I hope to find myself writing about issues like grassroots activism by South-Asian youth in Toronto, the musings of post-secondary student life at York University, implementing an anti-racist feminist politic/framework within classes at school, places of work and community, women working/volunteering within the local political scene in Toronto and women organizing in the not-for-profit sector in Toronto.

I can’t wait to get started!
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- Event Listings
Reminder: Shameless launch/birthday party this Thursday!

May 31, 2011 • Julia Horel

Don’t forget about our upcoming party, this Thursday!

Come help Shameless celebrate 7 years of talking back! There will be music by Spitfist, the comedic stylings of Mae Martin, a birthday presents raffle, party favours, nibbles by Vert Catering, and, of course, birthday cake courtesy of Sweets from the Earth!

We can’t wait to party with you. See you there!

Thursday, June 2 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm
Toronto Free Gallery
1277 Bloor Street West
Toronto, ON

FREE! All-ages, wheelchair accessible. We will also have an ASL interpreter joining us!

To get you excited, here’s some info about one of our performers, Mae Martin:

Mae Martin began writing and performing comedy at tender age of 13. In the 10 years since then she has cemented her place in the Canadian comedy scene. She has been nominated for two Canadian Comedy Awards, and her work has been featured on the Comedy Network, on CBC’s “Q”, TVO, The Space Channel and YTV. This year she has appeared on Muchmusic’s Video On Trial and Global Television’s boxing day special “Global Comedians” alongside Dave Foley, Maria Bamford, and Jon Dore. NOW Magazine recently praised her “smart, deadpan observations”, and Xtra Magazine called her “witty and wickedly funny”. Mae is currently expanding her audience across the pond - she recently headlined in numerous London clubs, and has headlined at the Liverpool Comedy Festival. She was also a finalist in the 2011 UK Musical Comedy Awards! This Pride, in Toronto, Mae will be debuting her solo show “Mae Day: I’m not waving, I’m drowning” at Buddies in Bad Times Theatre (June 23rd). See http://www.maemartin.ca for details.
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Shameless reader survey!

May 31, 2011 • Team Shameless

Dear Shameless readers,

We need YOU to help us learn more about our readers. Please take a few minutes to fill out our reader survey.

Those who complete the survey will have their email addresses entered in a draw for a FREE year’s subscription to Shameless magazine!

Love,

The Team
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- Event Listings
Shameless language issue launch & 7th birthday party!

May 19, 2011 • Julia Horel

Come help Shameless celebrate 7 years of talking back! There will be music by Spitfist, the comedic stylings of Mae Martin, a birthday presents raffle, party favours, nibbles by Vert Catering, and, of course, birthday cake courtesy of Sweets from the Earth!

We can’t wait to party with you. See you there!

Thursday, June 2 · 7:00pm - 10:00pm
Toronto Free Gallery
1277 Bloor Street West
Toronto, ON

FREE! All-ages, wheelchair accessible.
- All About Shameless
Shameless featured in This Magazine!

May 13, 2011 • Julia Horel

Your Shameless mag has been featured in an article in This Magazine by Jessica Leigh Johnston, outgoing features editor at Shameless and forever friend.

It’s not exactly Seventeen, and that’s the whole point — or at least it was. “When we started, we defined ourselves as what we aren’t,” explains Sheila Sampath, the magazine’s editorial director. “Now, we no longer have to do that. It’s more about what we are.”

Check out the whole article online or on newsstands in the latest issue of This!

Some members of the Shameless editorial collective. (Robin Hart Hiltz)
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- Arts
Meet Laura

May 9, 2011 • Laura Krahn

Works of Art: An Intro

Hello to all the Shameless!

I’m here to share some thoughts, rants and maybe even an occasional insight on arts and culture with you. It’s going to be lots of fun, I promise, and I’m super stoked to be here. I have a firmly established penchant for works of art of all types. From poetry slams and lit readings; photography and fine art exhibits; rock concerts and nights at the opera; classical dance to performance art weirder than Lady Gaga’s newest video; you name it, I love it. Hard core, big time, ketchup-to-my-scrambled-eggs type LOVE.

I’m not sure that I can explain where this love comes from. I was a lucky kid; I got to go to theatre shows and concerts and to take dance and music lessons. I was writing before I could write, when I was all scribbles and no discernible letters. Eventually, I grew up, learned to spell and spent eight years in university studying art, usually literature but film and visual art too, trying to figure out the whats, hows, and whys art does what it does. I’ve spent plenty of time making my own art as well, and, along the way, I’ve come to believe that, fundamentally, we are art-full beings, driven to create and express. Art is essential to our being human.

Being human is beautiful and complex and chaotic, and art helps us makes sense of all that stuff. For me, art is about stories. Sure, they aren’t always stories we understand, but those stories are always in there, in our words, movement, pixels and paint. Each of these mediums transforms what we experience, our thoughts and feelings and all of the great but gooey things in our lives, into some sort of shape to work with (no wonder lots of art is about love and sex, eh).

This idea of the work of art is key, I think. Making art is work in many ways. Firstly, creating something is usually hard, taking time and effort and sometimes long nights, heartbreak and extreme agony (yep). Secondly, doing art is hard because society makes it difficult even when you’ve been struck with the blessed lightening blot of inspiration. Arts funding is still being slashed left, right and centre (well, mostly by the political Right…). Society that acts as though art is a privilege and a luxury rather than something enriching in itself, something we need to survive. Or perhaps art is stereotyped as frivolous excess, undeserving of attention and funds, because it can be such a threat to dominant systems; art must be controlled and suppressed by the big guys precisely because it can bring about change. This brings me to the third way in which art is work: it does something.

Feminist art especially does something. Remember when I said art is fundamental to our being? Well, feminist art is fundamental to our being human in the world. Feminist art exhibits an awareness of the structures in which we are embedded and the ways in which those structures are misogynist, homophobic, racist, classist, ableist and otherwise oppressive. Feminist art critiques and challenges our relationships with others, questioning how those relationships can be (re)created in order to achieve a better world.

How that’s for optimism? Art! Change! Feminisms! Better world! Woots. It’s probably because I can’t wait to explore some awesome feminist art and artists with you. I can’t wait to hear what YOU think and to get into the nit and grit with y’all, too. I also totally want to know if you hear of any exciting shows or events coming up and if you want us to talk about anything in particular here. Reviews, profiles, musings, wherever inspiration takes us: here we go.
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Spring Issue on the Press!

May 3, 2011 • Sheila Sampath

Issue 18: Spring 2011.

This March marked the 100th anniversary of International Women’s Day. To honour the occasion, The Globe and Mail’s Margaret Wente got her hate on and wrote a scathing letter to Canadian feminists. The message: it’s 2011 and feminism is irrelevant. Get over it!

Shameless blogger Emma Woolley fought back. On our newly re-launched and fresh-faced blog, she brought forth the kind of sass that does us proud — the smart, articulate kind — the kind that takes a pretty bogus argument and challenges it, point-by-point, until the only thing you can possibly do after reading it is take to the streets, rally, march and celebrate the 100th International Women’s Day with more gumption than ever.

This year is Shameless’s seventh anniversary, and my fifth year with the organization. Admittedly, it hasn’t always been easy. Working for an independent magazine means a lot of deadlines and responsibilities. It means barrages of emails and lots of long days and late nights. But I re-discovered, after reading Wente’s article and Woolley’s response, that words are powerful. They have the ability to anger and to inspire. The words that we write, edit and publish here at Shameless have that potential as well. And, navigating that potential and doing my part to keep Shameless alive has grown to become my own act of feminist resistance.

The power of words, the power of language: that’s what this issue is all about. In it, we learn the meaning of the word stud (see “Sexy. Sef-Assured. Stud,” p. 28), and question the true meaning of justice (see “Justice for Girls Makes the Case,” p. 24). And we explore the ways in which we use language to resist (See “The ABCs of Words: An Activist’s Toolkit,” p. 18), reclaim (see “What is a Bitch,” by Shameless Wire grads, p. 10) and reflect (See “This is About Having an Accent,” p. 48). With that, I leave you to eagerly await this issue, these words and this feminist act.

Yours shamelessly,
sheila
- All About Shameless
Blog note: comment issue

April 25, 2011 • Julia Horel

Hi everyone,

We have been having some problems with certain blog entries becoming linked together and showing comments from other blog entries. We’re working on the issue and appreciate your understanding!

Love,
Team Shameless.