Atlantis: Critical Studies in Gender, Culture & Social Justice

Reflections from “Revisioning Feminist Engagements with Madness”

2024-01-05T14:38:03-04:00

This commentary builds on my presentation in the panel “Revisioning Feminist Engagements with Madness” at the 2023 Women’s, Gender, and Social Justice annual conference. In doing so, this piece grapples with several debates surrounding the stigmatized psychiatric label of “borderline personality disorder (BPD).” While feminists have long called for the diagnosis to be removed or replaced, Mad-affirmative scholars are reconceptualizing borderline as a cluster of insightful experiences and psychocentric activists are trying to destigmatize and raise awareness about “BPD.” The latter two efforts are very different from each other, yet both seem to be located in white, globally elite spaces. This piece suggests that we can learn from other reclamation movements that, co-opted by the colonial state and neoliberal market, have mainly benefited elites, and thus cautions against any attempt to universally reclaim, reject, or reconceptualize borderline. That is, rather than unpacking what borderline really is or should mean, this piece asks what borderline does, for whom, in which contexts, and towards what ends. Drawing from Gilles Deleuze’s ethological method and Jasbir Puar’s work on debility and capacity, this article acknowledges the socio-political patterns of borderline, as well as the broader systems we might be serving in our seemingly progressive discourses.

“I’m not discriminating against you, but…”

2023-07-03T16:02:53-03:00

In this paper, I use an autoethnographic approach to explore the fertility processes I underwent and the difficulties I had in accessing fertility services in an effort to get pregnant as a fat single mother by choice. Here, I outline my experiences at two different fertility clinics, one of which denied me care based on my fatness. I reflect on the difficulties of accessing fertility services as a fat woman, and indeed how fat women are viewed as risky bodies to be deterred from motherhood. I conclude this paper by situating the joyous delivery of my son against the backdrop of being “high risk.”

Gendered Emotional Labour in Academia

2023-08-31T23:15:19-03:00

The authors share their reflections in the aftermath of the roundtable Emotional Labour in Academia that took place during the Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes (WGSRF) 2023 conference. Although each participant at the roundtable had a unique positionality, they had experiences to share as women in academia who desire to do their work well without exhausting themselves in the process. This paper does not restate all that was said during the roundtable event but shares what we have learned collectively and individually and further expresses the authors’ desire for more discussion on similar topics wherein we learn with and from each other about how to foster spaces of care and solidarity with one another.

Relational Practices in Arts-Based Research

2024-06-26T17:09:13-03:00

Fostering Dialogues was an arts-based action research project that brought together LGBTQ+ older adults and homecare personal support workers in a virtual arts and dialogue program to explore presents and futures of community-based care. In this Research Note the artist and researcher team reflect on the researcher-artist relationship and arts-based collaboration, touching on topics including community engagement, horizontal decision-making, and the power of images to affect change.

The Feminist XResistance Project

2024-01-08T21:14:22-04:00

On May 31, 2023, we showcased the Feminist XResistance project at the Women and Gender Studies et Recherches Féministes (WGSRF) conference under the apt thematic “Take Back the Future.” The project started on July 9, 2022, when a group of international, interdisciplinary, early career feminist scholars convened on Zoom for the Feminist Digital Methods (FDM) Drop-in Virtual Lab hosted by York University’s Centre for Feminist Research (CFR). The drop-in took place two weeks after the United States Supreme Court overturned the constitutional right to an abortion and became a digital space to express our fears and anger over rising gender essentialist fascism, worries about the future, and to imagine feminist digital methods for resistance. In this reflection and commentary, we share our observations and processes for the Feminist XResistance project, starting with our first exploratory workshop, our co-creative analysis and outputs, the development of our AR installation, and, finally, our conclusions and insights.

Take Back the Future: 2023 Women’s, Gender, Social Justice Association (formerly Women’s and Gender Studies et Recherches Feministes) Conference

2024-10-22T12:02:02-03:00

Discourses of Disavowal

2023-08-25T17:45:10-03:00

This article undertakes a critical examination of prevailing discourses circulated by public authorities and the media during the weeks and months following three instances of Black women and girls being strip-searched by police in Canada: Audrey Smith in Toronto in 1993, three unnamed Black girls in Halifax in 1995, and Stacy Bonds in Ottawa in 2008. By focusing on three primary discourses of disavowal evident in both media accounts and legal records of these cases, this article sheds light on how collusion among the Canadian state, the criminal justice system, and the media culminate in narratives that re-install the national myth of Canada as a benevolent nation. Ultimately, the paper argues that the violence of the strip-search is naturalized through the disavowal of gendered anti-Black violence and liberal discourses of reform are upheld.

The Poverty Police

2023-08-20T09:21:04-03:00

This paper argues for forming a working group composed of peoples with intersectional, lived experiences of homelessness. The purpose of this group is to consult on implementing the recommendations made to York University Security Services (YSS) by an expert review panel, submitted in December of 2022 in Toronto, Canada. This paper also argues against empowering YSS with the Special Constable provision of the Comprehensive Ontario Police Services Act—a central matter under discussion by the expert review panel. Grounded theory and critical discourse analysis are used in this paper to observe YSS “incident summaries,” published on YSS’s Community Safety webpage, in conjunction with an analysis of the 2022 York University Security Services Review: Final Report. The findings reported in this paper include an approximate 43% overall interaction rate between unhoused people and YSS on the York University campus and a poverty-to-criminalisation pipeline leading to the arrest of unhoused people by Toronto police. These findings give reason to reject empowering YSS with the Special Constable provision. These findings also give reason to consult peoples with intersectional, lived experiences of homelessness on policing and police-proxies, such as YSS.

Invisiblizing Trans Homelessness

2023-08-31T11:09:39-03:00

Municipalities in Canada routinely count unhoused populations to inform policy and services. By examining 165 English Canadian municipal homeless count reports, this article explores how trans, Two Spirit, and nonbinary (T2SNB) people, and sex and gender more broadly, are constructed. Homelessness is prefigured as cis within and through the counting and reporting methodology and text. In subsequent counts, homeless services—including new and revamped services based on prior counts—are used to locate homeless people to count thus intensifying the construction of and further prefiguring cis homelessness. The gender binary is both overtly and subtly upheld through these reports in many municipalities. It is argued that there can be substantial material consequences for the invisibilization and misrepresentation of T2SNB people that can impact available services and housing.

"Shared and Collective Stress"

2023-08-28T15:40:09-03:00

The confluence of increased demand for mental health services and decreased resources due to the COVID-19 pandemic has created multiple challenges for mental healthcare and social service providers. 2SLGBTQI service providers may be disproportionately impacted by pandemic-related challenges, such as psychological distress, vicarious traumatization, and burnout. However, there are significant knowledge gaps regarding the needs and experiences of 2SLGBTQI and allied service providers in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. To address these gaps, we conducted a national survey (N = 304), eight semi-structured focus groups, and five semi-structured interviews (N = 61) with 2SLGBTQI care seekers and service providers across Canada. Based on data from the 106 2SLGBTQI service providers and 3 allied service providers who took part in these research activities, this paper explores the challenges service providers encounter when providing care to 2SLGBTQI individuals as well as their adaptive responses to these challenges. Understanding the experiences of service providers who share lived experiences of discrimination and marginalization with their clients is critical to addressing barriers to affirming mental healthcare, shifting services to meet the evolving needs of both care seekers and providers, and developing upstream, comprehensive solutions to address the causes of 2SLGBTQI mental health disparities.

Taking Back Curriculum

2023-06-19T11:30:27-03:00

This paper maps key factors that activate adult stakeholders in Ontario to support curriculum pertaining to consent and non-violence in K-12 education. The paper draws from a study that used three qualitative approaches: (1) the design of an original media literacy curriculum module for Ontario youth ages 13-15; (2) curriculum assessment of the module by diverse stakeholders in Ontario K-12 education (n=20); and (3) analysis of archival documents pertaining to consent education and media literacy in Ontario, including official curriculum and media reports. Four key factors united stakeholders in supporting K-12 curriculum pertaining to consent and non-violence in Ontario. Firstly, stakeholders are intrigued by media-based pedagogies that can facilitate consent education that is “culturally relevant” (Ladson-Billings 1994; 1995) for diverse learners in Ontario. Stakeholders are also more likely to support consent and violence prevention initiatives if accompanied by professional development and teaching tools. Educator collectives and political organizing also allow for more feminist and social-justice pedagogies in the classroom, including consent education. Finally, parent councils and community groups are essential places for activism and knowledge sharing that can meet the needs of community members, while addressing stakeholders’ attitudes and behaviours that gatekeep violence prevention initiatives in education.

The Subjectivity and Futurity of the Asian Canadian Woman

2023-07-12T17:36:56-03:00

This article asserts that subjectivity and futurity are critical sites of contestation between Asian Canadian women and the nation-state of Canada. It draws on primary research involving Asian Canadian women in the spring of 2022: a participant observation of a Canadian citizenship ceremony held virtually during Asian Heritage Month and an interview with Ellen (pseudonym), a member of the Asian Canadian Women’s Alliance. First, in my analysis of the citizenship ceremony, I argue that the figure of the Asian Canadian woman is bound to her allegiance to the nation-state. In the ceremony, discourses of Canadian multiculturalism and the model minority myth are conjoined and pronounced. Second, turning to my interview with Ellen and to instances of resistance by Asian Canadian women during the citizenship ceremony, I argue that Asian Canadian women confront Canadian nation-building and the model minority myth through their articulations and utterances of diversity, feminisms, and decolonization. With Asian Canadian women working to take back their futures from Canada, I propose that possibilities for collective and decolonial futures with Indigenous Peoples can also be imagined.

What Girls Want

2024-03-12T15:53:03-03:00

This paper is a critical reflection on the fieldwork and analysis stage of my dissertation project on activist girls. My project explores how an intergenerational lens can be critically applied to the actions and motivations of activist girls and asks how contemporary girls negotiate and feel about their activism, their relationships with their mothers and communities, and their imaginings for a feminist future. Between 2021 and 2022, I conducted semi-structured in-depth interviews with ten activist girls (aged 11-20) and their mothers/mother figures in a series of one-on-one and paired interviews. In this paper, I reflect on the affective landscape that emerged when interviewing girls, not only about their mothers but also with their mothers, and what this methodology might offer to the field of girls’ studies. I engage with how daughters and mothers negotiate, express, and sometimes struggle to articulate their desires for the future and their relationship in the context of the paired interviews and how both the subject matter and method of this study posed challenges for me as a researcher.

“We’re less noticeable to people”

2023-08-21T17:12:19-03:00

In recent years, there has been significant attention paid to girls who are engaged in activism. When we look at who has been recognized for their activism, however, mainstream exposure to girl activists has primarily included teenagers and youth. Girls of the tweenhood age, for example, are also engaged in activism but their efforts go largely unnoticed or face patronization. Instead of being taken seriously, the activism of many tween girls is: (1) clouded by the constructed inherent innocence of childhood, (2) entangled with the construction of (white) tween girlhood as a time of frivolity and fun, and (3) marginalized due to the adult-centric nature of citizenship in Canada and the United States. As the very structures that would traditionally allow for adults to make their voices heard are not designed for the equitable participation of children, tween girls are required to participate in creative ways. This article, therefore, frames tween girls’ activism as citizenship and offers opportunities to both reconsider and validate these varied activist practices as legitimate democratic participation. Tween girls are already shaping their social, cultural, and political worlds, asserting that they belong and deserve to be seen, heard, and taken seriously. The lenses of societal and feminist responses need to be reoriented and refocused to see it.

Body Modification as Body Art

2023-08-08T12:21:06-03:00

In this article, I discuss my “anti-aging” body modification practices as body art. The art documents my bodybuilding programs, self-administered neurotoxin (Botox) injections, and skin resurfacing treatments. Susan Pickard (2020) argues that femininity and aging are associated with the abject. She maps the abject and non-abject onto Simone de Beauvoir’s distinction between immanence and transcendence. Because “abjection should always be understood as an element of [...] oppression” (Pickard 2020, 159), my art practice could be read as an anti-feminist, ageist attempt to expel the abject. After offering a counter-argument that positions my practice as feminist, I use Kathy Acker’s (1993) writing on bodybuilding to offer a third reading. Muscles grow when they are worked until failure. This practice of constantly coming up against the body’s limits is a rehearsal for the ultimate failure of the body: death (Acker 1993). If thanatology is the study of death and dying, bodybuilding is autothanatology. My “anti-aging” interventions are similar; they are inevitable failures that cannot stop the aging process. In this way, my practice is a reminder that the body exists in a state of immanence, even while I may attempt to frame my immanence along transcendental terms.

The Bar Butch in the Attic

2023-08-29T19:21:31-03:00

In an analysis of Jane Rule’s “In the Attic of the House” from her 1981 anthology Outlander, this article examines how Rule uses both the figure of the lesbian and the figure of the ghost to demonstrate the complex, temporal relationship between two lesbian generations in Canada in the late 1970s and the early 1980s. Rule’s “In the Attic of the House” follows an older butch lesbian, Alice, as she is haunted by both the unseen apparition of her dead, once closeted, femme lover and by the presence of younger lesbian feminists in the main floor of the house who begin to consume and rewrite Alice’s queer past. In analyzing three types of social hauntings within this short story, this article draws on both Avery Gordon’s theories of hauntology and Heather Love’s queer theory of “feeling backwards” to imagine how lesbian-feminists in 1970s-80s Canada conducted a “backward” haunting of femme-butch lesbian elders, hailing from the culture of the lesbian working-class bar. By drawing parallels between Rule’s short fiction and the real, historical events of lesbian communities in Canada, this article seeks to recenter the erasures (i.e., the ghostings) and the (in)visbilities of lesbian existence and embodiment in Canada. This paper ultimately analyzes how Rule as author calls upon her readers to consider and contemplate the historical tensions and intimacies between butch-femme elders of lesbian bar culture and the emerging lesbian-feminist collectives in the early 1980s.

Feminist Things Rooted in Grief

2024-07-02T13:42:25-03:00

future forgetting fragments

2024-06-11T21:09:04-03:00