“Known as the Motorcycle Queen of Miami, Bessie Stringfield started riding when she was 16. She was the first African-American woman to travel cross-country solo, and she did it at age 19 in 1929, riding a 1928 Indian Scout. Bessie traveled through all of the lower 48 states during the ’30s and ’40s at a time when the country was rife with prejudice and hatred. She later rode in Europe, Brazil, and Haiti and during World War II she served as one of the few motorcycle despatch riders for the United States military.”

via A Usable Past

via NDÉ ISDZÁNÉ ŁANOHWILE’~~Lipan Apache Women Defense

waveofeuphoria:

India’s first woman photo-journalist Homai Vyarawalla dead

India’s first woman photo-journalist Homai Vyarawalla died at a private hospital here this morning at the age of 98.

She fell from her cot three days ago and was hospitalised at a private hospital, officials said.

Her husband Maneckshaw Vyarawalla predeceased her in 1970.

Born on December 9, 1913 to a Parsi family, Vyarawalla grew up in Mumbai and moved to Delhi in 1942 where she photographed events leading to Independence, as an employee of the British Information Services.

She took photographs of key events that would have a decisive impact on Indian history, including a meeting where leaders voted for the June 3 plan for India’s partition.

She also photographed the first flag hoisting ceremony at Red Fort on August 15, 1947, the departure of Lord Mountbatten from India and the funerals of Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Lal Bahadur Shastri.

She was awarded the Padma Vibhushan in January last year.

REVOLUTIONARY WOMAN OF THE DAY: Lucy Parsons (circa 1853 – March 7, 1942) was a labor organizer, socialist, and legendary orator. Lucy was of Native American, Black, and Mexican ancestry, born in Texas as a slave. She moved to Chicago where she was a key organizer in the labor movement and also participated in revolutionary activism on behalf of political prisoners, people of color, the homeless, and women. She said, “We [women] are the slaves of slaves. We are exploited more ruthlessly than men.” We salute Lucy Parsons, known by the Chicago Police Department as “more dangerous than a thousand rioters”. Know your revolutionary women’s history.

via REVOLUTIONARY WOMAN OF THE DAY: Lucy Parsons | AF3IRM

An interview I did with a group of some of the women involved with the Justseeds artists co-operative, back in 2010, has just been published online at the (new) Aorta blog. It can be found here: www.aortamagazine.com/blog/women-of-justseeds

Justseeds Artists’ Cooperative is a decentralized community of artists based in Canada, the US and Mexico who have banded together to collaborate with and support each other and social movements.

via remember who you are: justseeds interview now online

thepoliticalnotebook:

Kabul, Afghanistan. A female boxer’s reflection is seen in a broken mirror in a boxing club in the capital.

Read about female boxers in Afghanistan aiming for the 2012 Olympics.

Photo Credit: Ahmad Masood/Reuters

[via]

deafmuslimpunx:

draodoir-mna:

caffeinatedfeminist:

sexistappeal:

[Image: Photographic recreation of Rosie the Riveter featuring a femme-presenting person from India. Speech bubble above reads “we can do it!” in Hindi.]

deafmuslimpunx:

INDIAN VERSION OF “ROSIE THE RIVETER”

I have seen various photographic recreations of Rosie the Riveter - all modeled by white women. Yet I’d never seen an Indian version. And I thought to myself, “I’m gonna make one!” One of my family members, who lives in India, helped me with the translation of “We Can Do It!” in Hindi. The model is me, the photographer is me, and I wore a traditional polyester saree with a cotton choli (blouse). I modeled my look after my aunts and other working class Indian women in the home state where both my parents come from - I greatly admire them and their work ethics. I hope you guys enjoy my Indian version of Rosie the Riveter!

Please follow me on Twitter and Tumblr! Don’t forget to subscribe to The American Dream is Dead and my youtube channel!

Awesome! After I posted that embroidered image of Rosie the Riveter earlier, I was thinking about how all redesigned images using Rosie are always always white. This is so great!

LOVE

This is Amazing.

Kudos!

Wow - I cannot believe I got over 2,000 reblogs and notes on Tumblr. This is a huge shock but very exciting nonetheless. Thank you to everyone who reblogged and “liked” my photo! I hope to start selling shirts and posters of this design, along with other designs, so I can earn some extra money before I go off to East Africa (for volunteer work with the deaf) next year. Thank you and have a great day!

Many disabled feminists contend that the denial of disabled women’s reproductive and parenting rights also relates to their social and economic marginalisation. Because women with disabilities are themselves depicted as burdens to society and as irresponsible for having children, their sexual activity is open to public scrutiny and control. Waxman (cited in Kallianes & Rubenfeld 1997) contends that ‘the disabled woman who becomes pregnant is judged to be immoral by society and seeks to punish her by removing her children from her…..while a non-disabled woman’s pregnancy is considered a miracle, a disabled woman’s pregnancy is considered a crime against society’.

This is born out be anecdotal evidence from members of WWDA who have decided to have abortions because they were unable to find supports for when they would have the baby, and women who were pressured into sterilisation from being told they would not be able to care for children. In reality the women may only need 2-3 years of support and would be as good a mother as any other. A research study undertaken in Australia by Westbrook & Chinnery (1995) aimed to compare the childrearing experiences of mothers with and without physical disabilities. The study looked at the support the women received from health practitioners and members of their social networks and the satisfaction and problems they encountered in caring for their children as babies and as toddlers.

The study found that:

• 36% of the disabled women received negative reactions to their pregnancy from others, compared to 9% of the non-disabled women;
• 12% of the disabled women rated their doctors care during the pregnancy as ‘poor’, compared to 2% of the non-disabled women;
• 20% of the disabled women were advised by their doctor to have an abortion, compared to 0% of the non-disabled women;
• 23% of the disabled women found prenatal classes ‘unhelpful’ compared to 3% of the non-disabled women (reasons given by the disabled women as to why the classes were unhelpful included: lack of information; no consideration given to the needs of the women with disabilities; feeling excluded in the classes);
• 24% of the disabled women found the maternity hospital staff ‘unhelpful’ compared to 7% of the non-disabled women ( reasons given by the disabled women included: special needs of women with disabilities were ignored; patronising and bullying behaviour; rude and uncaring attitudes).

so: I’m a bit conflicted about what point women’s issues start being classed as feminist/disability issues vs. poverty/minority issues - where poor health is so common in the latter groups that individual disability is often hidden or normalized by group stereotypes.

That said: WWD is a peak community body who’ve conducted some of the most comprehensive research about WWD experiences in Australia.

Despite being pro-choice, and advocating for more support of mothers with disabilities or disabled infants, rather than any changes to reproductive rights law: their findings about abelism and over-referral for abortions have since been widely co-opted by forced birther ‘feminists’.

Through 2011, I was doing a little support work in community groups and public policy discussions about reproductive rights, and supporting parents & children with disabilities. People were constantly, even in left wing, minority, socialist etc groups - citing the right wing, forced birthers who’ve manipulated these findings, and the small niche of feminist mummy bloggers or feminist disability bloggers who legitimized them - rather than findings of and by independent, broadly representative WWD groups.

So you know, people ought to know what the original references are.

dykesanddykery:

huddle together after staying death for the day.

The white one whose bigness makes her look soft

holds the head of the beige one

whose drag makes her look hard

They rock each other to stay awake

to stay asleep to stay alive

exchanging softness and hardness

making themselves beautiful and strong

against death every day

Disfigured a little, perhaps,

by the small gun

beating against their mutual breast

A poem from Because Mourning Sickness is a Staple in My Country, which is “a collection of poetry by working-class dykes who have been going through changes and writing poems, among other things.” It was published in 1979 in Iowa City, and you can view the entire thing online here.