Welcome to Litsy!

A quick look back through history at how women have been silenced in the arena of public speaking for centuries. From the first written example of Telemachus telling his mother Penelope to shut up in 'The Odyssey', to women being hounded off social media today for daring to have an opinion.

It contains an analysis of the ways in which those in power have usually been educated in classical education & how the male-centric views of (continued)

The number of books in English on the shelves of my local library tripled recently and look what I found: Women & Power in a shiny shiny cover. I don't know whether the publisher was trying to appeal to the YA fantasy market (in which case good for them!) or what... Anyway, it is both informative and engaging, as you would expect from Mary Beard.

Really interesting - I would like to read a longer book exploring these ideas of women & power including throwback to Greco-Roman times.

Plus #bookspinbingo board for August!

So I‘ve just watched Mary Beard interviewing Gary Numan.
It was very surreal.

Short, important, and a unique historical perspective.

Hillary Clinton referenced this in The Book of Gutsy Women, & I knew I had to read it. A very short book, it‘s about the history of women being silenced and pushed out of power, dating from Greek/Roman times.
“For a start it doesn‘t much matter what line you take as a woman, if you venture into traditional male territory, the abuse comes anyway. It is not what you say that prompts it, it‘s simply the fact that you‘re saying it.”

Day 6: Women & Power: A Manifesto by Mary Beard

There is something very affirming about reading this book after studying Classical Civilisation – it really articulates this general unease I felt when reconciling the classical world and classical literature with how it is used in modern times to uphold ideals, exert superiority, and exclude people.

#7days7books

As a shallow American dumdum, my knowledge of the ancient world is really limited to Harry Hamlin‘s nipples in Clash of the Titans. In Women & Power, Mary Beard explains how entrenched misogyny is in the Western world and has been since the ancient Greeks. (Which, duh, Zeus is a rape monster) This collection of two speeches was informative and made me want to know more, so I‘ve put SPQR on my holds list. 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼

In this short book that contains two essays, Beard looks at how women has been silenced since the dawn of time and how women who speak up or doesn‘t follow the norm are treated.

#NFNov

Mansplaining and a sad reality #NFNov

This book details how women are perceived when they enter traditionally masculine fields like politics. Beard chronicles how women have been silenced since the ancient Greco-Roman period till how women are targeted on social media and other online platforms. Beard focuses on women in politics but her historical examples are revealing. #NFNov

#TIL #NFNov
Already in the Odyssey, a women is told to shut up. The Odyssey is more than Odysseus story of getting home after the Trojan Wars, and his wife Penelope waiting on him. It is also about their son Telemachus, and his growing up.

So the first time a women is told to shut up is when Telemachus tells his mother that speech is the business of men.

I had no idea that this was the beginning of Western literature

I‘ve started this for #NFNov today

@Clwojick @rsteve388

This slim but powerful book is the result of two lectures Beard has given (2014 and 2017). Looking back at stories from ancient Greeks and the Romans, Beard tells us how women‘s voices are continued to be silenced from ancient times till today. An informative read in an engaging narrative.
#NFNov

Thank you @Kalalalatja for gifting me this book, I‘ve finally read it after so long! 😁🙈💕

Beard uses a famous cartoon from Punch magazine that illustrates what she calls “the Miss Triggs question”, in depicting how women‘s voices are ‘not publicly heard in our own contemporary culture.‘ The cartoonist is Riana Duncan, who captured the sexist atmosphere of the boardroom 30 years ago.
#NFNov

This makes me laugh!
#NFNov

#NFNov

While I love watching documentaries, I don't read much non-fiction. Women and Power by Mary Beard has been my only #nonfiction read of the year so far! An interesting read full of personality - I wish it had been a little longer.
#GratefulReads Day 5 @Alwaysbeenaloverofbooks @OriginalCyn620

“We find repeated stress throughout ancient literature on the authority of the deep male voice in contrast to to the female...the tone and timbre of women‘s speech always threatened to subvert not just the voice of the male orator but also the social and political stability, the health, of the whole state.”

WOMEN AND POWER is an essay based on a couple of lectures that Mary Beard gave about how some aspects of misogyny today can be traced back to the Greco-Roman times. A really interesting and thought-provoking read. I only wish it had been longer!

#essay #feminist

This week has been a bit of a washout for #BFCr2 and apologies to #teamlitnfit for being a bit MIA! It's been a busy week what with packing up my flat in Palma and moving (temporarily) back to the UK, meeting my new little niece, sorting out my paperwork for Thailand, and generally trying to Marie Kondo everything I own 🙈

@mcipher @wanderinglynn @BeckyB @Books.Bottles.and.Babies @DebbieGrillo @okthislooksbad @twohectobooks @krayoncolorz

Here we go... my #nomakeup #nofilter selfie for #BFCr2 I've had to wait for today as I was being a bit vain and was waiting for the scratch on my cheek to heal 🙈

#teamlitnfit

@mcipher @wanderinglynn

So excited to start this today!

Take 2 at reviewing this fab little collection of lectures. Mary Beard is succinct yet knowledgable. Loved the first chapter which touched on some sociolinguistics as well as drawing on feminist thinking, classical history and modern politics. Thanks for sending this one @jenniferw88

The final title in my female voices in power audiobook trifecta is this short one by Mary Beard. She's a highly respected classics scholar and in this she's expanding on 2 lectures she's given. Delving into history & literature she tracks how the silencing of women is not a new phenomenon but one that is so old that it's informed much of the ways that we perceive & accept power as a concept, and what that has meant for women throughout history.

Thank you @TrishB for the book and bookmarks. I can‘t wait to read this one 🖤

Thanks @kaysworld1 for the lovely card ❤️
Appreciate it ladies 😘😘 #jbuk

There's not much feminist thought that's really new to me, but I like how Beard puts together the ideas here. Women being like men isn't a long-term solution to gaining society's acceptance of women in power. What we need is a shift in how we define leadership. Or so I summarize. Helps explain why I bristle when people tell my teen Girl Scout that she can earn her Eagle Scout now instead of that Gold Award no one's heard of.

This is so good. Mary Beard connects history, politics, literature, and personal experience to explore the ways women have power and voice, and more especially the ways women lack power and voice. It is well worth the read. I definitely need to get on reading more of her stuff.

Here is a closer look at the goodies from @TrishB —the Mary Beard book is gorgeous. Thank you again, my friend!

My girls were just as excited as I was about the lovely Litsy package that arrived today! Thank you, Trish for all the amazing feminist goodies. ♥️♥️♥️ I‘m so honored by your thoughtfulness & generosity!

The girls love the silly pens, as you can see, and I love everything else! 😘

“...if you were ever doubtful about the extent to which the exclusion of women from power is culturally embedded or unsure of the continued strength of classical ways of formulating and justifying it - well, I give you Trump and Clinton, Perseus and Medusa, and rest my case.” Mary Beard - Women and Power

I love this story.

This is SPOT ON! This happened to me too many times in my old workplace. That, coupled with male members of staff claiming credit for my work/ideas and being largely ignored when I suggested new ways of thinking, made for a pretty toxic workplace. The mansplaining was also real, particularly from a person who was new to the job when I‘d already had six years‘ experience. I didn‘t realise until I left and started at a new location. Not again!

Continuing my half term reading with this one. I‘ve only read a few pages but I‘m liking it so far 👊🏼

Rented this from the online library app. A very short but insightful read. Definitely gets you thinking.

Just a few off my #FebruaryTBR. Like half the world, I can't wait for On the Come up. I'm slower than some to read The Library Book and Women & Power but here I go, finally! And lastly, I've read Meaty but now it's in glorious audiobook format and read by the author, the hilarious, inimitable Samantha Irby. #LiteraryLove

This session was .... a little annoying. Mary Beard and Germaine Greer in a panel conversation but the Festival had dragged in a very smart Indian woman who was aggressively rebuked by an English panelist with clearly no actual idea about the Indian experience of MeToo and she didn‘t speak again. Beard‘s book sounds like a classically grounded and rational feminist treatise well worth the read and she‘s an amazing speaker (as is Greer!!)

In the final song of Hamilton #WhoLivesWhoDies I was always struck by the lyrics about Eliza's accomplishments after Alexander died. Above are just a few of the recent nonfiction books by extraordinary women about extraordinary women who are only now receiving their long overdue recognition for their achievements & contributions.
#MusicalNewYear
@Cinfhen

“Unpopular, controversial or just plain different views when voiced by a woman are taken as indications of her stupidity. It is not that you disagree, it is that she is stupid: ‘Sorry, love, you just don‘t understand.‘”

I read this short book in one sitting. It is a fascinating, eye opening discussion of power and the social, cultural and political efforts to keep it out of the hands of women. It should be required reading for all young people.

A slice of pumpkin pie and a #nonficnov read. I didn‘t realize that this was the texts of two speeches Beard gave in 2014 and 2017. As such it‘s only 115 pages long. I‘m almost done with it and I just wish it were longer

Adapted from lectures classicist Mary Beard gave at the British Museum in 2014, this slim volume is timely and powerful. The primary subject is female silence. I tabbed so many pages to go back and reflect on, and I might as well have tabbed them all.

Struggling with jet lag and catching up before returning to work tomorrow after a couple of weeks in southern England so I don't think I'll get much reading in today, but this my modest book haul from the trip. We found several great indie book shops that were fun to explore during our time there.

After some interesting conversations with my cousins on women and men positioning society and perception... More to think about. Thanks again @TrishB :)

Again, an uncooperative cat, but too cute not to take a photo! An interesting couple of essays about how our attitudes to women in power mirror those of the ancient Greeks and Romans. #essays #feminism #nonfiction

Two #shelves I don‘t show off all that often 😄 my non fiction shelf at the top, and my pretty, old books shelf at the bottom 👌

#31bookpics

Thank you @TrishB it's a lovely surprise and the book theme is just in my interest on non fiction :) plus I loved that the first bookmark I saw was the paris one :)

I took a long time to read this. I set it down a few times because the writing especially in the first essay felt really dry. But there is some good information in here, and I would recommend it.

This is a really good, short read exploring the idea that women have been silenced forever and the stories we look to historically enforce that and shape our thinking. Powerful read. #readwoman

I‘m glad to know I‘m not the only one who doesn‘t always call up women in my mind for things. #readwomen #feminist

Nice set of lectures that use myth as examples to show how women were silenced in the past and how easily their ideas are squelched and dismissed today. I would have liked delving into more examples of how women were treated in myths or older literature. Even when they were not entirely at fault it was women such as Medusa pictured above that were punished. Today women who are in high power positions are still labeled/ pictured in news as evil.