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<p dir="ltr"><i>Conjure, Care, Calls, and Cauls</i> centers the histories of Black and southern conjuring midwives in life, lore, and literature. I argue that these conjuring midwives are practitioners of wholistic care who employ conjure work as a method to access wholeness. This avenue to access Black wholeness was intentionally disrupted by 20^th century physicians across the United States and the South. These physicians espoused <i>disabling racist rhetoric</i> to attack Black midwives’ bodies and beliefs as dangerous, casting them as unreliable and unsafe caregivers. Widely circulated in US medical journals, physicians articulated a national and regional “midwife problem” that led to the overwhelming removal of Black midwives from US medical care. This successful displacement of Black midwives by Western medicine and its physicians created and perpetuated what I name the <i>crazy conjure lady trope</i>, the disabling stereotype that considers the Black folk health practitioner or believer as crazy, insane, or otherwise unwell in Black women’s literature and lives. Using Black feminist literary criticism and a Black feminist disability framework, I consider Toni Cade Bambara’s <i>The Salt Eaters </i>(1981), Gloria Naylor’s <i>Mama Day </i>(1988), and Jesmyn Ward’s <i>Sing, Unburied, Sing </i>(2017) alongside Black midwives’ ethnographies and autobiographies to center and consider the Black southern conjuring midwife in Black women’s literature and US history.</p>

Ce mémoire explore les apports et les stratégies de résistance des femmes noires montréalaises, à travers l’analyse de deux balados : Black Girls from Laval et Woke or Whateva. Grâce à une approche culturelle et féministe noire, j’explore comment ces balados, en tant que formes de médias alternatifs, contestent les discours socioculturels dominants au sein de la société en réponse à ce que l’on pourrait appeler l’ère « Black Lives Matter ». Plus précisément, cela porte sur les manières dont des jeunes femmes noires de Montréal ont utilisé la baladodiffusion pour représenter authentiquement les femmes et les communautés noires à Montréal. En partant d’un important cadre historique et théorique, les deux balados étudiés se situent dans une tradition de résistance féministe noire. Dans les épisodes étudiés, les animatrices Naïla, Christle, Laurie (Black Girls from Laval), ainsi que Titi et Beck (Woke or Whateva), mettent en évidence les expériences vécues par les personnes noires dans la ville. Elles démontrent et déconstruisent les stéréotypes racistes et sexistes véhiculés par les médias dominants à l’égard des femmes noires, et elles encouragent l’engagement communautaire. Ce projet, à partir des balados étudiés, souligne aussi l’importance d’amplifier les points de vue exprimés par des voix marginalisées. Elles ouvrent de nouvelles voies de réflexion sur divers enjeux sociaux, notamment sur la question de la prédominance du racisme systémique au Québec. En se concentrant sur les expériences des femmes noires à Montréal, ce mémoire contribue à la littérature existante sur le féminisme noir au Canada. Elle montre comment ces femmes affrontent l’oppression, en font l’expérience et la contestent de manière créative, par des moyens plus concrets pour les personnes issues de communautés marginalisées. / This Master’s thesis explores the contributions and strategies of resistance of Montreal black women, through the analysis of two podcasts: Black Girls from Laval and Woke or Whateva. Using a black cultural and feminist approach, I explore how these podcasts, as forms of alternative media, challenge dominant sociocultural discourses within society in response to what might be termed the “Black Lives Matter” era. Specifically, it addresses the ways in which young black women in Montreal, have used podcasting to authentically represent black women and communities in Montreal. Starting from an important historical and theoretical framework, the two podcasts studied are situated in a tradition of Black feminist resistance. In the episodes studied, hosts Naïla, Christle and Laurie (Black Girls from Laval), as well as Titi and Beck (Woke or Whateva), highlight the experiences of black people in the city. They demonstrate and deconstruct racist and sexist stereotypes of black women in mainstream media and encourage community involvement. This project, based on the podcasts studied, also highlights the importance of amplifying the points of view expressed by marginalized voices. They open up new avenues of reflection on various social issues, including the question of the prevalence of systemic racism in Quebec. By focusing on the experiences of black women in Montreal, this Master’s thesis contributes to the existing literature on black feminism in Canada. It shows how these women confront, experience and creatively challenge oppression in ways that are more concrete for people from marginalized communities.

In view of the scarcity of Indian women in the South African art field, this study investigates how issues of race, class and gender can affect the decision to become and sustain a career as a professional artist. By exploring the historical background of the Indian community and their patriarchal mind set it becomes clear that women's roles in this community have always been prescribed by tradition and cultural values, despite western influence. Moreover the legacy of apartheid created a situation in which black artists, especially women. have not always benefitted in terms of career opportunities. The research is based on case studies of five Indian women who have received due recognition as artists: Lalitha Jawahirilal, Usha Seejarim, Sharlene Khan, Simmi Dullay and Reshma Chhiba. These artists' lives, careers and artistic output are closely studied, documented and critically interpreted using key concepts such as orientalism, black feminism and post colonialism. / Art History, Visual Arts & Musicology / M.A. (Art History)

In view of the scarcity of Indian women in the South African art field, this study investigates how issues of race, class and gender can affect the decision to become and sustain a career as a professional artist. By exploring the historical background of the Indian community and their patriarchal mind set it becomes clear that women's roles in this community have always been prescribed by tradition and cultural values, despite western influence. Moreover the legacy of apartheid created a situation in which black artists, especially women. have not always benefitted in terms of career opportunities. The research is based on case studies of five Indian women who have received due recognition as artists: Lalitha Jawahirilal, Usha Seejarim, Sharlene Khan, Simmi Dullay and Reshma Chhiba. These artists' lives, careers and artistic output are closely studied, documented and critically interpreted using key concepts such as orientalism, black feminism and post colonialism. / Art History, Visual Arts and Musicology / M.A. (Art History)

In An Image of Africa, Chinua Achebe indicts Conrad’s Heart of Darkness for exemplifying the kind of purist rhetoric that has long benefited Western ontology while propagating reductive renderings of African experience. Edward Said refers to this dynamic as the way in which societies define themselves contextually against an imagined Other. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s fiction exposes how, by occupying cultural dominance, Western, white male values are normalized as universal. Nevertheless, these values are de-naturalized by their inconsistencies in the lived experiences of Adichie’s black, African women. Women who are at once aware of and participant in, the pretentions that underlie social interaction—pointing to the inevitability of performativity and disrupting the illusion of pure identity. These realizations interrupt Conrad’s essentialist conception of identity and reclaim diverse ontological possibilities for the Other.

Gender politics in Sweden is considered unique because gender policies (jämställdhet) are integrated into national politics and politicised both in the public and the private sphere. The Swedish case is therefore considered a role model by many feminist scholars. This view has been criticised by both post modern feminists and public administration scholars. Critics imply that the increased immigration and more heterogeneous population have led to a new challenge for state institutions. The Swedish model, with its universal welfare solutions, lacks the ability to recognise differences within groups. Universal solutions that treat everyone the same is no longer the most just way to treat people. The growing use of goal orientation in Swedish public administration has increased the civil servants discretion in the implementation process, and thereby the space for differentiated treatment. This thesis aims to study the civil servants that implement gender policies in every day practice. It is focused on their interpretations of gender and gender equality and how this affects their exercise of authority. The thesis is a case study of two authorities in a heterogeneous area – the northern part of Botkyrka. By using a two-fold theoretical approach and combine two perspectives, feminism and a policy analysis, the study analyses how the front-line bureaucrats handle the tension between the universal welfare politics and the demands of the immigrants. The first theoretical approach presents two different feminist perspectives: one that values economic redistribution and one that find it more fair to recognise differences between women. The second approach introduces theories on implementation that makes it possible to study how interpretations have an impact on the exercise of authority in front-line bureaucracies. The main result of the study is that the front-line bureaucrats’ interpretations differ from the national gender politics. They have a more differentiated view of women than the universal Swedish gender politics. The study also shows that front-line bureaucrats tend to attribute negative cultural factors to immigrants. These prejudices find their way through the bureaucracy, into the public administration and the exercise of authority.

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