#currently reading

[gatheringbones]

[“When I asked focus group participants again about body hair and their desires for women, Adam responded:

That’s what makes the woman different, her body, I don’t mind uh having hair in certain specific parts on her body um . . . in general I . . . like woman to be clean. Just in certain areas. But like I said, down in the genital, like it’s okay for me.

Hair, for Adam, Musiteli, and other participants, served as the visual representation of the differentiation between “men” and “women.” Further, Adam referred to a woman being hairless not only as “proper” but “cleanly,” as well.

Often, when I asked participants specifically about genital hair, the response was that they did not prefer hair due to cleanliness, hygiene, and other such myths surrounding body hair. The idea that hairlessness is cleanly is reflected in colloquial discourse (e.g., “clean shaven”). Ryan, an Indian American, cis-het man, explained to me his distaste for a “bush” or a large amount of hair genitally:

I just think like it's better to sometimes, maybe, fully shave it, like coordinate with your partner if you're going to do that, because then it could help but like, yeah, if like two people both have bushes then like you don't know what's going on. And, also, it's just like, cleaner. Like in terms of like keeping it clean. It's easier when you have less hair in those areas.

When I asked Liz, a cis-lesbian, Latina woman, whether she cares if a woman shaves her armpits and genitals or not, she similarly responded, “Yes (laughs). Yes definitely. It’s just . . . um . . . how should I call it? Hygiene. Hygiene.”

In Ryan, Liz, and Adam’s discourse, pubic hair is conceptualized as unclean, non-hygienic, and obtrusive. Such ideas, again, are not mere individual preference but are instead shaped by cultural and generational understandings of hair. Herzig highlights that “the normalization of smooth skin in dominant U.S. culture is not even a century old,” with such ideas arising during the same years as the Cold War with individuals in the United States describing “visible body hair on women as evidence of a filth, ‘foreign’ lack of hygiene.” Porn and the framing of sexually explicit material have also shaped cultural understandings of pubic hair. While pubic hair removal for women went out of vogue after the nineteenth century, it became popular once again in the 1980s, in part, due to pornographic depictions largely including hairless vulvas, and more recently, hairless bodies for men, as well. Cultural discourse surrounding pubic and body hair is, thus, shaped by racialized, gendered, and xenophobic understandings of the body and hair. The fact that these ideas are shared by immigrant participants/participants of color does not deny the racialized and xenophobic roots of such discourse, so much as it highlights the internalization of racism and xenophobia by immigrants and/or people of color, as an adaptive response to the racism of society.

As participants conceptualized hair as animal-like, masculine, and/or filthy, they also conceptualized of it as excess or surplus to the human (woman’s) body. Pubic hair shaped their idea of what it means to do womanhood and to be a woman. As such, participant discourse not only was shaped by racist, sexist, and xenophobic conceptualizations of hair that have proliferated in the United States but also cissexist concepts of manhood and womanhood as opposite, different, and biologically based. That which is “improper to manhood/womanhood within White schemas of a gender binary are unnatural, unclean, and undesirable.”]

alithia zamantakis, from thinking cis: cisgender heterosexual men, and queer women’s roles in anti-trans violence, 2023

[asmaa1995]

Hi

I am Asmaa from Gaza

I hesitated a lot before publishing this post!

But because of the war and its effects, my children's future and my scientific and practical experience were buried with our dreams.

There is confirmed news that the Rafah crossing will open during this period, and I have applied for many jobs in many Arab and European countries as a computer engineer... It may be an opportunity to continue, challenge, and build my dreams despite my limited capabilities.💪🏻

I am not writing to request financial assistance, but to help me exit through the Rafah crossing with the expensive coordination that we are unable to afford

The travel coordination for one person is $5,000 through the Rafah crossing.

My family is 4 people: my husband Ahmed and my children Omar and Rahaf.

Whoever wants to contribute to raising the amount so that my husband, children, and I can start building a future away from wars through knowledge, work, participation, love, and belonging, contact me via

[writtenroses1813]

I’m so sorry but in the nicest way possible do yall actually read books or just read words??? Cause I’ve been seeing that trend of people not understanding how “snarled” and “eyes darkened” and “eyes softened” etc. was used in a book and like…

Genuinely, do yall just not have imagination?? Or not understand figurative language??? Also eyes do literally darken and soften have you not lived a life??? How do you read with no imagination? Is this how you get through so many books in one month - you simply don’t take the time the understand the words as they are read?

[landsccape]

[catbrarian]

cats and libraries ۫ ꣑ৎ

[cansu-m]

[bookishfreedom]

on todays episode of “there aren’t enough hours in the day to read all of the books i want”

[figtreeforever]

Dostoevsky, The Idiot

Caspar David Friedrich, Gartenterrasse, 1811

(Collage: instagram @emmalinatotes)

[gatheringbones]

[“In my interviews with cis-het men and cis-LBQ women, nearly all participants (28/32) emphasized a desire for a natural look in a woman as regards hair and makeup and a desire for a muted or toned-down expression. It is important to ask, though, what constitutes a natural look? Does a natural look include wearing minimal, skin tone makeup? Does it include using only moisturizers, exfoliators, and cleansers but not wearing makeup? Or does a “natural look” refer to a completely unadulterated face—hair, pimples, and all? This list of question continues to grow when shifted to “natural hair.” I include within this category of natural hair and natural makeup a discussion of a desire for a muted or toned-down expression, as participants expressed a desire to see women in their “natural” element without bold aesthetics, makeup, or hair. The desire among participants for a muted aesthetic and natural hair/makeup connects around racialized and gendered views of how the body is stylized and expressed. As regards aesthetic, hair and makeup, participants detailed a disdain for that which is deemed “excessive.” What does it mean, though, for certain ways of looking, acting, and being to be considered excess and others to be considered natural?”]

alithia zamantakis, from thinking cis: cisgender heterosexual men, and queer women’s roles in anti-trans violence, 2023

[herigo]

[luvingsunshine]

sapiens: a brief history of humankind

[mgcsheaven]

realistically there is no chance i will have time to read, imma still bring a book though

[dearlyjess]

rainy november mornings spent reading and working on the thesis ☁️���️

[mostlyghostie]

Finished this one- the ‘Currently Reading Bedside Table’

Might order a few prints of this if anyone is interested

Shop / Instagram

[flowerytale]

Dizz Tate, from Brutes