Okay - I've read Delusions of Gender. I want to find out more about feminism. Can you guide me?

[FrozenNorthPole]

I really enjoyed Delusions of Gender - came across the Feminism/women's rights section in passing, saw it recommended, bought it on a whim and got hooked. I'm a research psychologist and respect the way she used evidence. I was also excited to see two of my colleagues cited in it (Hausmann & Rosenthal).

I've been trying to read The Equality Illusion but have been finding it less engaging - don't know whether it's the more anecdotal structure or just a different tone. I'm not finding much of it particularly surprising.

So, two questions:

• can anyone suggest other useful books / blogs / sources to read now?
• this is a bit vague but ... how do I go about applying any of this in my world / my life? E.g. decisions / relationship roles / educating my two daughters. I don't even know where to start.

Thank you

PS - I'm also considering planning a project with an evolutionary psychologist colleague. Is there anything in evolutionary psychology in itself (i.e. not its misapplication) that you think is fundamentally antifeminist?

I think you'd like Reclaiming The F-Word - it is less anecdotal than The Equality Illusion and has more explanation of Feminism and how it fits into different areas of life - eg education/religion/families/popular culture.

At the end of each chapter there are suggestions for how to "apply" your Feminism (not got copy in front of me so can't think of an example just now).

You could try The F Word Blog and Stop Sexist Remarks Blog and start getting your news from Women's Views On News website. And hang out here of course!

I haven't read Delusions of Gender myself but I read a similar book called Pink Brain Blue Brain.

Sorry - I don't know much about evolutionary psychology - but perhaps you could let us know the male/female split between academics and senior academics. Male/female ratio in journals and editors of journals etc?

Thank you - I've just added Reclaiming the F-Word to my Amazon basket. It sounds practical and up my street.

I think I'm going to like hanging out here. Nobody seems to pull punches and the debates seem intelligent.

The truth is, I don't know much about the gender splits in ev psych. My research - which is on preadolescent girls' body image and eating pathology - straddles clinical/health/developmental psychology. These are all fields in which large number of women have recently come to relative prominence (but probably still not much power).

I've been thinking a lot recently about the extent to which my research focus interacts with feminism i.e. for years I've accepted that girls are just unhappier about their bodies from a really ridiculously early age: in some cases, 5 years old (Davison, Markey & Birch, 2000). If someone put me on the spot to explain various variables in early problems with eating, I'd be fine. But if someone asked me - why girls? Well, I'd honestly struggle to answer based on evidence as opposed to conjecture, and that has left me disappointed in myself.

I've just realised I cited in my last post - it wasn't designed to be pretentious, honest, I'm just writing up a paper and typing here and tired and breastfeeding at the same time and it got mixed up

Wow - "preadolescent girls' body image and eating pathology" - that's a very interesting area to research in.

I guess it's nature v nurture.

Wasn't there some study on an island? (vague ) that showed after the import of American cable TV, girl's body image decreased dramatically?

Have you read <a class="break-all" href="http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20100418065544/www.homeoffice.gov.uk/documents/Sexualisation-of-young-people2835.pdf?view=Binary" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Linda Papadopoulos's Review into the Sexualisation of Young Children - good practical ideas in there for parents/society.

Also (literally) just found this amazing blog post written by a man about how men make women feel worthless. Lots in there painting a picture of how popular culture impacts (I know that's not research ).

Hey - no problems re the citing - tbh I didn't really notice - this is MN you know .

More likely to notice unreferenced claims!

When we know we have girls more effected than boys re body image/eating disorder (through empirical evidence) yet £££ not directed into researching why, I am suspicious that this is because there are not enough women out there (in academia/science/media) in positions of power SHOUTING - "OK this is serious we strongly suspect popular culture let's research that".

I guess there are many things which feminism has opened my eyes to which have previously been "explained away" by "nurture-type" arguments.

eg many rape-myths plus the whole women are better parents/women are better at cleaning etc etc!

lol, I did smile at the citation. I'm an assistant clinical psychologist so err...hi . Delusions of Gender was the second feminist book I read when I became curious recently, the first was Living Dolls which is more of an insight into modern objectification of women and the impact this has on self perceptions, even from a young age, and the impact of it on everything else really.

If you have access to journals, there are some great papers out there. I found that you can access back articles of The Feminist Review for free.

Yes, that's the Fiji islanders study. If this is a section where citations are welcome I could definitely stay .

Slight tangent ...
I've followed up a group of girls over 3 years looking at how their body image changes, in relation to measured and perceived BMI, over time. I also looked at factors that predicted increases and decreases in problematic eating behaviours e.g. restricting/disinhibiting cycles. Quite depressingly, for instance, an overwhelming majority of the eight-year-olds I worked with endorsed the sentence "you have to look good to get ahead nowadays".

I think that it's an interaction between biological and cultural factors, as you say. This is an interesting time to be studying such an interaction since we're in the realms of developmental unknowns insofar as obesity, and indeed an obesogenic environment, have never been more prevalent. As such we don't know exactly how this will affect children's food behaviours nor their self-concept.

Off to read that blog now . Thank you again for the warm welcome and book recommendations

X-posts aplenty

Dittany - I too have been wondering recently how I've not encountered more feminist thought at least in reading around the topic. I have a feeling that exploring the area properly is going to help me answer some niggling questions. Orbach duly added to amazon basket (have been meaning to read it for ages).

Msrisotto - Living Dolls is now also in my amazon basket. I have a gift voucher to spend

Thinking about myths around women being better at cleaning / cooking / similar ... I wonder whether trying to find out more about feminism is going to change how I see my relationship.

It might do
The Politics of Housework

yy those Killing Us Softly videos are fab - type "Killing Us Softly" into youtube and there are few spanning several years

Thanks for the links, killing us softly is an amazing presentation. I watched the one Dittany linked to, then the most up to date one and she barely had to change her text, just the images, nothing has changed, except the models are still working when they die of anorexia.

FNP- welcome. Nothing very useful to add except I felt that same about both the Equality Illusion and Reclaiming the F Word. They're good books, that need to exist to restate the current terrain but they didn't tell me much new. Your research sounds very interesting, so am looking forward to reading your book (once you've included your feminist lens of course)

Re the original questions you asked, the best place to read I would say is here. There's all sorts of other things I have looked at in the past, but this has the widest spread, most active and intelligent discussion.
And applying it in your own world, again hang around here. There's both discussion and application.

I'm smiling at "I wonder whether trying to find out more about feminism is going to change how I see my relationship". Welcome to a great journey.