This thesis is an examination of enski list, arguably the first magazine published exclusively for women between the wars in Croatia, and Yugoslavia. To fully understand the place, meaning and the impact of this magazine on everyday lives of its readers, with the study of the content I also include examination of the role of its editor and the first Croatian woman journalist Marija Jurić Zagorka. Finally, this thesis examines readers' responses to the content, their opinions, interactions between the readers and the editor, as well as interactions between the readers themselves for the overall assessment of the significance of enski list in the history of popular women's press in Croatia, and Yugoslavia. This thesis is a historical project which uses two theoretical approaches to study of media: feminist political economic approach, and the feminist critique of the public sphere. By combining these two theoretical standpoints I illuminated some of the ways in which media participate in everyday lives of people, specifically marginalized groups, in this case women. Situating the study within the historical context of the interwar Yugoslavia, and interwar Europe was important for understanding of this project, and its research questions. In this study I used multiple methods: (a) textual; (b) historical and biographical and, (c) audience study. In the larger part of this study which is a narrative discourse analysis of the content of enski list, I was also inspired by the interpretive ethnography of texts. I connected ethnography to feminist theory and political economy, to circumstances of gendered everyday practices and to circumstances of media culture production, all within the specific historical context. In this study I found that women in the changing socio-political and economic context expressed their relation to capitalism and modernity in different ways, sometimes exerting their critiques and the refusal of the existing patriarchal structures and sometimes seeking inclusion within the structures, with the intent to practice primarily gender equality by direct participation. Finally, the analysis of enski list has told an important story of the place of media, and the women's press in particular, in initiating, carrying, and challenging traditional and emerging discourses in the hope that they would contribute to the ways in which society can be imagined differently.

Since 2014, Airbnb has been the poster-child for an impassioned debate over how to best regulate short-term home rentals (STR’s) in New Orleans, Louisiana. As critical perspectives toward on-demand economic practice become increasingly common, it is important to understand how the impacts of STR platforms like Airbnb extend beyond the realm of what is traditionally conceptualized as the economic (i.e., pressure on housing markets). In this thesis, I explore the ways in which Airbnb recalibrates the spatial and temporal rhythms of everyday neighborhood life for people external to the formal trappings of an STR contract. Drawing in particular on theories of authenticity and feminist political economy, I argue that locals’ emotional labor of “playing host” is necessarily enrolled into the creation of value for Airbnb, and is essential to the reproduction of the platform’s business model and marketing rhetoric.

The dissertation thesis Structures and hierarchies in professional discourse of journalists in the Czech Republic with a focus on the factor of gender deals with professional self-reflection of Czech daily news journalists from the perspective of feminist political economy. This attitude connects the field of gender media studies and the political economy of communication, stresses the intersection of gender and other factors (demographic, socio- cultural, economic, organizational) when examining the influences in the profession and poses questions about the extent of individual autonomy in both professional and extraprofessional hierarchies. The theoretical introduction defines the field of gender media studies in terms of topics and conflicting ideas, summarizes the conclusions of gender research on media institutions and focuses on the perspective of studying gender among many influences in the news such as economic, sociocultural and organizational factors. The analysis of in-depth interviews with Czech daily news journalists reveals how the importance of gender as an influence in news media is constructed in professional discourse in the context of other structural and organizational influences. Based on the collected data and its analysis, it suggests focusing in detail on the possible...

Tanzania has in the recent years kept a steady economic growth and the poverty rate has fallen significantly. At the same time, informal financial services have increased in popularity as a tool for poverty reduction. Previous research claims that gender equality will progress when economic development is taking place. But despite the economic development, the situation for Tanzanian women is still tough and the man is considered to be the head of the household. This paper aims to show why Tanzania is a deviant case regarding economic development and gender equality, and investigate how informal financial services impact women empowerment, by looking at membership in Village Community Banks. Feminist theories are used to explain why economic development and gender equality does not always have a linear relationship. It is concluded that membership in Village Community Banks have impacted the women on a personal level, enhancing self-confidence and belief. However, the gender equality within the household is not progressing due to a patriarchal social ordering, where the male is superior and the female inferior. It is not enough to focus on financial services, such as access to savings and credit, for a woman to be empowered enough to become equal to her husband.

This dissertation turns to recent feminist history of the 1980s to consider feminism’s relationship to class, economics, and labour. Challenging the idea that feminism is an inclusive project, I look at how feminist ideology produces commonsense forms of racism, classism, and sexual normativity. To demonstrate this argument, I evaluate two important moments in 1980s Canadian feminism: the development of feminist political economy and the debates of the feminist sex wars. In tracing the ways in which these histories unfold to value some feminist subjects more than others, I show how feminist narratives appear cohesive through quotidian practices of exclusion. I claim that the resistance of marginalized subjects is integral to these narratives, particularly when this resistance has been made to appear invisible or absent. I first turn to feminist political economy to show how a white feminist discourse about gendered domestic labour emerged while simultaneously omitting analyses of the experiences of women of colour and migrant domestic labourers. This white feminist discourse is imbued with commonsense racism, and imagines migrant domestic workers as located elsewhere to feminism. Subsequently, I examine how the feminist sex wars pursued a line of inquiry into sexuality that privileged a framework of danger. Feminist theorizing of violence against women as intrinsic to prostitution and pornography had dire consequences for understanding sex work and the diverse women employed in the industry. In promoting a white, middle-class perspective on sexuality, feminists appropriated sex workers’ experiences of violence and sought state support for abolishing commercial sexuality, in turn contributing to the heightened state surveillance of sexual minorities. In looking to and for marginalized women’s experiences within an archive of women’s publishing, this project insists on the integral place of sex workers and migrant domestic workers within Canadian feminist labour histories. / Thesis / Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) / What is feminist labour history, and whom does it include? In a study of feminist periodicals published during the 1980s, I consider how feminist writing contributes to the project of women’s liberation. In particular, I explore debates between feminists over race, class, and sexuality. I claim that feminist periodicals offer a window into the ideas animating feminists in the 1980s, and document the ways in which women’s household labour, paid domestic work, prostitution, and pornography were taken up—or ignored—by feminists. I show how everyday practices of race, class, and sexual supremacy have created narratives where white, middle-class women’s experiences appropriate and stand in for diverse feminist histories.