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

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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

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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

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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.