FEM Newsmagazine – UCLA's Feminist Newsmagazine Since 1973

Feminism 101

Feminism 101: Misogynoir

In 1851, Sojourner Truth asked, “Ain’t I a woman?” Ever since race was conceptualized, Black women have wondered what makes them different from other women. Why is Black womanhood discredited? Why do Black women have…
Feminism 101: What is Greenwashing?

While large corporations label themselves as “green,” people, communities, and ecosystems are suffering.
Feminism 101: What is Heteronormativity?

Heteronormative society ingrains the prejudice or dislike of people who are ‘different.’ Due to gender roles within heteronormativity, it is ‘natural’ to assume that if someone does not fit in one category, they must be…
Feminism 101: What is Environmental Racism?

Within the world of social media, the scrutiny we place on individuals' choices alienates people who aren’t able to be vegan, zero-waste, or adopt other inaccessible lifestyle changes. The people who are able to participate…

Theorist Thursdays

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Sonia Sanchez

“I wanted to tell people how I became this woman with razor blades between her teeth.”

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Sara Ahmed

Sara Ahmed is a British-Australian author who describes herself as a “feminist killjoy, affect alien, [and] angry queer woman of color.” Ahmed's work focuses on…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Audre Lorde

Audre Lorde was a Black poet, feminist, and activist who wrote and spoke powerfully about race, gender, sexuality, and class.

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Fawn Brodie

Fawn McKay Brodie (1915-1981) was one of the first women to become a tenured professor at UCLA, a controversial biographer, and a noted ex-member of…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Kate Millett

Kate Millett (1934-2017) was an American feminist theorist, activist, writer, educator and filmmaker. Her main areas of interest were mental health reform, human rights advocacy…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: bell hooks

Image from Wikimedia Commons. bell hooks is a Black feminist theorist, professor, and cultural critic who has authored over 30 books, in addition to dozens…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Mitsuye Yamada

Mitsuye Yamada is a Japanese American writer, educator, and activist. Her works expose the discrimination faced by Japanese Americans during and after World War II,…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Angela Davis

Davis has since become the figurehead for the prison abolition movement, a movement that calls into question what it means to be a criminal within…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Patricia Hill Collins

Patricia Hill Collins is an acclaimed social theorist known for her intersectional approach to the sociologies of feminism, Black liberation, and nationalism.

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Gayatri Spivak

Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak is an Indian scholar who continues to add to many academic disciplines. She is known mainly for her work in post-colonial studies,…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Simone de Beauvoir

“One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.” This provocative assertion from Simone de Beauvoir’s acclaimed book, “The Second Sex,” helped destroy the notion…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Adrienne Rich

In her letter to the NEA chair, Rich stated: “There is no simple formula for the relationship of art to justice. But I do know…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Gloria Anzaldúa

Throughout her lifetime of writing, Anzaldúa consistently contributed to theories countering social oppression, spanning topics that encompassed her intersectional identities. She let her spirituality and…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Assata Shakur

A teacher, healer, freedom fighter, and aunt to hip hop legend Tupac, Assata Shakur has organized against the prison-industrial complex, police brutality, discriminatory education, poverty,…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Adichie, a Nigerian novelist, is one of the latest women to join the lineage of iconic feminist writers like Maya Angelou, Adrienne Rich and Toni…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Judith Butler

In her 1988 essay “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution,” Judith Butler—philosopher, gender theorist, and professor at UC Berkeley—proposed the theory that gender is behavior, rather…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Kimberlé Crenshaw

Crenshaw’s great theoretical contribution, that of intersectionality, is a call to action at every moment. In light of the Trump regime’s past few weeks in…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Susan McClary

Susan McClary is one of the most important musicologists responsible for introducing feminist critique to musicology. Her work, though controversial, was some of the first…

Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Cynthia Enloe

Cynthia Enloe’s book was and is part of the movement to open political spaces to women, deconstructing the exclusionary structure of international relations. This remains…

Gendertainment

“Mi Vida Loca” and Lessons on Girlhood

It's a gang movie that refuses to shame its characters for their involvement in gang culture and instead shows gang life as a means of…
Recasting the Spotlight: Meet Anissa Salazar

Before, I couldn't ever imagine that I would be at the level of my position. I thought it would take a lot longer to reach…
The Mad Witch in the Multiverse

It took six years and a limited series for Marvel Studios to finally christen Wanda with her comic book codename ‘The Scarlet Witch,’ but “Multiverse…
Men We Reaped – FEMoir Series

Jesymn Ward’s memoir “Men We Reaped,” published in 2013, documents the harrowing journeys of Black families that have lived in Delisle, Mississippi for generations. Ward…
The Commodification of Self Care

The rise of TikTok and Instagram influencers as dictators of style has drastically transformed the landscape of contemporary fashion and lifestyle trends. The haphazard incorporation…
Being Lolita – FEMoir Series

It’s frightening when your perception clashes with reality in a sharp, electric flash of clarity and anxiety. You're terrified that things will be different; that…

Campus Life

The State of Title IX Reform at UCLA

Through my work perusing the semantics of Title IX policies for places where I could advise an edit or seek to expand on narrowly-defined terms,…
Anti-Blackness and the Case of the BBRC

Since the EARN! Referendum called for support of the BBRC, its failure to pass indicates a tendency for piecemeal reform visible at UCLA and within…
UC Strike Primer

The basic steps all undergraduate students can take are respecting the picket line by not attending discussion sections (even if they are still scheduled), contacting…
On Being Asian American at UCLA, & in Today’s America

Design by Sarah Huang. Image Description: At the center of the image, a young Asian girl holding a teddy bear sits atop a man’s shoulders …
Armenian Genocide Commemoration Week

This week, the UCLA Armenian Student Association will be holding events on campus as part of Armenian Genocide Commemoration week.
The Future of Disability Studies: Afrofuturism, Literary Criticism, and the Intersection of Blackness and Disability

In this virtual event, Therí Pickens discussed her new book, Black Madness: Mad Blackness, in which she aims to “disrupt the idea that Blackness and…

Politics

Why Your Anti-Gun Control Arguments Are Baseless, From A US Debate Champion

AR-15s are not a rational threat to a government with F-35s, aircraft carriers, and a multi-trillion-dollar nuclear arsenal. They are a threat to a classroom…
Eurovision, Your Personal Guide to Understanding European Politics

As 10 million Europeans sat in front of their televisions on Saturday night, May 15th, a screen of blue and yellow lit up their rooms.…
Creativity Secures People’s Voice on Women Trafficking under Censorship

Through the creative derivation of and active adaptation to censorship, feminist netizens in China generate enormous power which attests to their resilience and determination.
The Republican Culture War on LGBTQ+ Youth

From the “Don’t Say Gay Bill” to the “Save Women’s Sports Act,” 2022 has seen an overwhelming increase in state legislation filed to promote anti-LGBTQ+…
Show’s Over: Ending The Miserable Cycle of LA Politics

Mejia reveals a unique talent for bridging the gap between big data and normal people, based on his firm belief that the people, empowered with…
Meet Kenneth Mejia, the Candidate Running for L.A. Controller on a Radical Platform: Doing His Job

“Your generation has the most to benefit from a city watchdog, especially when it comes to issues like the environment. We’re endorsed by so many…

Dialogue and Opinion

Disability is Not a Metaphor

Disabled people and their experiences are not metaphors. Still, we often co-opt disability terminology and utilize casually ableist language for other purposes.
What’s Wrong With BookTok

Why can’t we escape Colleen Hoover’s chokehold?
Feminist Theorist Thursdays: Denise Oliver-Velez

Born in Brooklyn in 1947, Denise Oliver-Velez is famously known for being a member of the Young Lords, a rebellious revolutionary civil rights organization mainly…
The Aesthetic of Health

Picture the average pilates-goer: she’s clad in Lululemon and deeply concerned with her gut microbiome, she eats enough vitamin supplements to cure a horse of…
Gender Beyond LGBTQ+ Labels

Modern LGBTQ+ discourse has advanced gender inclusivity, but more attention should be drawn to gender across different cultures.
Polari: Language and Queer Identity

Bona to vada your dolly old eek!

Arts and Creative

God must be a Man

"somewhere, in the encumbered air before me is a pair of eyes…
Mama Loves the Hummingbirds

We are all borne of each other from the pulsating womb that…
batang bahay

the language eroded in my mouth/and i swallowed dust.
Rat on Polished Wood

I let the silence boil as I pick mismatched graphic tees off…
I Lost My Virginity and I Don’t Know Where It Went

Im going to spoil.
Ladyfinger

Sweep and wipe and hunger. Sing yourself into a special little frenzy.