After showing Fiona our progress on Wordpress, she made some important observations and suggestions to direct us back towards our original proposal (because we've gone offtrack a bit and our blog was becoming too much like other feminist blogs).
Initially, we decided that our blog will focus primarily on how women use online media (e.g. social media, blogs, video sharing websites and forums) to engage in political activism.Other ideas included taking a close look at the circulation of sexist memes, misogynistic views and gendered humour online, and how women are using the internet for information and advice on sensitive or what they consider to be 'embarrassing' health problems.
We were also going to look at debates around cross-cultural/multicultural/intercultural feminism and how the internet has revealed some of the problems surrounding 'Western' feminism - for instance, women in other cultures, particularly African and Muslim cultures have voiced their frustration at western feminists telling them how they should live their lives. They feel that these women are trying to 'save' them and that they don't need saving. Because the internet is globally accessible, women from various cultures are able to reach out to each other more easily and women living in societies vastly different from ours have been able to respond more openly and honestly.
Astha suggested a great idea that we should collect statistical data on the locations from which women (or others) are accessing our blog (whether from western countries or non-western countries); Fiona agreed and suggested using Google Analytics to help organise and analyse our data.
In terms of pages, we re-added a health section, now called "Body Matters" (Thanks to Laura for coming up the with the page title). Here, Astha has agreed to submit an article on plastic surgery and how the internet is promoting extreme solutions to women's beauty and health concerns. Fiona also suggested that we talk about pro-anorexia sites (where young women with body image insecurities and eating disorders exchange 'thinspiration' images - i.e. photos of unhealthily skinny celebrities, etc. and encourage each other to start or continue unhealthy eating habits or the use of medicines such as laxatives, diuretics and ipecac syrup for alternate purposes). I think it will be interesting to talk about forums where women talk to each other about health problems that are difficult to talk about offline (due to lack of anonymity) - such health problems include lack of libido, menstruation-related problems, thrush and other vaginal problems.
Fiona also recommended that we get rid of the 'Links' page because it's static and doesn't necessarily provide anything interesting or new (sorry, that was my idea). Astha thought we could change that page to an analysis of all the blogs we linked. So now, that section is called "Blogs We Love" and will study the various feminist blogs out there on the internet and the ways they've influenced the way women engage in feminist activity.
As per Astha's suggestion, we've also added a 'Forums' page. This will allow our followers to interact with us and each other. I think it will be great to have different categories of discussion topics such as "Women Who Inspire Me" (where people can talk about ordinary people who have achieved and done things that are extraordinary or worthy of recognition). Our followers will also be able to share images and videos on these forums, and most importantly be able to talk to other like-minded people (or at least others who are interested in feminism and online media) about issues that are important to them.
Phoebe has done an excellent interview with Frances Shaw (Feminist Scholar whose PhD thesis focused specifically on Australian Feminist Blogs and Online Discursive Activism). She has also contacted people to contribute to our blog and will be interviewing Mia Freedman, Publisher of Mamamia.
What was previously "Art & Poetry", then "Feminist Art", is now "Art Explored" (thanks again to Laura for coming up with the title). Instead of talking about Feminist art in general, Fiona suggested we focus it on how the internet has allowed women to showcase and be recognised for their art. So far for this section, I've selected some prominent Feminist artists and their artworks to talk about, but I think it would also be interesting to talk about art sharing websites such as deviantART, and how people interact there. I have a fairly large gallery there (built over 5 years) and have quite a few followers, so I can discuss this with them and they'll happily contribute, especially as most of my closest friends and supporters there are strong, independent women.
Most importantly, overall, is that we relate everything back to online media and ensure that we present all sides of feminist debates.
All other suggestions, I have forgotten. So if there's anything else you can recall, please comment.
That's it for now.
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