Teresa Fund - News from Marian Meyers

It is with great pleasure, appreciation and humility that I announce that the Teresa Fund has been fully endowed at the level of $10,000 – all of it very generously contributed by our own Yoo Jae Song of Ewha University in Seoul. Yoo Jae decided to establish the fund in memory of her beloved mother, who passed away last year. Her mother’s whose Christian name was Teresa. It is Yoo Jae’s hope that the fund will enable, so that feminist scholars could to get the recognition and honor their they deserve. This incredibly wonderful gift is FSD’s first endowed fund, and the awards committee is working to establish criteria and guidelines for its operation. The awards committee this year consists of former FSD chair Carolyn Byerly, Yu Shi of Pennsylvania State-Harrisburg, and myself. Yoo Jae, who has been very active with the awards committee in previous years, will remain an honorary member of the Teresa Fund committee so as to stay informed.

With this $10,000 endowment from Yoo Jae, FSD can being begin the process of honoring our own deserving scholars. But it is up to us to make sure that the fund remains robust and grows so that we will be able to make significant awards to support feminist scholarship. Over the years, the Feminist Scholarship Division has put forward some of our best scholars for ICA awards, only to have the honors go to more traditional researchers. The problem that feminist scholars are facing is not simply within ICA – as we well know, feminist scholarship is still often overlooked, excluded and marginalized within our own and many other fields. The Teresa Fund Committee would like to use Yoo Jae’s donation as a starting point, to encourage others to contribute so that we can grant larger awards and so that more of those who are deserving of recognition get it. We ask that FSD members and others consider making donations to the Teresa Fund for its continued and sustained growth. It is worth noting that AEJMC’s MaryAnn Yodelis Smith Award, established in the early 1990s to support women’s research, has been the recipient of book royalties and other contributions from AEJMC members and others. We would like to see the Teresa Fund similarly be viewed as a deserving recipient of royalties from books and other types of donations. In supporting the Teresa Fund, we not only honor the spirit of its founding, but also ourselves and our own work, and the future of feminist scholarship.

News and Updates from Vicki Mayer

After an exciting meeting in San Francisco, I want to write you about the state of the Division as well as upcoming efforts.

First off, we are better off than we were just six months ago in terms of membership and our collective voices in ICA. The $3 campaign urging members to join our sister divisions (ERIC, LGBT, and Phil Comm) seems to have been working to our benefit, even though we charge a bit more than $3 for membership. As you remember, we were in danger at some point of dipping below the minimum numbers demanded for divisional status (200 that is), but with the assistance and support of fellow division leaders Isabel Molina, Lynn Comella, David Phillips, Kumi Silva, Katherine Sender, and Nick Couldry, we have all mutually become stronger. This is a really important thing because ICA board members vote on such important issues as what organizations ICA develops connections with and invests in, where we host conferences, and what indeed how we should define communication as a discipline in the future. If you have not yet registered for the sister divisions above, please consider doing so. The collective cost of joining all of the divisions for a year is about the price of a martini at the conference hotel in Montreal.

Speaking of Montreal, let’s support the Divisions by attending joint-sessions and preconferences. Preconferences are an excellent way to spend a day discussing and debating hot issues in communication today (not to mention a great venue for making new friends and contacts). FSD is co-sponsoring a preconference with Popular Communication entitled “Analysing Media Industries and Media Production: an Emerging Key Area for Communication Research.” While “feminism” is not in the title of the preconference, I think its very important to recognize the feminist contributions in an area of research that historically has been masculinist in the ways that gendered labor and cultural identities, as well as feminist theory and methods have been downplayed or completely overlooked. See the longer description in the newsletter for further details.

FSD has been a leader in promoting social change in ICA. Division member efforts have led to more recognition for feminist researchers and helped push for a new journal in the association. One of those efforts, the Media Associations Project (MAP), needs assistance right now.

Started from informal discussions at the 2000 FSD business meeting about gender discrimination in media and communication departments, MAP launched through the hard work and efforts of past-chairs Cynthia Carter from the Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies, Carolyn Byerly of Howard University, and Marian Meyers of the University of Georgia. The first MAP project coordinator Sheida Shirvani (Ohio University at Zanesville) oversaw an online survey, followed by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen’s (Cardiff School of Journalism, Media and Cultural Studies) efforts to recruit focus group leaders to follow up on quantitative measure. In all, Wahl-Jorgensen, Tara Emmers-Sommers (University of Nevada- Las Vegas), and others have conducted several focus groups using a bi-national sample of professors, graduate students, and faculty chairs.

As they analyze this data and prepare a report on their findings, it is important to find a new coordinator for MAP. Although FSD was the lunch pad for this initiative, we would like to extend the opportunity to our sister associations (NCA and AEJMC) to lead this project through the next stages. Anecdotal evidence points to the enduring discrimination in university departments, despite the perception of equality in the popular imaginary, but we need this empirical research to corroborate our stories. Please contact me if you can help with this project!

Special thanks to Diana, Claire, Rosa, and Marian. Their collective efforts continue to keep us growing.

FSD and Popular Communication Pre-Conference Information

Analysing Media Industries and Media Production: an Emerging Key Area for Communication Research

Organised by the Popular Communication and Feminist Scholarship Divisions

Date: 22 May 2008
Venue: tbc
Costs: $tba will include lunch and regular coffee/tea breaks

Description and Rationale:

This pre-conference brings together established and up and coming scholars who are examining the fundamental question of how popular communication artefacts come to take the form they do. This question involves re-examining questions of cultural production, the status of cultural industries, and their organization in light of new approaches drawn from cultural studies, feminist and critical race studies, and global studies. This is a vibrant and interdisciplinary area, drawing on sociology, cultural studies, organisational and management studies, political economy, economics, social history, cultural geography and social theory, to name just a few. Which theories and methods are most likely to consolidate the recent success of this field of analysis? What tensions exist between the various disciplines contributing to the field and how might they best be addressed?

The pre-conference addresses these questions in four panels, consisting of leading speakers that represent disciplinary and geographic diversity. Each group of presentations will be followed by open round-table discussion from all participants. The preconference is meant as an inclusive dialogue, a chance to search for points of agreement as well as clarify differences. Position papers will be posted to all participants before the conference and we will establish a blog for participants to post questions and challenges that we may address during the course of the day. Following the preconference, we expect to look to participants for next steps in considering production or industrial studies as part of the communication discipline.

Pre-conference convenors:
David Hesmondhalgh, University of Leeds
Amanda Lotz, University of Michigan
Vicki Mayer, Tulane University

Panel 1: Traditions of Theory and Research, 8:30-10 a.m.
This panel brings together three traditions with their own theoretical orientations. John Caldwell (Professor and Chair of Critical Studies at UCLA) addresses the contribution of film and television studies to a long history of mass communication research. Graham Murdock (Reader in the Sociology of Culture at Loughborough University) has been a key theorist of the political economy of culture. Joseph Turow (Robert Lewis Shayon Professor of Communication at Penn's Annenberg School for Communication) has been a longtime proponent of organizational approaches in the study of media industries.
Moderator: Amanda Lotz, University of Michigan

John Caldwell, UCLA
Graham Murdock, University of Loughborough
Joseph Turow, University of Pennsylvania


Panel 2: Methods, 10:30-noon
This panel brings us to our diverse groundings, that is, the actual methods we use in building our theories about production and industries. Widely influenced by feminist theories and ethnographic approaches, these panels present complementary, yet distinct approaches to the study of challenging spaces and their human subjects. Georgina Born (Fellow and Director of Studies in Social and Political Sciences, at Emmanuel College, Cambridge) brings an anthropological perspective based in her esteemed work on musicians and BBC employees. Laura Grindstaff (Associate Professor of Sociology at University of California, Davis) adds the perspective of the participant-observer in a sociological tradition. Lisa McLaughlin (Associate Professor of Mass Communication and Women’s Studies) adds a third voice straight from the field, with a discussion of feminist methods in the context of global electronics industries.
Moderator: Vicki Mayer, Tulane University

Georgina Born, University of Cambridge
Laura Grindstaff, UC-Davis
Lisa McLaughlin, Miami University

Lunch 12:30 – 2 p.m.

Panel 3: Transnational Industries and Production, 2-3:30 pm
Theories surrounding the globalization of media industries and their ancillary products frequently overlook the local dimensions to production, distribution, and exhibition circuits. This panel seeks to overcome these dichotomies with a discussion of the global dimensions of their located research. Michael Curtin (Professor of Media and Cultural Studies and Director of Global Studies at the University of Wisconsin, Madison), Jyotsna Kapur (Associate Professor of Cinema at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale), and Serra Tinic (Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Alberta) are each working on geographies (respectively, China, India, and Canada) that are crucially important to our understanding of global production, from the roles of states and transnational industries, to the perspectives of workers and laborers in those fields.
Moderator: David Hesmondhalgh, University of Leeds

Michael Curtin, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Jyotsna Kapur, SIU-Carbondale
Serra Tinic, U. of Alberta

Panel 4: Directions, 4-5:30 p.m.
This final panel raises future directions for a study of cultural industries and production by capturing some issues that have frequently fall outside of the purviews of our respective disciplines. Jonathan Burston (Assistant Professor of Information Studies at the University of Western Ontario) investigates the role of the military in media production. David Hesmondalgh (Professor of Media and Music Industries at the University of Leeds) raises the role of affect in symbolic production sites. Vicki Mayer (Associate Professor and Chair of Communication at Tulane University) works with invisible labor communities in the new television economy. Timothy Havens (Associate Professor of Communication at the University of Iowa) pushes us to look at cultural negotiations in standard business practices.
Moderator: Amanda Lotz, University of Michigan

Jonathan Burston, University of Western Ontario
David Hesmondhalgh, University of Leeds
Vicki Mayer, Tulane University
Tim Havens, University of Iowa

New ICA journal - Communication, Culture and Critique

After many FSD business meetings ending up in a disappointed discussion about the lack of an ICA journal which would publish the critical, qualitative work so favoured of our division members, our very own Karen Ross is the Editor of the new ICA journal: Communication, Culture and Critique. Let’s hope we see some of the best gender scholarship making its way to a wider ICA audience.

Communication, Culture & Critique provides an international forum for research and commentary which examines the role of mediated communication in today's world. We welcome high quality research and analyses from diverse theoretical and methodological approaches, from all fields of communication, media, film and cultural studies, which is critically informed, methodologically imaginative and careful in its exposition and argument. Foci for enquiry can include all kinds of text- and print-based media, as well as broadcast, still and moving images and electronic modes of communication including the internet, games and mobile telephony. We publish research-informed and theory-focused articles, commentaries on evolving and topical issues, research notes and reviews (books, films, DVDs, etc.). Any and all approaches, analyses and perspectives are welcome, but especially those with a qualitative and/or interpretive inflection. Issue 1, vol.1 will be published in March 2008 and subsequent issues in the volume published in June, September and December 2008. We look forward to receiving your contributions to this exciting new journal which we hope will quickly become an important voice in our field, offering lively and innovative perspectives and critiques.
Contributions to CCC are via the online submission system provided by Manuscript Central. To submit your article/note/review, please go to:
http://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/cccr
and follow the online instructions.

Women and Language

Women and Language is seeking an editor, term beginning January 2010. The Executive Committee of the Organization for the Study of Communication, Language and Gender (OSCLG) selects the editor. Editorial terms are for four years, renewable.

Women and Language, an international, interdisciplinary research periodical has the mission of providing a feminist forum for those interested in communication, language and gender. W&L publishes peer-reviewed research and theoretical articles from all disciplines with interests in women and language. Also included are essays; personal narratives; poetry; news about scholarly publications, work in progress, bibliographical material, conferences, relevant magazine and newspaper articles; and correspondence from around the world.

Women and Language is affiliated with the Organization for the Study of Communication, Language and Gender with which it shares many aims.

Process for Selection

Applications for editorial appointment are sought beginning immediately and must be received by August 1, 2008, with interviews scheduled at the OSCLG annual meeting in October 2008, which will be held in Nashville, Tennessee. During 2009 transition arrangements will be made and the new editor will begin accepting manuscripts in preparation for her/his first issue of Spring 2007.

Interested persons may raise questions with current editor, Anita Taylor, at ataylor"at"gmu.edu; or with Laura Ellingson at lellingson"at"scu.edu.

FSD CALL FOR REVIEWERS

Reviewers play an essential role in our selection process. We know you are busy with other important research/teaching/professional responsibilities, but ask that you find some time to review submissions for FSD. In the past, as a reviewer for FSD and other divisions, I found the wide variety of papers and panels to be so intriguing. It was a terrific feeling getting an advance look at what may show up on the program later. We need as many of you to sign up as possible so that we can lessen any burden that would befall a smaller pool of reviewers.

Aren’t you excited already!!! I know I am.

Signing up to be a Reviewer is not tough at all.

We have an electronic sign up system set up inside the ICA website--Once you are inside the site, the options will allow you to do a great many things including Updating membership to FSD and indicating that you want to be a REVIEWER for FSD.

1. Visit: http://www.icahdq.org/cfp

2. Sign in using your usual ICA log in details

3. In the Main Menu, click on "Volunteer to be a Reviewer"

4. Complete the form and submit it by clicking "Apply"

5. Be sure to check the appropriate DIVISION box on the next screen and click on "Accept Continue"

6. Confirm on the following screen

We will assign submission for review in early November and you will be able to access these submissions soon afterwards. You will be able to access the submissions online and evaluate them using a pre-established instrument for that purpose.

When you fill out the reviewer form, indicate your Areas of Expertise. This helps in assigning you research that is most interesting to you and that you feel comfortable evaluating. There is not always a perfect match, but we will certainly try.

Very Sincerely Looking Forward to All You Terrific People
Volunteering to be Reviewers,

Diana I. Rios
Program Chair, FSD, ICA

FSD ICA CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS

2008 Annual Conference of the

International Communication Association

May 22-26, 2008. Montreal, Canada

Conference Theme--Communicating for Social Impact

The Feminist Scholarship Division is looking forward to another fantastically fabulous year and a wide variety of research submissions (papers, works in progress, panel proposal, round table proposals) that fall under the umbrella of FSD.

What to submit? The Feminist Scholarship Division is interested in receiving formal research papers, papers that are work in progress, panel proposals, and roundtable proposals that explore the relationship of gender and communication, both mediated and non-mediated, within a context of feminist theories, methodologies, and practices. The division explores issues including feminist pedagogy; the social implications of the gendered “digital divide”; international gender commonalities and differences by “race,” social class, gender, sexuality, and nationality; women’s alternative media; feminist political economy of the media; feminist cultural studies; and transnational feminist theory and political practice, among others.

Submissions may be
1. Full length completed research papers (maximum length 25 pages, plus tables and references);

2. Works in progress papers may be submitted in any stage of completion but should have enough material to allow for evaluation (3,000-7,500 words). Works in progress reflect on-going research that has not yet reached full completion stage. Works in progress should be clearly labeled.

3. Panel proposals (title, rationale of 400 words maximum, and a 150-word description of each panel paper; 75-word rationale for conference program; a full list of participants; or

4. Roundtable proposals (same submission criteria as panel proposals on current issues and debates in the field of communication scholarship).

Please Note: In creating your panels and roundtables, avoid single institution representation. Stress variety in institutional affiliations among panelists and roundtable members

For more details about submitting work to ICA, and information about the conference, please refer to the official CALL FOR PAPERS that is available on the ICA website.

New announcements!

Check the call for papers and positions blog linked here on the right for new announcements as of June 25, 2007 on an open position and a call for submissions.

Women Challenging Barriers in Mass Comm Fields

submitted by Carolyn Byerly

As promised, I wanted to post some additional information about problems that feminists (and other leftists) have experienced in the academy in recent years. This follows up on the last FSD session at ICA, in which a number of our members shared some of the findings from their research with women in the mass communication field related to barriers to advancement – getting hired, tenured, promoted, etc. FSD has been tracking women’s advancement for six or seven years through the Media Associations Project, a broad effort that has sometimes involved those in our sister feminist groups in NCA, AEJMC, IAMCR, etc. The MAP has produced an annual session at ICA at which we report what has been learned through our inquiries of the previous year. Alongside our own work, a number of other feminist and critical theorists have been doing parallel work, giving our own efforts a bigger context by revealing similar problems throughout higher education for anyone who challenges status quo ideas, values and practices. I suggest the following as excellent related sources.

Aronowitz, S. (2000). The Knowledge Factory: Dismantling the Corporate University and Creating True Higher Education. Boston, MA: South End Press.
Notes: A readable, thoughtful analysis of how university administrations have systematically worked to eliminate intellectuals who critique or challenge neoliberalism or corporatism, or, in the case of feminists, patriarchal values.

Byerly, Carolyn M. (2004). Women and the Concentration of Media Ownership, pp. 245-262. In Rush, R.R., Oukrup, C. and Creedon, P. (Eds.), Women in Journalism and Mass Communication: A Thirty Year Update. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Notes: This is my own political-economic analysis of women’s problems in academic journalism programs, which I believe is related to larger trends associated with conglomeration in the media industries and the gradual corporate takeover of US culture.

Kolodny, A. (1998). Failing the Future: A Dean Looks at Higher Education in the Twenty-first Century. Durham, NC, USA and London, England: Duke University Press.
Notes: Annette Kolodny, a well-known feminist scholar, successfully sued her New England university a number of years ago for sex and religious discrimination. She used the settlement to establish a fund in National Women’s Studies Association (NWSA) for other women going the lawsuit route. This book is a sobering tale of her difficult journey to improve the problems she encountered, by entering administration, after her lawsuit.

Rush, R., Oukrup, C. and Creedon, P. (Eds.). (2004). Women in Journalism and Mass Communication: A Thirty Year Update. Mahwah: NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, Associates.
Notes: This edited volume contains varied essays and empirical pieces that scrutinize women’s persistent under-ranked status in mass communication fields within the United States. It is the definitive resource to date on why we encounter the problems we do.

2006 ICA FSD business mtg minutes

Greetings, folks. Below are the minutes from the 2006 Dresden ICA FSd business meeting. Please feel free to post comments with corrections, notes, or, well, comments!

Minutes

Feminist Scholarship Division business meeting
Dresden, June 2006

1 Announcements

a FSD Chair Marian Meyers thanked FSD officers and all those colleagues who had supported the planning of this year's conference, together with those who had given service in various capacities.

B ICA President Elect Select, Sonia Livingstone, addressed the meeting to discuss ICA 2007 in San Fransisco. She urged members to consider liaising with women's groups in SF and to think about involving some of those groups in the conference, especially to perhaps put on performances in the conference hotel which will be the Hilton. She strongly encouraged members to email her with their ideas for SF but also more generally, in terms of FSD's vision for future directions for ICA.

C Approval of minutes. These were approved.

D 2006 programme and discussion
78 submissions
posters given the same weight as formal panel presentations
pre-conference - Women and News - had been extremely successful, attracting 34 participants from 12 nations: conference organiser Carolyn Byerly was thanked.
To celebrate FSD's 20th anniversary, Joo Yae Song had agreed to organise the printing of T-shirts which were available for sale. She was thanked.
Members were informed that the proposal to create a new journal which would focus on qualitative research, including feminist research and methodologies, had been approved for development by the ICA Board. Marian Meyers was congratulated on a marvelous achievement.

ACTION POINT - Chair to request ICA Exec Board that FSD (as originator of proposal) be encouraged to suggest names for editor and members of editorial board.

ACTION POINT - Chair to request ICA Exec Board that FSD be encouraged to suggest names of new members of the Publications Board.

A key area of concern is the static membership, and Chair said this would be a significant piece of work to progress in the upcoming year. Suggestions from the floor about strategies for increasing membership included more co-sponsorship of sessions with other divisions, more explicit promotion of FSD to others; more explicitly inclusive stance taken to embracing multiple methodologies and promotion of same.

Vicki Mayer was duly voted in as Vice-Chair.

E Top student papers
The three award winners were all present to receive congratulations and their awards.


2 Officer reports

FSD Awards Committee report – the committee put forward nominations for ICA awards, but these nominees were not chosen by the ICA awards committee.

ACTION POINT: FSD Awards Committee to undertake an exploration of the mechanisms whereby individual get asked to serve on Awards Committee and report back. It was thought that as President Elect, Sonia Livingstone might be more receptive to an increase in transparency, so no immediate action was required of the Chair to seek clarification at this moment, hence the work to be undertaken by the Awards Committee.

A Note from Claire Wardle - Newsletter Editor

Firstly, apologies for the late arrival of the Spring newsletter. A number of different factors have conspired against us, including Google changing this blogging software, which has forced us to move the blog and update it as we went. We are in the process of moving over the old material as we speak. Thanks again to web-mistress Rosa Mikeal Martey for all of her help.

I would also like to encourage people to submit material for the newsletter. I didn't receive anything in reply to my call for information, and for that reason, this newsletter is only really a space for messages from the chair and vice-chair, information about the conference panels and some useful travel information about San Francisco, including restaurant and bookshop tips (a personal favourite when travelling!) We had really hoped this blog format would open up the newsletter, but without suggestions and comments, it's not really working at the moment.

Please take note of some of the great sessions happening in San Francisco and the business meeting, which is on Friday 25 May at 3pm (Franciscan Room C). I look forward to seeing many of you at the conference, and for those of you who aren't able to make it this year, please do get in touch if you have any comments or suggestions for improving the newsletter.

A Note from Marian Meyers - Chair

The ICA annual conference is almost upon us, and I am very excited about the program FSD vice chair Vicki Mayer has put together for us. Vicki has done a tremendous job, and I am confident it will be one of the best we have ever had (please see her article for some of the highlights). I look forward to more of her creativity and vision when she assumes the position of chair of the division after the San Francisco conference. At that point, I will become immediate past chair, and Diana Rios will take over as vice chair. As I contemplate the future of FSD, I know the division will thrive under the leadership of Vicki and Diana.

And so, as I contemplate the end of my tenure as FSD chair, I want to express my thanks and gratitude to all those who helped make my two years as chair – as well as my two years as vice chair prior to that – so truly memorable and gratifying. I could not have done it without the help of so many of you. With this article, my last as chair, I would like to express my appreciation to all of you – because I could not have done my job nor would the Feminist Scholarship Division exist without you. So, first and foremost, the FSD membership deserves my deepest appreciation. It has been such a pleasure to get to know and work with so many of you!

In addition, so many of you deserve singling out for special mention. Cynthia Carter was a tremendous help in guiding me through my first few years as vice chair and then providing on-going support and feedback in my years as chair – in addition to heading the awards committee. When Karen Riggs had to step down as vice chair in the midst of organizing the 2007 conference in Dresden – which also happened to be FSD’s 20th anniversary -- I put out an urgent call for help, and I received a tremendous response. As a result, the Dresden conference and anniversary celebration were a smashing success – thanks to the collaborative efforts of a number of division members – including – but certainly not limited to -- the efforts of Yoo Jae Song, who not only came to the conference from Korea with boxes of T-shirts commemorating the division’s 20th birthday, but also set up shop selling them. It was an honor to sell them alongside her. During my years as chair, Claire Wardle, FSD’s newsletter editor, and Rosa Mikeal Martey completely revamped the division newsletter, Feminist Con/Text, to make it interactive and more responsive and informative to membership. Rosa, our webmistress extraordinaire, also revised FSD’s website. Both the website and the newsletter have set new standards and have been pointed to as models within ICA.

FSD members also supported me in urging ICA to establish a new journal that would welcome critical, primarily qualitative research of the type conducted by feminist communication scholars (and other critical scholars). The result is that Communication, Culture & Critique, to be edited by FSD member Karen Ross, will be launched in spring 2008. Carolyn Byerly was particularly helpful in this process, appearing with me before ICA’s publications board at the New York City meeting in 2005, and providing support and encouragement in so many other ways on so many other issues over the many years I have known her. Of course, the names mentioned here can’t begin to include the many wonderful FSD members who have contributed in innumerable ways to the division’s successes – from serving as translator and arranging for a wonderful meal for FSD members at a traditional German restaurant in Dresden (that would be graduate student Martina Myers) to serving as the division’s student liaison (Rebecca Hains) to filling the role of FSD secretary/historian (Bernadette Barker-Plummer) to volunteering to take minutes and write them up (Karen Ross) to… You get the idea. If I have been successful at all as vice chair or chair, it is only because I have had an army of women behind me. And for that I am extremely grateful.

A Note from Vicki Mayer - Vice Chair

I was so happy to be the programming coordinator for San Francisco’s conference and hope you’ll have a great time there! It was so much fun thinking with the other divisions and interest groups of the ways FSD could be involved with a city that has such an amazing history of progressive feminist, multicultural, and LGBT movements.

One thing we came up with was a plenary re-thinking the impact of the Barnard Convention 25 Years Later, called “Representing Sexuality, Mediating Power.” This was a milestone in articulating a pro-women/pro-sex standpoint for academics and activists alike. It’s an all-star panel, scheduled for Friday, May 25th from 4:30 p.m. to 5:45 p.m. in the huge Franciscan Room C. Check out the participants:
Carol Queen: Part Owner of Good Vibrations, Founder of the Center for Sex and Culture, and Performance Artist, http://www.carolqueen.com/pages/queen.htm
Susan Stryker: Gay Historian, Filmmaker, and Executive Director of Gay and Lesbian Historical Society of Northern California, http://geography.berkeley.edu/ProjectsResources/CaliforniaThinkers/profiles/stryker.html
Carla Freccero: Professor and Chair of Literature, University of CA, Santa Cruz, http://humwww.ucsc.edu/PEMS/faculty/freccero.html
Respondent: Lisa Henderson, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, http://www.umass.edu/communication/faculty_and_staff/faculty/lisa_henderson.shtml
Chair: Lynn Comella, Indiana University, http://www.indiana.edu/~gender/html/visiting_lecturers_and_instruc.html
It’s SO IMPORTANT that you make time for this panel, which is co-sponsored by FSD, LGBT, Phil Comm, and Pop Comm.

This fab group is scheduled right after the FSD Business Meeting, where we will strategize for the future health of the division and award some excellent student papers by Hongmei Chen (University of Maryland), Melissa Fritz (University of Toronto), and Karen Sichler (University of Georgia). Afterwards, we are having a joint reception with LGBT, Phil Comm, Pop Comm, and ERIC, our new and rapidly growing ICA interest group. So folks, I’m sorry, your Friday is booked. Bring yer friends.

Some other notes of interest: We had over 100 submissions for about 52 slots. The quality of the papers and works in progress were really high. There’s a range of panels focusing on everything from girls’ media uses to women’s health, from women’s activism to women and technology. I want to THANK the reviewers for FSD; I could not do this without you!

So I hope to see everyone in San Francisco. If you have a chance, be sure to see some of the great feminist centers, performances, bookstores, and shops in the city.

-- Vicki Mayer

Top 3 Student Papers

*****************************************************************************************************************
Melissa Fritz, University of Toronto
“Revisiting the Gender Gap: Further Data Analysis of the Gendered Digital Divide in Canada”

Sunday, 27 May, 12pm, Hilton Hotel/Grand Ballroom

*****************************************************************************************************************
Hongmei Shen, University of Maryland
“All-China Women’s Federation: A Party Representative or Feminist Organization?”

Saturday, 26 May, 3pm, Hilton Hotel/Franciscan Room C

*****************************************************************************************************************

Karen Sichler, University of Georgia
“Hyperreal Gendering: The End of the Quest for Origins”

Sunday, 27 May, 9am, Hilton Hotel/Franciscan Room C

FSD Sessions at ICA

1. Caught in the Net: Gender Identity Online

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Sun, May 27 - 9:00am - 10:15am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

2. Claiming a Voice and Voicing Claims: Feminist Activism

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Sat, May 26 - 3:00pm - 4:15pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

3. Feminine Contradictions and the Politics of Mediated Ambivalence

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Panel

Time: Sat, May 26 - 12:00pm - 1:15pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

4. Feminism and the Not-So-Domestic Arts

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Fri, May 25 - 1:30pm - 2:45pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

5. Feminist Scholarship Division Business Meeting

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Meeting

Time: Fri, May 25 - 3:00pm - 4:15pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

6. Feminist Scholarship Interactive Paper Session

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Interactive Paper Session

Time: Sun, May 27 - 12:00pm - 1:15pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Grand Ballroom

7. Getting Real: Gendered TV Politics

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Sun, May 27 - 1:30pm - 2:45pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

8. Joint Reception: Feminist, Popular, Phil Comm Divisions; GLBT and ERIC Special Interest Groups

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Reception

Time: Fri, May 25 - 6:00pm - 7:00pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Imperial Ballroom A

9. More Than a Pretty Picture? Image Analysis of Women in Magazines

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Mon, May 28 - 10:30am - 11:45am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

10. On the Screen and Behind the Scenes: Gender, TV, Nation

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Sat, May 26 - 9:00am - 10:15am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

11. Ripped From the Headlines: Sex, News, Spectacle

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Fri, May 25 - 10:30am - 11:45am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

12. Solitude or Solidarity? Women's Identities

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Mon, May 28 - 9:00am - 10:15am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

13. Starving Girls, Mean Girls, Trafficking Girls, Blogging Girls: Gendered Deviance & Media in the Digital Age

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Panel

Time: Sat, May 26 - 10:30am - 11:45am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

14. The Gendered Experiences of Academics in Communication Studies

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Roundtable Proposal

Time: Sun, May 27 - 4:30pm - 5:45pm

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

15. Women's Health and Bodies

Division: Feminist Scholarship

Session type: Paper Session

Time: Sun, May 27 - 10:30am - 11:45am

Place: Hilton Hotel, Franciscan Room C

San Francisco Restarants

Top 15 restaurants in San Francisco as listed by Trip Advisor

1. Restaurant Gary Danko, 800 North Point at Hyde Street, San Francisco, CA 94109-1228
Cuisines: Contemporary
Price range*: $59-89
Special features: Romantic, Business
Neighborhood: Pacific Heights
Tel: 415 749 2060
Fax: 415 775 1805
URL: http://www.garydanko.com/
2. La Folie, 2316 Polk Street, San Francisco, CA 94109
Cuisines: American, French, Contemporary
Price range*: $41-80
Special features: Romantic, Business
Neighborhood: Pacific Heights
Tel: 415 776 5577
URL: http://www.lafolie.com/
3. Pacific Catch, 2027 Chestnut Street, San Francisco, CA 94123
Cuisines: Asian, Polynesian, Seafood, Eclectic, International, Californian
Price range*: $1-20
Special features: Outdoor seating
Neighborhood: Marina-Bay Area
Tel: (415) 440-1950
4. The Dining Room at the Ritz Carlton, 600 Stockton Street, San Francisco, CA 94108
Cuisines: French, Mediterranean, Contemporary, Californian
Average price*: $80
Special features: Romantic
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: 415 296 7465
5. Tommaso’s Restaurant, 1042 Kearny Street, San Francisco, CA 94133-4525
Cuisines: Italian, Pizza, Seafood
Average price*: $30
Special features: Child-friendly
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: 415 398 9696
URL: http://www.tommasosnorthbeach.com/
6. Dottie’s True Blue Café, 522 Jones Street, San Francisco, CA 94102-2008
Cuisines: American, Coffee Shop, Diner
Price range*: $1-20
Special features: Breakfast/Brunch, Child-friendly
Tel: 415 885 2767
7. Delfina, 3621 18th Street, San Francisco, CA 94110-1531
Cuisines: Italian, Californian
Price range*: $25-40
Neighborhood: Mission
Tel: 415 552 4055
URL: http://www.delfinasf.com/
8. Lupa Trattoria, 4109 24th Street, San Francisco, CA 94114
Cuisines: Italian
Price range*: $21-30
Neighborhood: Peninsula
Tel: (415) 282-5872
URL: http://lupatrattoria.com/
9. Jeanty at Jack’s, 615 Sacramento Street, San Francisco, CA 94111-2509
Cuisines: French
Price range*: $41-80
Special features: Romantic, Business
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: 415 693 0941
URL: http://www.jeantyatjacks.com/
10. Maya, 303 Second St, San Francisco, CA 94107
Cuisines: Mexican
Price range*: $30-40
Special features: Business
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: 415 543 2928
URL: http://www.mayasf.com/
11. Chez Nous, 1911 Fillmore Street, San Francisco, CA 94115-2706
Cuisines: French, Mediterranean, Tapas
Price range*: $31-40
Special features: Romantic
Neighborhood: Western Addition
Tel: 415 441 8044
12. Jardiniere, 300 Grove Street, San Francisco, CA 94102
Cuisines: American, French, Contemporary, Eclectic, Californian
Price range*: $41-80
Special features: Romantic, Business
Neighborhood: Western Addition
Tel: 415 861 5555
URL: http://www.jardiniere.com/
13. Mama’s on Washington Square, 1701 Stockton St, San Francisco, CA 94133-2914
Cuisines: American, Coffee Shop, Diner
Price range*: $1-20
Special features: Breakfast/Brunch, Child-friendly
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: (415) 362-6421
14. The Terrace, 600 Stockton St, The Ritz-Carlton, San Francisco, CA 94108
Cuisines: Mediterranean, Californian
Price range*: $41-80
Special features: Breakfast/Brunch, Outdoor seating
Neighborhood: Financial District
Tel: (415) 296-7465
15. Frascati, 1901 Hyde St, San Francisco, CA 94109
Cuisines: American, French, Italian, Mediterranean, Contemporary,
Price range*: $31-40
Special features: Romantic
Neighborhood: Pacific Heights
Tel: (415) 928-1406

San Francisco Independent Bookstores

San Francisco Bay Area is one of the most diverse and best areas in the United States (perhaps the world?) to find bookstores for special audiences and for independent bookstores. (Reviews taken from Tripadvisor.com)

Alexander Book Company--50 Second St (near Market St.)., San Francisco: A fine general and literary bookstore in the San Francisco Financial District, with a special emphasis on books by and about African-Americans. Open weekdays only, because that's when the Financial District is. Transit: Montgomery BART and Muni Metro. Near California Historical Society, Foto-Grafix Books SFMOMA.

City Lights Books--261 Columbus Ave (at Broadway), San Francisco--North Beach's great bookstore of the Beat era lives on, as vital as ever, and Lawrence Ferlinghetti is around too. Literally floors of poetry you won't find anywhere else, and a whole basement full of world history, politics, geography. Some creatively named sections. Transit: Muni 15 Third St. or 30 Stockton.

Cody's -- 2 Stockton Street near Market Street, San Francisco : The original, legendary Cody's on Telegraph Avenue is gone as of July 12, 2006, R.I.P., but two more stores -- including this new one near Union Square -- still live. This one is so conveniently located you should be ashamed if you find yourself walking into Border's or B&N instead. Authors such a Armistead Maupin are part of a regular schedule of appearances by writers. Transit: Muni's #30 Stockton and any transit conveyance heading down Market Street can take you here.

Eastwind Books San Francisco -- 1435 Stockton St (bet. Vallejo and Green streets), (415) 772-58771435 Stockton St, (415. 772.5877) The Chinatown location of Eastwind features everything from books to magazines to greeting cards. Extensive collection of Asian American works, with a focus on Chinese, and Chinese-American, in particular.

Forest Books--3080 16th St. (near Valencia) St., San Francisco--There's a collection of mostly used bookstores along Valencia St. from 16th St. to 20th St. in San Francisco's renowned hipster/Latino Mission District. Forest Books has one of the most careful selections, particularly strong on literary titles. Transit: 16th St. Mission BART; Muni 14 Mission, 22 Fillmore, 26 Valencia. Near Modern Times.

Green Apple Books--506 Clement St. (near 6th Ave.), San Francisco--Out in San Francisco's foggy (and foodie) Richmond district, Green Apple Books is one of the largest used bookstores (with some new books) around. Transit: Muni 38 Geary, 1 Caifornia, 2 Clement

Kayo Books--814 Post St. (near Leavenworth), San Francisco--This quality used bookstore west of Union Square describes its stock as "pulp and vintage popular culture," the stuff you used to have read sneakily. A favorite of John Waters. Transit: Muni 38, 2, 3, 4

Marcus Books -- 1712 Fillmore Street, San Francisco (415.346.4222) : That's Marcus, as in Garvey. Dedicated to the education, history and future of African Americans. Everything from children's books to biographies and academic texts.

Photography Books-Foto-Grafix Bookstore--655 Mission St., San Francisco--The Ansel Adams Society had to give up its gallery in high rent Downtown San Francisco, but it left behind this comprehensive photography bookstore. Transit: Montgomery BART/Muni Metro. Near
Alexander Book Company, San Francisco Museum of Modern Art.

"Queer" Books--A Different Light--489 Castro St. (near 18th St.)--A large gay bookstore in the heart of The Castro that also has outposts in Greenwich Village and West Hollywood. Stock goes from serious to sin-filled. Transit: Castro Muni Metro, Muni F, 24.

Note from the Editor

Claire Wardle
FSD Femininst Con/Text Editor

Welcome to the new look of the FSD newsletter! After the business meeting in New York last year, production editor Rosa Mikeal Martey and I decided we wanted to try a more interactive newsletter format, taking advantage of the easy-to-use technologies available in website design.

As a result, we are testing this new blog format, which we hope will be a big success. It is our hope that rather than the newsletter remaining a rather static bi-annual publication, this blog will be a place where FSD members can post items throughout the year, including interesting articles (both scholarly and journalistic) that they think would be of particular relevance to others, calls for papers, book reviews, job postings etc.

We will still formally ‘publish’ columns and think pieces in the Fall and Spring, but with this new format, we hope the newsletter will include up-to-date information throughout the year. Additionally, the ‘blog’ interface we are using will mean members can comment and respond to postings, thereby encouraging more dialogue amongst FSD members. In this newsletter, Rosa has posted a short piece about the technicalities of the new website and how you can get involved by posting your information, ideas and comments.This newsletter is full of interesting and thought-provoking pieces. Robin Means-Coleman has written a wonderful piece entitled ‘Were it not for students, I would love to teach!’, that tackles issues about gender and race that many of us struggle with. Most usefully, it offers suggestions for making your own teaching experiences more rewarding and satisfying.

In the Chair’s column, Marian Meyers outlines all the latest news from the Division, and it's full to the brim. Marian has also written a piece highlighting all that we can expect from the Dresden conference in June. It sounds like it will be another action-packed conference for Division members.

We also have reports by Karin Wahl-Jorgensen on the Mapping Project about gendered experiences in academia, by Cynthia Carter on the four FSD nominations for ICA awards, and by Carolyn Byerly on the International Symposium on Women and News in Dresden.

We also have a book review by Ann Taylor of Feminist Communication Theory: Selections in Context and a call for papers for the Commentary & Criticism section of Feminist Media Studies.

Enjoy the issue, and we look forward to your feedback.