In the media is a fortnightly round-up of features written by, about or containing female writers that have appeared during the previous fortnight and I think are insightful, interesting and/or thought provoking. Linking to them is not necessarily a sign that I agree with everything that’s said but it’s definitely an indication that they’ve made me think. I’m using the term ‘media’ to include social media, so links to blog posts as well as as traditional media are likely and the categories used are a guide, not definitives.
This fortnight’s been dominated by post-election coverage:
- Rebecca Traister, ‘Blaming Clinton’s Base for Her Loss Is the Ultimate Insult‘ in The Cut
- Mo Moulton, ‘An American in Brexit Britain: Reflections After the Presidential Election‘ on Catapult
- Toni Morrison, ‘Making America White Again‘ in The New Yorker
- Sal Randolph, ‘A Letter to My Male Friends Who May Not Know That They Are Women‘ on The Rumpus
- Gabrielle Bellot, ‘Queer Writers in the Age of Trump‘ on The Atlantic
- Hennessy Williams, ‘As a Sex Worker, I’m Terrified for the Next Four Years‘ on Vice
- Masha Gessen, ‘Why We Must Protest‘ on Literary Hub
- Valeria Luiselli, ‘This Is How the World Ends?‘ on Literary Hub
- Shani Gilchrist, ‘When There Is No Option to Forget: How My Family Shares Our Stories of Survival‘ on Catapult
- Jenny Zhang, ‘Against Extinction‘ on The New Enquiry
- Helen Lewis and Caroline Crampton, ‘How Ivanka, the new first daughter, sold the Trump brand to women‘ in the New Statesman
- Various, ‘What It Means To Be A Writer In The Time Of Trump‘ on The Huffington Post
- Kali Holloway, ‘Stop Asking Me to Empathize with the White Working Class‘ on Alternet
- Rhiannon Lucy Cosslett, ‘Hillary Clinton lost because of her gender, and it hurts like hell‘ in the New Statesman
- Muna Mire, ‘Resisting Trump’s Islamophobic Promise for America‘ on The New Enquiry
- Liz Meriwether, ‘After the Election, the White People of Los Angeles Adopted Pets‘ on The Cut
- Megan Garber, ‘Pop Culture Resents ‘The Establishment’ Too‘ in The Atlantic
- Sarah Blackwood, ‘Parenting by the Books: Slavery’s White Women‘ on The Hairpin
- Christina Sharpe, ‘Lose Your Kin‘ on The New Enquiry
- Melissa Febos, ‘Teaching After Trump‘ on Granta
- Rebecca Solnit, ‘How to Survive a Disaster‘ on Literary Hub
- Various, ‘Aftermath‘ in The New Yorker
- Rebecca Solnit, ‘Don’t call Clinton a weak candidate: it took decades of scheming to beat her‘ in The Guardian
- Abi Wilkinson ‘We need to talk about the online radicalisation of young, white men‘ in The Guardian
- Catherine Baker, ‘Queer grief and the secret chord with Kate McKinnon: it’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah‘ on Little Queer Ideograms
- Rachel Klein, ‘I, For One, As a White Woman, Welcome Our New Alien Overlords‘ on McSweeney’s
- Caitlin Frazier, ‘The Iconic Hillary Clinton‘ on The Atlantic
- Clare Foran, ‘Women Aren’t Responsible for Hillary Clinton’s Defeat‘ on The Atlantic
- Summer Brennan, ‘Cohen Dies, Trump Wins, and We Will Sing About these Dark Times‘ on Literary Hub
And the woman with the most publicity this fortnight is Zadie Smith. She’s interviewed on Literary Hub, Nylon, Waterstones, Lenny, The New York Times, The Atlantic, Slate and profiled by Sarah Hughes in The Observer.
The best of the rest:
On or about books/writers/language:
- Rebecca Slater, ‘Verse goes viral: how young feminist writers are reclaiming poetry for the digital age‘ in The Guardian
- Mica Lemiski, ‘Does Genre Really Matter?‘ on Room
- Emily Reynolds, ‘The literary glamour of madness‘ in The TLS
- Amy Kurzweil, ‘How I Made This Comic About How I Make My Comics: An Interactive Essay‘ on Catapult
- Miranda Popkey, ‘Call Me Elena‘ on The New Enquiry
- Sian Cain, ‘Costa book award 2016 shortlists dominated by female writers‘ in The Guardian
- Danielle Groen, ‘How Rupi Kaur Became the Voice of Her Generation‘ on Flare
- Aamna Mohdin, ‘Women are horribly under-represented in the world’s top literary awards‘ on Quartz
- Alanna Bennett, ‘The Harry Potter Fandom Is At A Crossroads‘ on Buzzfeed
- Ruth Padel, ‘Writing needs connection to the outside world: a lot of it seems to get done when you’re simply living’ in The Guardian
- Katherine Faw, ‘Elena Ferrante and Me: An Irrational Essay‘ on Catapult
- Svetlana Alexievich (tr. Anna Gunin and Arch Tait), ‘In Chernobyl‘ in Five Dials
- Melinda Sailsbury, ‘Why I will no longer submit my books for review by the Daily Mail or the Sun‘ in The Guardian
- Elaine Blair, ‘Chris Kraus, Female Antihero‘ in The New Yorker
- Ruth Scurr, ‘Elena Ferrante: Game of clothes‘ in the TLS
- Cornelia Funke, ‘Hurrah for translators: why we need to translate more children’s books‘ on BookTrust
- Nina Renata Aron, ‘Fake Failures: Why Are Successful Young Women Writers Playing Miserable Online?‘ on The Millions
- Zana Fraillon, ‘on writing about refugee children: “Their resilience keeps hope alive”‘ in The Guardian
- Jane Martinson, ‘Only 1.8% of sport articles are written by women – so much for progress‘ in The Guardian
- Jo Scott-Coe, ‘The Communion of Saints‘ on Talking Writing
- Milena Britto, ‘Women Writing in 21st Century Brazil: Experimentation and Narratives of Self‘ on Critical Flame
- Bim Adenwunmi, ‘Why “The Walking Dead” Has Become Fanfiction’s Muse‘ on Buzzfeed
Photograph by Rachel Eliza Griffiths
Personal essays/memoir:
- Kathleen Alcott’s Ghosts of Thanksgiving on Literary Hub
- Alison Stine, ‘Graffiti Taught Me Grit‘ on Lenny
- Jen Maidenberg, ‘Misfit Doc: In Living Colour‘ on Queen Mob’s
- Marian Ryan, ‘Things I Never Told Her‘ on Granta
- Kelly Luce, ‘Truth, Lies, and Videotape‘ in NY Mag
- Jen Sookfong Lee, ‘I Was Once That Girl‘ on Room
- Morgan Parker, ‘How to Stay Sane While Black‘ in The New York Times
- Ana Maria Guay, ‘Living in the Labyrinth of My Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder‘ on Catapult
- Elisabeth Sherman, ‘Why I Never “Fixed” My Teeth‘ on Catapult
- Evelyn Hampton, ‘Weightlessness‘ on Catapult
- Leah Kaminsky, ‘Finding Love at the End of History‘ on Literary Hub
- Esmé Weijun Wang, ‘After the Psych Ward, Eggs Are Freedom‘ on Extra Crispy
- Linda H. Davis, ‘Open After My Death‘ on Granta
- Eliza Kostelanetz Schrader, ‘The F Word‘ on Guernica
Feminism:
- Lisa Whittington-Hill, ‘Gateway Spice‘ on Hazlitt
- Alex Ronan, ‘What Women Used Before They Could Use the Law‘ in n+1
- Zoë Beaty, ‘Why we should celebrate our difficult friendships‘ on The Pool
- Kiera Feldman, ‘With Child‘ in Harper’s
Photograph by Kevin Day
Society and Politics:
- Celeste Ng, ‘Giving Thanks Is a Political Act‘ on Literary Hub
- Jane Martinson, ‘Why didn’t the Daily Mail put the jailing of Jo Cox’s murderer on its front page?‘ in The Guardian
- Anne Helen Peterson, ‘One Hundred Years Of Men Taking Off Their Shirts‘ on Buzzfeed
- Tara Isabella Burton, ‘Cult of One‘ on Real Life
- Rebecca Altman, ‘The Toxic-Waste Drum Is Everywhere‘ on The Atlantic
- Morgan Babst, ‘Everything Is Not Fine If It’s Not Fine for Everyone‘ on Literary Hub
- Charlotte Higgins ‘The hygge conspiracy‘ in The Guardian
- Ariel Ramchandani, ‘When the Devil Enters‘ on The Atavist Magazine
- Lara Whyte, ‘The Campaign Recruiting Former Extremists to Stop Girls from Joining ISIS‘ on Broadly
- Sara Peterson, ‘I Hate Shopping (and Shops Are the Problem)‘ on Catapult
The interviews/profiles:
- Kate Tempest (and Phoebe Waller-Bridge) in The Guardian
- Brit Bennett on Broadly
- Lydia Davis on Literary Hub and The TLS
- Alice Mattison on The Rumpus
- Emily Witt on Jezebel
- Magda Szubanski in The Guardian
- Julie Koh on Asymptote
- Lara Pawson on 3:am
- Chimamanda Ngozie Adichie on Racked
- Chivvis Moor on Literary Hub
- Elif Shafak in The TLS
- Ottessa Moshfegh on Publishers Weekly
- Ambai in the Indian Express
- Margot Livesey on The Millions
- Robin Coste Lewis on Literary Hub
- Carolyn Parkhurst on The Rumpus
- Elena Ferrante on Hazlitt
The regular columnists:
- Laurie Penny in The New Statesman
- Lucy Mangan in Stylist
- Roxane Gay in The Guardian US
- Yasmin Alibhai-Brown in The Independent
- Caitlin Moran in The Times
- Lauren Laverne in The Pool
- Ella Risbridger in The Pool
- Sali Hughes in The Pool
- Bim Adewunmi in The Guardian
- Sophie Heawood in The Guardian
- Eva Wiseman in The Observer
- Tracey Thorn in The New Statesman
- Chimene Suleyman and Maya Goodfellow on Media Diversified
- Josie Pickens on Ebony
- Bridget Christie in The Guardian
- Lizzy Kremer on Publishing for Humans
- Juno Dawson in Glamour
- Kashana Cauley on Catapult
- Louise O’Neill in the Irish Examiner
- Jendella Benson on Media Diversified
- Lola Okolosie in The Guardian
- Sarah Gerard, ‘Mouthful‘ on Hazlitt
- Books by Women We’d Love to See in English on Literary Hub
The Writes of Womxn 