Sexual Socialization for Good Girls

A recent conversation gave me the courage to share this older post more publicly... these are my experiences with socialization about sex.  I don't mean to imply that they apply to all women, or all LDS women.  Just sharing MY experiences.

So, I'm a pissed off woman, and here's why.

Sex has been on my mind a lot lately. Not just in the way that it's on everyone's mind, I mean.  I'm really thinking a lot about my own sexual development as a woman and how that is informed by the culture and subcultures that I move in.  While this is a vulnerable topic to me, and something I've been socialized to never talk about, I think it's important that these conversations happen and I think the taboo about discussing sex sometimes sets us up for a lot of problems.  So I'm about to get really personal here.

This is a timely topic of discussion given the hullabaloo over the GOP definition of rape as "forcible rape" exclusively. (See http://www.everydaycitizen.com/2011/02/defining_and_redefining_rape.html) But it's not so much that controversy that I want to focus on. It's more the lived experience: mine and some of the women I know.

As a therapist, it's fairly frequent that I talk to a woman who has been sexually assaulted. It's even more often that I talk to a woman who has had a painful sexual experience that has impacted her negatively, but doesn't know whether to call it rape/sexual assault or not. Often these women had painful first experiences with sex as young girls, and have suffered emotionally. Their relationships and sex lives have been impacted, their ability to enjoy their own sexuality greatly diminished, and their self-esteem has plummeted. Yet, they aren't sure about how to label the experiences they've had.  Often what I hear is that they didn't want to have sex, but "gave in" after a lot of coercion on the part of the men they had sex with.

Coercion (pronounced /koʊˈɜrʃən/) is the practice of forcing another party to behave in an involuntary manner (whether through action or inaction) by use of threats, rewards, or intimidation or some other form of pressure or force. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coercion).

I also often hear that at first they consented to some part of the sexual activity, but then said "stop" (or, more often, "stop... please stop.... please, please stop..." sometimes through cries of pain and tears) and their partner did not stop.  Other times, I hear about women and men getting drunk together, and the man taking advantage after the woman passes out or while she's too drunk to even attempt to stop him.

I consider myself a relatively strong woman.  On most things, I can pretty much hold my own.  But, like so many women, I've had painful experiences in my own personal life regarding sex that have caused me to reflect on the socialization that I've received as a woman.

For as long as I can remember, I've felt that the defining feature of my value as a human being was how my sexuality could be used to the satisfaction of a man.  Was I pretty enough? Curvy enough? Were my breasts large enough? Was I thin enough?  Seductive enough?  My lips pouty enough? Before my intellect, my spirituality, my kindness, my strength.... any other aspect of my being was considered, the measure of my worth in life was all about how ripe for exploitation I was.  The best compliment I can ever receive, I've been taught, is that I'm sexy.

I was also taught as a young woman in the LDS (Mormon) church that I had to be a virgin until marriage, and that if I wasn't, I was responsible pretty much regardless of how that happened.  I was taught that if I made out with a boy and let it go "too far," he would reach a point where he was physically incapable of stopping and therefore, it was always MY job to make sure that we stopped in time before he would be unable to control himself.  From this, I learned to fear men because I expected them to be out of control of their sexual behavior.  I also learned to accept responsibility for whatever they might do.

I was told that if I ever drank alcohol (a big no-no in the LDS church), that I could more or less expect to be raped, and that I would deserve it if I was.  From this I learned that drinking safely and in moderation is never possible, and also that drinking means giving men permission to rape me.  Tell me that's a healthy message!

I was also taught that if I ever showed a little cleavage (and by the way, try NEVER showing cleavage when you wear a DD!), that I was responsible for it if men ogled me, if they thought dirty thoughts about me, and if they raped me.  So not only could I be to blame if I was victimized, I could also be blamed for stealing some man's innocence and ruining his chances at heaven merely because my neckline was too low or my skirt too short.  Please!

 

Here are some other related quotes from church literature (listen to this podcast for a little more info from the perspective of a young women's leader/feminist in the church http://mormonstories.org/?p=1368)










This lovely gem on the left supposes that we have the ability to fight off a man, which sometimes we just physically don't.  And it supposes that we're better off dead than raped.  Really?  We risk getting ourselves killed when we're being forcibly raped, so that God won't BLAME US for "cooperating" with someone much bigger and stronger than we are?









Oh, but don't worry ladies, because if you are to blame for having been raped, there will be a priesthood leader (read: MAN) who will assess the situation for you and determine to what degree it's your fault, and help you repent.

I also have had a lot of experiences throughout my life in which I've felt like a piece of meat.  I know that phrase is a bit trite, but I relate to it wholeheartedly.  I remember when I was a 16 year-old virgin (I had never even kissed a man) and my 40-something supervisor constantly commented on my body or my clothes, and twisted everything I said into a sexual joke of some sort.  When this sexual harassment culminated in him first spanking my ass while I was washing dishes, then later sticking his hand down the back of my pants (all the way down them) to put a tip left for me by one of the waitresses there.

I was really uncomfortable, embarassed, and creeped out, but knew that if I said anything about it, I'd be further embarassed when people told me I was "making a big deal of it."  That turned out to be true: that when I did speak up, I was essentially told "what's the big deal?" and that I was being too sensitive.  When one of my friends told her mother about it, and her mother reported it to child protective services, I felt so much guilt for the possibility of getting that man in trouble that I lied and said it didn't happen that way.  He didn't get in trouble because of my lie. And HE was the one angry at ME because the report was made...

like a good little girl, I apologized to him.  


Some of the women in my life discouraged me from being truthful about what happened primarily because they wanted to protect me.  They believed that speaking up about it would have led to others viewing me suspiciously.  Questioning whether what happened really happened, whether I did something to bring it on, whether I deserved it.  And that was just a case of sexual harassment.  It wasn't even rape.

During my first year of college, I met a guy who flirted with me by trapping me, essentially.  Pinning me down and holding my arms so I couldn't move while he whispered in French to me, or tickled or breathed heavily on my neck.  I found it really confusing because it did turn me on, but at the same time it felt unsafe and I felt powerless.  He was much stronger than me and I felt that he could trap me and do anything that he wanted.  Although I was turned on by it, I was afraid of it.  I barely knew this guy and I didn't have enough trust with him to feel safe with him on top of me, pinning me down.  It wasn't welcome.  But I didn't want to make a big deal out of it, so I didn't.

It was a lesson in what it meant to feel completely at the mercy of a man, in a sexual way (I'd already experienced being at the mercy of a man's violence).  I felt demeaned, humiliated. I had no right to define the boundaries of my own body.


By the time I lost my virginity, I knew that several of the women closest to me had been forcibly raped (like, bruised, bleeding bodies and date rape drugs raped).  So my experiences are very, very mild in comparison.

I had heard about their terror, their nightmares, their feeling of not being safe even in their own beds.  I knew the stories about doctors, friends, family, and people who were supposed to be their support systems doubting them and blaming them.  I was lucky and I knew it was just that.  Luck.  I could easily have been them and I was scared and confused about sex.  I had a new boyfriend with a lot more sexual experience, and a dogged determination.  He pressured me.  Asked me to spend the night, but promised he wouldn't pressure me for sex, then did. He pushed the boundaries just a little at a time, did things just a little longer after I'd said no.  Did just a little more than he had permission to do.  Ultimately, I had sex long before I was ready.  I didn't want it yet.  I didn't trust him yet. And I wasn't even turned on enough yet, so it was really, really painful. I curled up in a ball afterward and cried, and neither one of us really understood why. That's not how I wanted my first experiences with sex to be.

I'm not sure if this man meant to violate my boundaries.  That's the part of it that's confusing.  I think men are socialized into believing that it's their job to persuade us, because when we're resisting, we're actually just being coy and flirtatious and really we want it. I think men are taught that just because we can experience physical pleasure when our boundaries are violated, that means it's ultimately okay.

"She said no but I know it's on tonight" 


"Your mind says no, but your body says yes. And I'm gonna give your body what it wants and leave you fully blissed"
~Pitbull, Call of the Wild



99% of my experiences with sex have not been positive, fully consensual, and non-painful experiences .  And I'm pissed off about that!

The Birth of Venus

This is a post from last summer on my personal blog that I felt like I wanted to share with my feminist friends!

I had a conversation with a guy friend of mine recently, who surprised me when he said that I seem to be a woman very in charge of my sexuality.  There is probably some truth to that now, but the opposite has been true for most of my life.  I've grow up with the misconception that my sexuality exists for the benefit of others, and that misconception definitely played out in my first relationship experiences.

Now, don't get me wrong.  I love being the goddess of someone else's fantasies.  Who doesn't?  It makes me feel sexy and desirable. 

And yet....

I have historically been very much afraid and hesitant to let others know who I really was as a sexual or even relational being.  When I didn't like something.  When I wanted more of something. When their fantasy of me did not match the reality of who I am.  If I didn't like what they were saying, and didn't encourage and indulge their fantasy then I wasn't fulfilling my role as a woman, right?  That has led to me enduring some rather boring, un-stimulating conversations... and touches.  

No more, my friends.

I should have been taught that it's okay to not like someone's sexual representation of me.  It's okay to have my own sexuality.  

With all the dating I've been doing recently, I've had abundant opportunities to practice this.  Saying no.  Identifying what I'm open to, and what I'm not up for: the who, what, how, when, and why... has been a gratifying exercise in self-love.  Here's a recent example that incorporates the intersection of a couple of identities of mine that people love to objectify: my ethnicity and my gender.

During the course of a rather delicious make-out, man-in-question called me Pocahontas.  What. The. Fuck.  Talk about killing any shred of desire I had for him.  Later, he sent me an email with the following youtube vid:

  

If any of you out there were wondering how to go about seducing me, fetishizing my Indianness is definitely NOT the way to go. Also, sending me a song that refers to an Indian woman as a squaw, not a great move.

This guy is actually a very nice guy and well-intentioned, just ill-informed, as many white folks are.  It's not necessarily his fault. Still, he had asked for my response to the song.  So I gave it.  Here's my response:

It seems to me like your intent was to connect with me, and show appreciation of my culture.  I appreciate that about you, and I appreciate your kind heart.  At the same time, it's not really comfortable for me when you bring up all the Indian stuff...

As an Indian woman, one of my fears is being seen as "exotic".  I get sick to my stomach when I see images like this (which I've seen all my life): 

They don't have anything to do with who I am, and they don't have anything to do with who Pocahontas was. I don't want to be some guy's fantasy of being with an Indian woman, because that reduces me to a stereotype and doesn't make room for my whole personhood.  It objectifies my Indian identity, which is a part of me that is very complex, deeply personal, and for me (and many of us!) riddled with mixed feelings and pain and loss.  Pocahontas is a sore subject for me because of the way Americans have twisted her story to fit a white man's sexual fantasy about Indian women.  She was 14 years old when she met John Smith, who was a grown man.  There was never any trace of a sexual relationship with him, AT ALL. The story is twisted and messed up in the way it's presented, objectifying Pocahontas.  Also, the fantasy of how she introduces John Smith into the idyllic world of the "noble savage" bothers me, too.  It's like Dances with Wolves or Avatar.  White Americans love to fantasize about the white man who wins the heart of the sex pot Indian woman, and then gets "adopted" as an Indian and becomes some hero and honorary member of a tribe.  

Also, the word squaw is a pejorative word referring to a woman's vagina.  Basically, calling an Indian woman that is like calling a white woman a cunt.

I don't want to be the canvas onto which White people project their guilt, or their fascination / idealization / romanticizing of Indian culture.  It's pretty common to meet people with new age sort of spiritual interests that get really fascinated about Indian stuff, and sometimes over-identify with it in my opinion.  I think it's well-intentioned, but represents another form of colonization. It isn't respectful...

In case you're wondering, writing that took some serious ovaries.  =P 

 It's one example of the experiences I've had recently that have blessed me with the opportunity to take care of myself.... to be a strong woman.  

This is my birth as a sensual, sexual, relational woman in charge of her own experiences.  Since I'm a true Pisces, I like to think of it as the birth of Venus...  born from the deep water of my own spirituality, my very own brand of womanness, my core.  

I won't be colonized.  I won't be objectified.  I won't be patronized.  

"talk to me now" by Ani DiFranco

he said ani, you've gotten tough
'cause my tone was curt
yeah, and when i'm approached in a dark alley
i don't lift my skirt
in this city
self-preservation
is a full time occupation
i'm determined
to survive on these shores
i don't avert my eyes anymore
in a man's world
i am a woman by birth
and after nineteen times around i have found
they will stop at nothing once they know what you are worth
talk to me now
i played the powerless
in too many dark scenes
and i was blessed with a birth and a death
and i guess i just want some say in between
don't you understand
in the day to day
in the face to face
i have to act
just as strong as i can
just to preserve a place
where i can be who i am
so if you still know how
talk to me now

Plastic Shamanism

This week's topic in my feminist theories class was Indigenous Feminism.  In one of the readings, Anna Louise Keating refers to "Plastic Shamanism, which she explains by citing the discussion by Aldred (2000) of "commercial exploitation of indigenous spiritual traditions."  The author explores whether the work of a noted Native American feminist sharing of various Native traditions and stories in her books and other writings represents this kind of exploitation of indigenous spirituality.  I found myself very drawn to the question of whether this was Plastic Shamanism because this is a question I find myself asking all the time.

I grew up in Salina, Utah.  I was not raised as part of a tribal community.  The only kind of spirituality I was raised to understand was the LDS (Mormon) religion, and LDS religious ordinances were the only kind of ceremony I knew.  At the same time, I had a strong sense of myself as being Native American primarily because I heard many messages from the White people that surrounded me about their view of me as "other than White."  Salina is a tiny community and most people who knew me, also knew that my father is a dark-skinned man who grew up on the Turtle Mountain Chippewa reservation in Belcourt, North Dakota. And so, I experienced myself as Native American in contrast to the white community that surrounded me, in spite of not belonging to a tribal community.  This experience of myself as Native has morphed in many directions over time, and actually in some ways I see it as problematic for me to identify that way- though in some ways I don't (all fodder for discussion in another post or series of posts, probably).  

At any rate, all my life I have been bombarded with messages about what it is supposed to mean for me to identify myself as Native.  Very frequently, when a non-Indian person learns that I identify myself as Native American, this seems to conjure up all sorts of imaginings about who I am.  How do I know this?  Because many people have been very eager to tell me all about their imaginings. In this post, I'll stick to the exploration of one such story.  

A past supervisor of mine was one of those non-Indian people (to be specific, a middle class straight White American male) eager to share with me his image of who an Indian is.  He told me all about a vision quest he had been on and how it made him aware of the existence of spirits.  He was very excited about this experience and shared it in a way that suggested to me that he thought it would be a source of bonding for us.  But for me, I felt offended on so many levels I did not know where to begin to address it.  Even now as I try to write about this, I feel like there are so many layers to peel back it is difficult to be concise or even organized.  

Here's the thing.  As I experience it, there were several assumptions he made in that interaction:

1. That my religious or spiritual beliefs, or cultural practices, were traditional Native American.
2. That traditional Native American is a 'thing.'  In other words, there is a generic Native American spirituality, and it includes vision quests.
3. That, as a Native American, I would identify with or understand a vision quest.
4. That I would be comfortable discussing a Native religious or spiritual ceremony with my supervisor.
5. That I would be okay with a White person (my supervisor) participating in such a ceremony AND subsequently sharing details about it with others.

Those are a lot of assumptions, all of which seem to me to be false.  I will say that, going back to my own history, I have not been raised with knowledge of traditional Native American beliefs.  Therefore, I am not particularly qualified to evaluate the authenticity of my supervisor's vision quest.  But I have listened as much as possible.  I have listened to White people and Native people.  I have filtered in the media, and I have read books (some by White people and some by Native people).  I have participated in ceremony led by Natives who WERE raised in a tribal community context.  I have received a little bit of education, and what I have learned is this...

Historically, Native spiritual beliefs have been subject to the forces of colonization in much the same way Native lives and bodies have been.  There is so much I could say about this, but in the interest of time, I'll say that if you want to know more, comment below and I'll talk to you about it or connect you with resources.  The environment was made hostile for the continuation of Native traditions, and the people were devastated with the loss of sacred lands that were central to the practice of ceremony, the loss of so many lives, the destruction of culture and tradition through the boarding school system, the illegalization of Native religious practices through the Dawes Act, the disconnection of the young from the old, the introduction of disease and alcoholism and PTSD and homelessness and hopelessness... and as a result less and less of the Indian people were raised with a true understanding of the Indigenous knowledge of their tribes and families.  But in the 60's and especially in the 70's, there became a resurgence of interest.  Some of that interest came from within Native communities, such as with some segments of AIM (the American Indian Movement) for example.  But some of that interest came from White America.  Since then, White America seems to have found a fascination with Indigenous belief systems.  Information gets shared, gets twisted, gets adapted and a whole industry has been built around selling indigenous culture... or at least what would appear to be indigenous culture.  There are many frauds and much misinformation out there, and I encounter it all the time.    When a friend tells me she's really into Native spirituality, which is why she bought Native tarot cards at Borders.  Or a brand new acquaintance who knows nothing of my history or religious beliefs asks me to take her to a sweat lodge.  I could make an entire blog out of just listing experiences, telling these stories just within my own life.  Probably most people who identify as Native could.  In fact, hey, here's a blog about Native appropriations.

It creates a situation in which this really disconnected, messed up, stereotype about Native spirituality is out there, being perpetuated and "embraced" and practiced by all kinds of people.  I find this frustrating, as a Native-identified woman not raised within a clear tradition and with the generations-old knowledge about Who We Are surrounding me.  It stirs up all kinds of mixed feelings about whether should, and can, learn about that part of my heritage.  Trying to learn that traditional knowledge if you have not been rooted in it requires sifting through a lot of garbage to know whom you can trust and what is real.  As a mostly-White (blood quantum-wise as well as in terms of the way I was raised) person, is my attempt to understand that history just another appropriation?  But then, I had no choice about how I was raised or how my family line has incorporated both White Americans and Natives.  Many of us have been forcefully cut off from that traditional knowledge, tribal life, and family line.  I have, and I grieve that just about every day.  I yearn to know more what is real, and where I come from.  I feel like it is a part of who I am, and I'm angry about the destruction and even more angry about the appropriation and false representations I encounter continually.  It all hurts my heart, and raises so many feelings of injustice and and loss, despair and insult.  

"Who's Got My Back Now?" by Creed

run, hide

all that was sacred to us, sacred to us

see the signs, the covenant has been broken by mankind

leaving us with no shoulder, with no shoulder 

to rest our head on

to rest our head on

to rest our head on

who's got my back now

when all we have left is deceptive, so disconnected

what is the truth now?

there's still time

all that has been devastated

can be recreated, realized

we pick up the broken pieces

of our lives

giving ourselves to each other, ourselves to each other

to rest our head on

to rest our head on

to rest our head on

But how does my yearning to know distinguish me from hipsters who go on these vision quests and wear their fake head dresses, completely disconnected from community and context?  How can I live in such a way that is neither rejecting my heritage nor appropriating what is NOT mine, like every other person out there seeking out the Plastic Shaman? 

I feel like I have to dodge and duck, and constantly re-evaluate and question in order to avoid being duped.  I feel like I have to exert conscious effort to understand, anticipate, and explain myself in order to resist that image of the earthy spiritual guru that so many people seem to want to project onto me, not taking into consideration my context, no matter how much I urge them to.  

And all I really want to do is know myself.

The Starvation of Venus

An Italian model named Anna Utopia Giordano used photoshop to alter the famous paintings of Venus an update, making the models' bodies fit today's standards of beauty for models.  Artists' work Utopia altered included Botticelli (The Birth of Venus) and others  (Hayez, Tiziano, Westal Richard, to name a few).

I think I have been as strongly influenced by today's standards for beauty as anyone else.  Even though my body is large and soft and curvy... and even though I fancy myself a feminist... I still tend to believe that very, very thin women are the most attractive and I still compare myself- as well as your average woman- to that body type and find us all wanting.

However...

The contrast in these pictures highlighted for me the beauty of the original models' curves.  I was delighted to realize that I thought the women in the originals looked so much healthier, and much more attractive.  I love that this project was done!  What do you think?

The Dancing Bug

In my feminist theories class, one of the feminist theories we have discussed is ecofeminism.

"Ecofeminists highlight the multiple ways in which human beings oppress each other, but these theorists also focus on human beings' domination of the nonhuman world, or nature... [which is] shaped by an oppressive patriarchal conceptual framework, the purpose of which is to explain, justify, and maintain relationships of domination and subordination"

This is a comic I got a long time ago from my social psychology class as an undergraduate... I think it's an interesting illustration of part of that hierarchy that ecofeminism critiques...

Chatty Cathy

I'm a chatty cathy.  Most anyone who knows me, know that speaking up comes pretty easily to me.  In fact, I often struggle with resisting the impulse to think out loud pretty much constantly: to speak every thought that comes to my mind, when it comes to my mind.

Sometimes, I think this is a strength for me.  It has certainly been a boon as I have made my way through higher education: particularly graduate school with its heavy emphasis on participation in class discussions. The U.S. educational system seems to be largely based on the assumption that the mark of a successful learner is someone who is able to articulate what she or he has learned, form an opinion, and make a valid argument.  When a person does not demonstrate mastery of the material in this way, s/he is presumed to be either ignorant or disengaged.  And this assumption seems to rarely be questioned.  Although I am a highly verbal person (particularly in academic settings), I find this bias in favor of highly verbal behavior to be very frustrating.

And here's why. I actually think my readiness to speak is sometimes a very significant weakness of mine.  This is something I have reflected on quite a bit over the years, and it came up for me again in my feminist theories class last week.  When discussing postcolonial feminism, one of my classmates shared a quote from her reading notes from an article by Linda Alcoff.  The article discusses the pitfalls of speaking for others.  Here is the quote: 

Although Alcoff refers to evaluating our "impetus to speak" in situations where we are tempted to speak for others, I think her advice applies to the urge to speak more generally.

Although in White American culture and the U.S. educational system, verbal behavior is highly valued, my understanding is that in some traditional Native American cultures, an educated, well-mannered person would more highly value the ability to listen, absorb, think slowly and carefully, before speaking up.  I share this information with a very important qualification: I have been raised in White American culture, so even in sharing this I am "speaking for others."  

I have been very much socialized surrounding the importance of speaking and I can see that if everyone was just listening, there would be nobody to listen to. At the same time, I agree with the old adage that we have two ears, one mouth for a reason.








Often, I think it is those who hold the most power who speak up the most.  For myself, I've noticed that the more power and privilege I hold relative to whomever I'm interacting with, the more emotionally activated I become when the conversation turns to social justice (especially, but not only, when we talk specifically about the relationship between the particular oppressed and privileged groups to which we belong).


I've also noticed that emotional activation has a lot to do with my likelihood of speaking up.  When I do not feel particularly emotionally charged about something, I feel little motivation to speak up and I am not likely to.  When I feel more emotionally charged, I feel more motivated to speak.  However, that emotional engagement reaches a point of diminishing returns when it comes to me actually speaking up.  If I'm TOO emotionally activated, I find it difficult to think clearly.  I have difficulty managing my emotions. I become afraid and nervous and fumble over myself.  When I feel like this, I'm actually less likely to speak up.

This is just my personal experience: if there are existing models of communication/empowerment/emotion that examine this, I am not familiar with them.  But I wonder if this, [coupled with cultural values], might explain why people in power tend to do most of the talking.

In one recent example, a friend of mine posted some links to blog posts by a couple of BYU professors regarding the LDS church's history of denying Black men the priesthood.  Having grown up in the LDS church, I struggled  SO HARD with the racism in church history: the Blacks and the priesthood issues as well as teachings that Native Americans' skin was turn brown as a result of a curse from god brought on by their sin.  It was probably the primary factor that led me to move away from the church.  I had so many powerful emotions, and I really wanted to react in some way to these ignorant blog posts.  They represented the same ridiculous answers I was given over and over again by men in the church when I tried resolving my faith crisis.  I felt completely disempowered, and utterly incapable of joining the conversation.  I have been able to join in so many other conversations that just didn't matter as much to me... but when it came to this, the emotions were so strong that I felt like I was choking. Even though the forum it was being discussed in was full of people who were likely to share my view, my history of being shut down when trying to discuss my feelings was so present for me that I was too activated to be able to speak.

[For reference, if interested:

• First professor's blog
• Second professor's blog
• Church statement in response ]

As Alcoff put it, "Some of us have been taught that by right of having the dominant gender, class, race, letters after our name, or some other criterion we are more likely to have the truth.  Others have been taught the opposite, and will speak haltingly, with apologies, if they speak at all."

Sometimes, I really think conversations would be much richer if things happened the other way around.  If the people in power would listen more than they talk.  I also wish we could move away from evaluating people's engagement based on their verbal behavior, and realize that engaging in that way is driven by cultural values, empowerment, and emotional activation.

Native Women in Ms.

On Sunday, Ms. blog featured an article called:

10 Things You Need to Know About Native American Women

 http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2012/02/05/10-things-you-need-to-know-about-native-american-women/

1. “A lot of people think that us women are not leaders, but we are the heart of the nation, we are the center of our home, and it is us who decide how it will be.”–Philomine Lakota, Lakota language teacher, Red Cloud High School, Pine Ridge, S.D.

2. The art forms Native women practice stand as reminders of cultural endurance. “Their crafts survived the Greasy Grass (Battle of Little Big Horn), Wounded Knee One (1890) and Two (1973),” writes Christina DeVries in Native Daughters. “Their spirits survived the Trail of Tears, the Relocation and Termination program and continued struggles against cultural annihilation.”

3. In 1997, Ms. magazine named Winona LaDuke (Anishinaabeg) Woman of the Year. That same year, the activist also debuted her first novel, Last Standing Woman.

4. Of nearly 2 million women enlisted in the U.S. armed forces, 18,000 are American Indian women.  Their representation in the military is disproportionately high—and Native women are more likely to be sexually harassed, which increases their chances of developing post-traumatic stress disorder.

5. The number of Native women applying to medical school has increased since 2003, peaking in 2007 when 77 Native women applied nationwide.

6. In 2007, when Cassandra Manuelito-Kerkvliet (Diné) was named president of Antioch University, she became the first American Indian woman president of a mainstream university. Not only that, but about half of the nation’s tribal colleges are led by Native women presidents.

7. Cecelia Fire Thunder (Lakota) became the Oglala Lakota Tribe’s first woman president. She has fought against domestic abuse, saying it’s not a part of traditional culture, and been a leader for women’s reproductive rights. In 2006, when the South Dakota state legislature prohibited abortion, Fire Thunder announced plans to build a women’s clinic on the reservation, and therefore beyond state jurisdiction. She was impeached by the tribal council, who said she was acting outside her duties as president.

8. Women lead nearly one-quarter of the nation’s 562 federally recognized tribes.

9. “Through the late 1700s, Cherokee women were civically engaged. They owned land and had a say during wartime,” writes Astrid Munn in Native Daughters. “But this changed after the tribe ceded large tracts of land to the U.S. government in 1795.”  Since the mid-1980s, though, a generation of Native women activists, lawmakers and attorneys have been changing that history and working to empower women again.

10. Indian Country could never survive without Native women.