WOMEN'S ROLES IN FILM, HISTORY, AND LITERATURE

"It's been a few years since I've checked in with The Bechdel Test for Women in Movies so I thought it would be a good time to look in on Hollywood and see if there's been any substantial improvement in women's representations on the big screen. In this updated video, I go through the 2011 films nominated for Best Picture at the 84th annual Academy Awards and see how they measure up to the Bechdel Test. Keep watching because I also propose a small addendum to help clarify the spirit of the test and provide a solution on how Hollywood can fix the glaring problem that the Bechdel Test exposes. I'll also address the question, "What about the reverse test?" and I'll show an alternative test that has been adapted by critics to identify the presence of people of colour in films. Sprinkled throughout this video I offer a few movie recommendations."

Women's stories not being told is a problem everywhere. Whether you look at our history books or the literature books we're required to read in school growing up, they're all about men and boys and their journey. Women have accomplished a lot of remarkable achievements under the patriarchy, despite the fact we have had zero rights. However, all of these achievements have either been excluded from our history books, or the credit of them has been given to men.

For instance my thesis for my Communications degree (I was a double major) was all about Einstein's wife Mileva. She was this incredible woman who was a very talented mathematician. She was the only woman in the university with Einstein, and was always at the top of the class. While it's unclear if she was the person who actually came up with the theory of relativity or if it was a joint effort (they often worked on everything together) it is clear that at the very least it was an equal effort. Although, I argued she was the one who came up with everything, because he never accomplished anything great after they were no longer together (he left her so that he could marry his 18 year old first cousin, yes cousin, he was a psycho!) and when you look at his history of male privilege, versus hers of being a woman who was a pioneer for her time, it becomes clear who should be a household name. Her story is amazing, but he stole everything from her, and than all the documents that had her name on it, (they signed the bottom of their work) were either destroyed or have convinentely disappeared. All so that they can continue to give Einstein credit for a bunch of stuff he clearly didn't do. Because if the documents prove that he was the only person involved, than why would they destroy or hide them? The point is that men have stolen so much from us, but the truth will come out, because it always does!

I think this is why I never want to hear another man speak again. I've grown up being saturated in boy world and I just want you guys to disappear and never have to hear another story or see another film about a man's journey. It's definitely made me abhor anything and everything that's male.

TEACHING FEMINISM IN THE CLASSROOM CHANGES EVERYTHING!

"Girls are already so overwhelmed with all of the classics written by (and for) dead, white men. They encounter important heros in literature such as Guy Montag, Holden Caulfield, and Jay Gatsby to name a few. They also encounter their helpless and often short-lived female counterparts who generally serve to inspire or otherwise drive the male hero of the story with no true agency themselves. While these books are important for students to read, if we don’t counter the images of women we show young female students in literature, we risk sending the message that women aren’t good for much besides inspiring men."

I want to expand on this a bit, and say that I don't think being an inspiration is necessarily a bad thing, I think the problem comes when we are just designated to being these sort of side characters in the male populations world. And in this case art definitely reflects life, because that is how we're treated all the time. That we only exist for the purpose of men, and not as our own unique beings. I think if a woman inspires a man, than she should be the center of attention, and he should be on the sideline. I also think that we just need to be given the spotlight and have our stories, our accomplishments throughout history, and books that we've written be the center of topic for everyone. This will inspire the next generation of girls, and send an important message to boys that we are important too!

The above quote is from the first article below, and the other link is from an article written by the same author, and the last link is about including women's stories in hollywood films :

http://www.care2.com/causes/teaching-feminism-summer-reading-girls-vs-boys.html

http://www.care2.com/causes/teaching-feminism-why-should-we.html

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