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“Challenging norms of ‘good womanhood’ within the heteropatriarchy” - March 2022

The Young Feminist Network Newsletter

March 11, 2022

The Young Feminist Network was established in July 2020 by Everystory Sri Lanka to bring together people interested in learning more about feminism, particularly from a Sri Lankan and South Asian perspective.

This month, in the spirit of sharing our platform as a space for other women, we invited YFN member Sumini Siyambalapitiya to curate a newsletter for the Young Feminist Network, to allow her outstanding knowledge to be shared with you. This newsletter is curated on the theme of “Challenging norms of ‘good womanhood’ within the heteropatriarchy”.

Please click and drag this email to the “Primary” tab in your email interface so this newsletter won’t get lost among other promotions.

My name is Sumini and I work as a Research Assistant on the Economics team at Verité Research. My current work is within the realm of gender economics and public finance in Sri Lanka. I graduated this past year from Lafayette College in the United States with a dual degree in Mathematics/Economics and Women, Gender and Sexuality studies. I am an avid reader, tote bag wearer, lover of the sun, and fan of my cat!

For this newsletter, we will be exploring how "what it means to be a ‘good’ and ‘respectable’ woman" is defined by the patriarchy. 'Fitting in’; whether it’s to the beauty standard or middle-class ideals, is rewarded, but comes at the cost of reinforcing gendered inequalities themselves. Therefore, it is interesting and important to discuss what it means to reject these norms. My favourite section in this Newsletter is the interview with Dr. Asha Abeyasekera where she talks about her current research regarding women and security in the realm of the home and provides insight into how the cultural emotion of laejja-baya dictates the lives of girls and women in Sri Lanka.

As always, The Young Feminist Network loves to hear your thoughts and feedback, and value the complimentary and the critical equally, so please share! You can get in touch via email at [email protected]

In Solidarity,

Sumini Siyambalapitiya,

YFN Newsletter Editor - March

This reading list consists of literature that explores gender norms, roles standards through a feminist lens. It includes pieces that explore the history, how these realities manifest in the modern-day, both on a global scale and in South Asia. Finally, this reading list recommends the work of wonderful Sri Lankan women and their writing on how women across class and ethnicities have challenged and continue to subvert the gendered and classed mores imposed upon them.

Click on the link below to read this month's Reading List.

Interview Segment

Dr. Asha L. Abeyasekera is an International Fellow of Urban Studies at Royal Holloway, University of London (2022). She also served as a senior lecturer — Gender and Women’s Studies — at the Faculty of Graduate Studies, University of Colombo. Read her Interview segment on the link below.

Learning Circle Sessions

This month we will be having the brilliant Dr. Asha Abeysekara on a discussion on being a "Good Woman" - how gender norms shape our sense of self and life histories. The Learning Circle this month will take place on the 26th March at 11.30 AM. Only 25 slots are available, so register now to reserve yours. For registrations please click here.

If you want to suggest any particular topic for our Featured Speaker sessions and learning opportunities, please fill in this Google Form and let us know!

Also explore...

The Grindmill Songs Project is a unique storehouse of over 100,000 ovi – couplets sung by women in rural Maharashtra – with recordings, videos, transcripts, translations, and stories. This collection of all installments published so far on PARI speaks of the diversity and depth of this form, through which the women sing of everyday life, patriarchy, caste, poet-saints, historical events, Babasaheb Ambedkar, and more.

This blog post is a very introspective piece about contending with how identity for young women is shaped by global capitalism and patriarchy. The author very eloquently puts into words the way we impose certain identities on ourselves as a packaged product for the world to consume.

(A great example of this in pop culture is the ‘that girl’ trend on TikTok!)

This episode of the Shhh Talkshow is a nuanced conversation on how intertwined respectable femininity in Sri Lanka is with marriage. Albeit to varying degrees, women of all socio-economic classes and across the rural-urban divide, feel the cultural pressure to commit to heterosexual marriage. To stay single or childfree by choice, can often be a difficult terrain to navigate within society.

Do check out their other episodes as well - the show takes on some very culturally sensitive but relevant topics, especially related to notions of good womanhood, sex, and identity.

TikTok Pages to Follow!

Tiktok (despite all the bad rep it gets!!) is a great space to engage in feminist content. It’s a particularly great platform because not only can you learn from peers across the world in an accessible manner, but also have constructive conversations and contribute to discourse yourself. Below are two creators on the app that talk about challenging ideals of ‘good’ and ‘respectable’ femininity as defined by the patriarchy and also link and contextualise a lot of feminist ideas within popular culture.

Poetry Corner

A hauntingly beautiful poem on the ‘pretty’ versus ‘smart’ dichotomy, where women are forced to choose one or the other and shamed either way. It explores how ideas of beauty are ingrained from childhood, yet when one strives to achieve that ideal, she is ridiculed for being shallow, empty. My favorite line from the poem is ‘My vanity is insanity unless it helps get you off - and I think it captures the essence of the poem really well. This reading of the poem on TikTok is particularly poignant.

Education

FemCom has been one of DIVA and RESURJ’s feminist praxis in holding spaces with younger feminists and newcomers from the Global South attending the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW). It is a space to facilitate collective learning, joint analysis, and practice collective care for each other and with younger south feminists and newcomers participating in regional and global advocacy spaces.

The 66th session of the CSW will take place virtually between 14-25 March 2022. FemCom gatherings will begin in mid-February and run till the end of CSW66. It will accommodate different time zones and share a detailed agenda with confirmed participants soon. There will be stipends to cover data and other related costs to your participation.

Call for Papers - SLJSAS Combined Issue 2019 - 2021

For more information and guidelines on the above submission, please refer to the link below.

Paid Work Opportunities

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Details regarding this position can be found at the link below.

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For more on the Support Team, read here.

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Women, girls, and transgender/non-binary individuals who are of Sri Lankan heritage are also invited to join our Facebook group “Young Feminist Network by ESSL”

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ESSL is conscious of the ethical handling of the data we hold of our members and their privacy. In order to respect the feminist values through which we try to shape our day-to-day work and the vetting we carry out of all information and opportunities we send out, we ask that members please refrain from directly emailing the YFN mailing list or using the reply all feature.

If you do have any information which might be of interest to the Network, please send it across to the ESSL team so we share it via appropriate channels.

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