By Maya Dusenbery • @mayadusenbery • 12 years ago

Weekly Feminist Reader


Joyce Banda became Malawi’s first woman president.

Oh, the good old days: When you could have an abortion without anyone calling you slut.

Lynn Parramore argues that the era of the female hero has arrived.

The Atlantic profiles the stories of six Pakistani women.

This Roxane Gay piece on The Hunger Games, rape, and strong women is required reading. (Trigger warning.)

How 25 National Magazine Award nominations went to 25 male writers–and what needs to change so that doesn’t happen again.

Check out Jamia Wilson’s personal hair journey at Rookie.

Teyonah Parris, Don Draper’s new secretary, talks to Vulture about playing the first major black character on Mad Men.

“The simple truth is that what happened in Sanford, Florida, is a tragedy law cannot mend.”

Important piece at Colorlines on how voter ID laws affect women voters.

The next time you’re looking for a good flick about female friendship, check out the 163 comments on this Feministe thread.

Good: Planned Parenthood is suing Texas for excluding them from the state’s women’s health program.

“We have trouble, in our culture, with any love that isn’t based on sex or blood.” A wonderful piece on friendship between men and women.

Somali refugee women often face sexual violence outside the home and reproductive coercion within it.

What have you been reading/writing/watching/learning this week?

St. Paul, MN

Maya Dusenbery is executive director in charge of editorial at Feministing. She is the author of the forthcoming book Doing Harm: The Truth About How Bad Medicine and Lazy Science Leave Women Dismissed, Misdiagnosed, and Sick (HarperOne, March 2018). She has been a fellow at Mother Jones magazine and a columnist at Pacific Standard magazine. Her work has appeared in publications like Cosmopolitan.com, TheAtlantic.com, Bitch Magazine, as well as the anthology The Feminist Utopia Project. Before become a full-time journalist, she worked at the National Institute for Reproductive Health. A Minnesota native, she received her B.A. from Carleton College in 2008. After living in Brooklyn, Oakland, and Atlanta, she is currently based in the Twin Cities.

Maya Dusenbery is an executive director of Feministing and author of the forthcoming book Doing Harm on sexism in medicine.

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