Task Force on Gender and Cultural Change

Northampton and Woods Hole, MA USA

The Task Force on Gender and Cultural Change, formed in 2001, prepares an annual listing of resource materials dealing with violence against women and its roots, and participates in the campaign "16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence" coordinated by the Center for Women's Global Leadership. Projects in the related areas of spirituality, gender equality, and animal ethics may be found at GlobalBird.Net.


RESOURCES 2007-2008: Challenging the Mentality of Violence Against Women and Animals

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16 Days of Activism Against Gender Violence  International networking of activists to challenge entrenched attitudes and policies that continue to allow women to be targeted for acts of violence and sexual and other exploitation of their bodies.

The Feminist Agenda  Looking at the root causes of violence against women with sections on What is Patriarchy?, Animals and Women, and Surviving Domestic Violence.

The Pornography of Violence, Super Weed, June 8, 2007. Discussion of sexualized violence and the degradation of women in pornography; essay and comments.

Color of Violence: The INCITE! Anthology/ Incite! Women of Color Against Violence (South End Press), 2006. Challenging essays, including "The War Against Black women, and the Making of NO!," "Sistas Makin' Moves: Collective Leadership for Personal Transformation and Social Justice" and "The Medicalization of Domestic Violence."

Sistah Vegan Project  Project devoted to "Decolonizing our Diets, Healing Our Bodies, Liberating Our Souls." Anthology: Sistah Vegan! Food, Health, Identity and Society: Black Female Vegans in North America  (2007).

 End Violence against Women: Information and Resources. Particular attention to domestic violence, female genital mutiliation, HIV/AIDS. See also Equality Now.

VDay: Until the Violence Stops, video or DVD. Documentary on the anti-violence movement based on Eve Ensler's play The Vagina Monologues. 

The White Ribbon Campaign. An international campaign by men working to end men's violence against women.

'Honour': Crimes, Paradigms and Violence Against Women/Lynn Welchman and Sara Hossain, eds. (Zed Books), 2005. Examination of "culture" and indifference by social institutions in the perpetuation of violent control of women by men in Europe, the Middle East, Latin America and South Asia.

Conquest: Sexual Violence and American Indian Genocide/Andrea Smith (South End Press), 2005. Violation of women's boundaries and autonomy from a Native American perspective.

Sex Trafficking: The Global Market in Women & Children/Kathryn Farr (W. H. Freeman & Co), 2004. A million women and children trafficked annually. Also, Sex Traffic: Prostitution, Crime and Exploitation/ Paola Monzini (Zed Books), 2006.

Sexual Violence and American Manhood/T. Walter Herbert (Harvard University Press), 2002. Sexual pathology within the male supremacist traditions of America. Also "Warriors' Power" in Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence/Mark Juergensmeyer (U.California Press), 2002.

The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory/Carol J. Adams (Continuum Publishing Group), 1999. See Chapter 2 on the mentality of sexual violence against women and the eating and exploitation of animals: "women in brothels can be used like animals in cages." See, also, The Link Between Violence Against Animals and Violence Against Humans, Society & Animals Forum.

Eternal Treblinka: Our Treatment of Animals and the Holocaust/Charles Patterson (Lantern Books), 2002. Human mastery over nonhuman animals and its connection to violent use and destruction of human bodies; title from Nobel Laureate Isaac Bashevis Singer, "for the animals it is an eternal Treblinka."

The Dreaded Comparison: Human and Animal Slavery/Marjorie Spiegel (Mirror Books), 1996. A look at the enslavement of people of African origin in America and its parallels to humanity's violent exploitation of nonhuman animals.

Prisoned Chickens Poisoned Eggs: An Inside Look at the Modern Poultry Industry
/Karen Davis, Ph.D. (Book Publishing Co.), 1996. Animal abuse and disease in a multibillion dollar industry marketing the flesh and reproductive products of birds; Slaughterhouse: The Shocking Story of Greed, Neglect and Inhumane Treatment Inside the U.S. Meat Industry/Gail A. Eisnitz (Prometheus Books), 1997; Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth from the Cattle Rancher Who Won't Eat Meat/Howard F. Lyman with Glen Mertzer (Scribner), 1998. Animal cruelty and environmental degradation. Also, see websites Farm Sanctuary People for the Ethical Treatment of AnimalsVegan OutreachPhysicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

Task Force Archive - Additional Bibliography


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