It’s time for women to radically change our views about pornography. By radically change our views, I mean views both as in watch more porn and views as in attitudes. Statistics suggest that half of all women with access watch porn, but there’s still a veil of shame to it. Why? After all, most people, male or female,…
Listed in some exciting women’s month features
I was incredibly honoured and quite stunned, frankly, to be one of twelve esteemed women (including Michelle Obama, and other heavy weighers!) to feature in ELLE Magazine Malaysia feature “Celebrating International Women’s Day: 12 women changing the world”. https://www.elle.my/life-and-love/Career-and-Money/gallery/Women-who-make-it-happen#1 It was also a delight and honour to be among YNaija’s Nigeria’s 100 most influential women list. https://lindaikeji.blogspot.de/2015/03/meet-nigerias-100-most-influential.html Check…
7 ways that women are oppressed without knowing it
I will live but that is all that I will do for patriarchy, is my conscientious feminist motto. It is not always an easy task for women, however, because society constantly tries to diminish feminist consciousness by encouraging women to redefine rather than, remove, oppression. For instance, rather than embolden legal action against rape, women are encouraged to…
7 great novels by African women writers
“In the stories we tell ourselves, we tell ourselves,” said Michael Martone rightly. We also read ourselves in the books we read, or at least in those books that we cherish. For this reason, one of my 2014 resolutions was to return to a favourite pastime, namely reading fiction. For some years my reading life…
The objectification of men
I am intrigued, despite my previous post about how African women’s art is feminist, by how seldom women artists (from Africa but also elsewhere) objectify the male body. We lose out from this disengagement with the male as object. Whether it is fine or digital art, photography or sculpture, we are culturally deprived of an artistic female…
Meditations with Lorna Simpson
Why do I like pictures that seem ghostly? I’m not religious and I am no more spiritual than any one else. I’m not an atheist either but I cherish rational argument. I spend quite a lot of my time upside down, in Adho Mukha Svanasana and occasionally Urdhva Dhanurasana and so on, and yet despite my fondness for…
What does women’s day mean to African bloggers?
When I was seventeen, I got a job as a telephone salesperson of ink cartridges. The worst thing about the job was that I was so good at it. I was promoted and was eventually earning a serious lot of money. I don’t know what made me a successful ink cartridge seller but I use…
Dressing up as Frida Kahlo
A few weeks ago, ahead of FRIDA – Female Revolution in Dance & Art, I got “unibrowed”, moustached, red lippied and dressed up as the legend Frida Kahlo for the International Women’s Month event. Or rather, as Frida Kahlo in a selection of her self-portraits. The photos, which are part of the ongoing exhibition, were…
Can women have it all? On marriage, motherhood and work
One of the most popular articles in 2012 was “Why women still can’t have it all“, by Anne-Marie Slaughter in The Atlantic. It received the most facebook likes any Atlantic article has ever received and everyone from Michelle Obama to Gloria Steinem weighed in on the matter. Whether or not women can have it…
The Independent: Twitter, power lists and the question of gender
Power list after power list fail to represent women as influential in social media and in society at large. Why is it that women are not considered influential on social media and particularly on Twitter? To understand why, we we must answer a few basic questions: What does influence mean? How is it measured? And…
My Afropolitan fashion shoot with Essentials Magazine
I was recently featured in Essentials magazine in an article about women whose style reflects who they are. Here are some photos from the shoot. How would you describe your style? Who are your favourite African designers? Anything else fashion related come to mind?— — SUBSCRIBE TO MY NEWSLETTER
MsAfropolitan Boutique Interview Series – Douriean Fletcher, founder of eKlektik eKhos
The mission of the MsAfropolitan Boutique is to showcase and offer a handpicked range of products made by African Diaspora women on a rotating basis. Visit us here. As part of my journey to achieving this goal, I’ve met many inspiring women whose stories I want to share with you in an interview series features which…
The melodious song of longing, Baaba Maal – In Praise of the female voice
Apart from lyrical gratification, what do you get when you fill the Royal Festival Hall in London Southbank with artists like Senegalese superstar and advocate of women’s rights Baaba Maal, Speech Debelle, VV Brown, Eska, Krystle Warren and Annie Flore? You get a powerful evening of inspirational female voices from across three continents aptly title…
Mixed race femme fatale, or blonde bombshell?
Returning to the race topic, not because I love talking about it but because it makes me feel somewhat uncomfortable and pushing ourselves out of our comfort zones is good. I also do think we have become too p.c. in how we tackle racial tensions. I agree we should be speaking of them delicately, but…
American Apparel joins the black hair debate
So in short – Zeitgeist brand American Apparel prefers Solange to Beyonce. Following the recent revelation that when it comes to staff the company is more interested in the natural hair look than what they wrongly referred to as the trashy look, there’s been a lot of hoo ha about American Apparel having policies on…