lin·gua·phile

Scarlett Johansson, when asked if we see Black Widow and Hawkeye in a romantic situation. (via helicarrier)

(via the-eyre-affair)

From an article about the reviews downplaying/ignoring the importance of Black Widow in the film, and the role of women in action in general. (via honeyspider)

(via dduane)

archiemcphee:

This is Makpal Abdrazakova, she is 25, and she lives in Aksu-Ayuly, central Kazakhstan. She cuts an awesome figure, doesn’t she? She is making headlines for something she’s been doing since she was 13. Makpal is a golden eagle hunter, a berkutchi, and participates in competitions that evaluate how well her eagle, 10-year-old Akzhelke, can catch and kill prey. She has won several of the local contests, which also demonstrate the bond between the bird and its master.

The bond in her case began with feeding the golden eagle when her father Murat was away. He taught her the ancient sport after getting the approval and blessing of the local elders, since it has traditionally been practiced only by men. Since 2003, they and the professional hunters have welcomed her, and she remains the only woman in Kazakhstan to compete.

She does not, however, want to be the last: “I hope that in the future there will be more berkutchi-girls,” she says in her native language (see video here). Golden eagles have been used in falconry for centuries (see slideshow here) and are among the world’s fiercest birds, with the ability to fly at their prey at 190mph with their razor-sharp talons. They weigh up to 15lbs, grow up to 3’ tall, and have a wingspan of up to 7’.

Makpal describes, “The bird can be difficult, but if she gets used to her master, who tames her, she learns. She begins to understand human language, and further training is easy. If the bird has a good relationship with someone, she begins to see the person within her master.”

A traditional saying in Kazakhstan states, “As a man trains his eagle, so too does the eagle train his man.” Makpal and her bird may have trained each other, but the woman has also been training in law. “I don’t need to give up being a berkutchi. I will do both things at once.”

How completely awesome!

[via Quigley’s Cabinet]

(via luxheroica)

No, really. Let’s recap the things that have come up in this essay — that are, in some cases, essential to this essay’s construction — that I first thought about or learned about thanks to the quality social justice commentary that shows up on my dash on a regular basis:

• a focus on female relationships (this paper started out with the question, “Why do women keep trying to kill each other in this novel? Why can’t they just be friends?”)
• notions of intersectionality and the inability to explain oppression or privilege accurately based on a single trait (this novel is all about the intersections of sexism, racism, and classism)
• a method of reading culture against the grain in order to put it to use in a broader context, however unintended that context may have been to the empowered producers of culture (a method that, I would argue, this novel also encourages and embodies)

Frankly, the awesome people I follow on Tumblr have gone a long way in helping me realize some of my own unquestioned privileges and prejudices and complicities which were NOT OKAY but which, without the commentary of others, I might never have seen as not okay. 

fangirlingforeverz:

invaderk:

bookofstars:

roxanneritchi:

m-azing | girlfrombasingse:

We all knew that’s what they were thinking.

“…Korra…………”

“…GOD I LOVE SPORTS……………”

“I can’t stop thinking about her…”

“I CAN’T WAIT TO PUNCH SOME MORE GUYS IN THE HEAD WITH WATER FISTS…”

#guys what if korra x mako is hilarious #WHAT IF IT IS HILARIOUS #i love hilarious things#hilarious things are my favorite things of all #what a great ending #mako all OH NO I SUDDENLY HAVE CAUGHT AN EMOTION #korra all I LOVE PUNCHING THINGS! I CAN’T WAIT TO PUNCH MORE STUFF!!! #good #good people #good story #good work

#If you thought when I compared Mako to Mr. Darcy I meant dark and brooding and OMG RIVALS TO LOVERS #You thought wrong #I meant doofy dudes and hilarity and excellent ladies

This is the Makorra that I ship. This is it.

Amen to all of this! At some point I will write up a long rant about the problem with modern readers of Austen going on about the male leads when THESE ARE NOVELS ABOUT WOMEN AND FEMALE EXPERIENCE, and in light of this I want to emphasize that Mako’s characterization at present is NOT why I would, eventually, at some future point, like to see romantic interaction between Mako and Korra. Or at least not directly.

To bring back the Pride and Prejudice comparison: Elizabeth spends the first half of the novel not knowing, not caring, that Darcy thinks anything of her. She goes around being her badass self, trekking miles in the mud to visit her sister, engaging in witty wordplay, occasionally not being as discerning as she ought to be (ex. trusting Wickham’s side of the story), but ultimately fiercely loyal to people and to principles that, I think we can all agree, matter.

Now, Darcy’s observation of all of this changes him — but not because that is Elizabeth’s intention. She is just there, being herself FOR herself (and for those she cares about). When Darcy first admits his feelings for her she’s totally baffled and DOES NOT RECIPROCATE THEM: her refusal is not just a pose, and I don’t believe that Austen means her readers to think that Elizabeth’s refusal is wrong. Highly unconventional, yes, but Austen’s novelistic practice is all about revaluing conventional expectations, and it’s clear that she believes in mutual respect as a foundation of any worthy relationship (see for comparison the failed marriage between Mr. and Mrs. Bennet, which gets hashed out within the novel’s first chapter, before Elizabeth is even physically present in the story!). And Austen does not blame Elizabeth for not having that respect for Darcy. Not in the least.

So, circling back around to Korra and Mako, when I say that I would like to see a romantic narrative play out between them, and that I view it through the lens of Pride and Prejudice, what I really mean to say is that I want this to take the necessary time for both parties to come to terms with what they may or may not feel, and I want Korra to be in love with fighting and to have no real thought for Mako at all except that he’s ridiculous and his scarf is a silly affectation only really useful for disguising oneself from the Equalists (because obviously it looks better on her than on him), and I want it to be a LONG LONG TIME before anything else occurs. Because at the end of the day I go back to Pride and Prejudice as a touchstone because of ELIZABETH, the force of her individuality and the realness of her mistakes and her attempts to remedy them, the power of her personality with all its faults and contradictions. Not because of Darcy. And no matter what happens with Mako, my primary interest here is and will always be with what is best or most interesting for KORRA’S narrative.

Finally, to adapt something I’ve said before about Dairine/Roshaun: 

To say “I ship X/Y” often leads to the problematic assumption that the shipper in question wants this ship to be canon NOW, in utter disregard of proper character and conflict development arcs, etc.; rest assured, that is not a valid assumption to make of my intentions when I say “I ship Korra/Mako.”

(via thistlewitch)

oliviacirce:

zlot:

dollsome-does-tumblr:

Favorite Downton Abbey Scenes (That Didn’t Actually Ever Happen) : #1 - Mary and Lavinia’s tearful love confession [2x09 - “The Christmas Special”]

Lavinia and Mary have grown closer than ever in the months following Lavinia’s recovery from the Spanish Influenza, thanks to Mary’s steadfast presence by Lavinia’s bedside and their shared impatience with the love square they’ve found themselves entangled in. Mary’s engagement to Carlisle is becoming more set in stone with every day; meanwhile, Matthew’s determination to marry Lavinia has been ardently strengthened by her brush with death, and they’ve set the wedding date for December 31. In this memorable scene, hailed by critics as a surprising but elegantly executed and beautifully acted plot twist that no one but the internet fangirls saw coming, Mary pays a late night visit to Lavinia’s bedroom to wish her well … and instead, the two women are forced to ask themselves — and each other — what it is they truly want. (And then they run away to Paris.)

#ZLOT THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT #ALL YOUR FAULT!

SELDOM AM I EVER BLAMED FOR ANYTHING SO WONDERFUL

aadflkjal;dkfj;lkajflk THIS.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m ecstatic that Mary/Matthew is endgame because I am sort of addicted to people who end up with the very opposite sort of person that they thought was meant for them, but I am mortified by the way that the show went about doing this.

There are too few complex female relationships of all kinds represented on television, and Mary and Lavinia had so much potential to be the complex relationship that kept viewers interested. What if there really were two girls who were attracted to (or at least had deep and complicated feelings for) the same guy, but could — gasp! — also be friends with each other? Maybe even more than friends! Maybe it’s only one-sided — maybe Lavinia discovers during Matthew’s paralysis that she’s weirdly relieved not to have to have a sexual relationship with this man, maybe she loves Mary more than she could ever love her former fiance and admits this to Mary only to hear from Mary that the feeling isn’t mutual, and so Lavinia graciously bows out of her betrothal to Matthew (and there is still Matthew-Mary drama, and Matthew can still blame Mary for losing Lavinia). But maybe it is mutual! Maybe Mary and Lavinia meet each other because of a man but what they have turns out to be so much more than just Matthew, and maybe he’s ultimately a part of their equation and they all live together in a house in the country, and maybe he’s not and Mary and Lavinia go off to New York together and live it up in the roaring twenties!

But do you notice what all of these “maybes” have in common? In none of them does Lavinia get piously sacrificed to a narrative that suggests that the only valid, long-term, interesting relationships are heterosexual romantic relationships!

Bottom line: I may not even be sure if (or how) I ship Mary/Lavinia, but I would have really appreciated seeing the Mary-Matthew-Lavinia relationship play out at greater length and with a real equilateral triangle geometry going on (i.e. one in which Mary and Lavinia were allowed to develop a relationship as central and significant, though in different ways, as the one between Mary and Matthew). None of this “straight line” bullshit, please.

courtneygoof:

I’ve heard you recently said you don’t know how any young person could vote Democrat. I honestly don’t know how any young person, especially a young woman, could vote Republican. In fact, I am actually a registered Republican who is planning to vote to re-elect President Obama (GASP). I was raised in a conservative, Republican home, so when it came time to register two years ago, I just followed in my family’s footsteps. However, I now plan on giving Obama my full support.

For me, isn’t about party lines or republicans vs. democrats; it’s about the issues that matter to me. As a woman, I just can’t bring myself vote for any candidate that does not acknowledge me as a person. I was raised in a Christian home, but I will advocate for anyone’s right to choose. I’m one of the 98% of women who use birth control. I can’t vote or even seriously consider a candidate who wants to take that away from me.

This will be the first election that I am eligible to vote in. I’m happy to know I stand firmly behind my choice. I’m even happier to know that my choice stands firmly behind me.

-Courtney G

Emphasis mine.

(Source: barackobama)

avataraang:

meorkisyourpants:

New Korra trailer from Nick’s Upfront.

Wait. You guys. It says “April 14” at the end. As in THIS April 14th? I AM NOT PREPARED FOR THIS MUCH AWESOME.

(via burdge)

delladilly:

you know those things that feminists and social revolutionaries who mostly consume fiction and analyze it to death (aka tumblr) are always wishing for

like gosh it would be fabulous if we had young adult fiction where all the main characters were of color

or where the most important relationship was between two women

or where no women were demonized or hated or belittled or unrealistic or scapegoats, where all women were treated with compassion and respect

or where the love interest actually genuinely respected and listened to the protagonist

or if fantasy used its freedom to investigate the shitty things that bind our world, colonialism and racism and misogyny and a thousand forms of structured oppression that we’re so deeply trenched in that it’s hard to see them properly

like ALL OF THOSE THINGS, if you told me that a book could give me ALL OF THOSE THINGS, I probably wouldn’t believe you, and if I did, I would be satisfied with it, I would be bloated by it, it would be all I would need or want

and I know I sound like an infomercial, but Cold Magic has all of that— AND MORE

it’s steampunk— genuinely steampunk the way steampunk was meant to be, reconstructing history from the ice age onwards to make you think about the way our history happened and how it formed the society that we assume is unavoidable and authentic and real

and this ice age went on longer, and the Roman Empire didn’t fall till the year 1000, and one of the principle arguments of the book, which takes place 800 years later, is that the Romans told lies

and plus there are sentient dinosaurs. 

REVOLUTIONARY ANTI-COLONIALIST FEMINIST THEORY

AND

SENTIENT

DINOSAURS

and the heroine is brave and rude and a little cocky, and she holds her secrets tight to her chest, and she thinks with her feet and keeps going

and she gets the dreamiest unlikeliest most besotted love interest you’ve ever met, who takes an absurd amount of pride in his clothing, who is angry about having sweet tender feeeeeelings

and let me remind you that both of them (plus everyone else of importance!!!) are of color

and there is magic, and magic interacting with politics, and with it investigations into freedom/power/safety/oppression/obligation/choice, and also it is sexy

and there are plagues and ghouls and a beautifully drawn spirit world, actually the most complete world building I’ve seen since His Dark Materials or Harry Potter

and the talking heads of poets

and also kissing, and hilariousness, and thrilling action, it’s described in the blurb as an Afro-Celtic Roman icepunk, like DO I HAVE TO BEAT YOU OVER THE HEAD WITH THIS BOOK TO MAKE YOU READ IT

BECAUSE I WILL

Having now read this and its sequel, Cold Fire, I can get 100% enthusiastically behind this whole squee. I did have some issues with the technical/writerly/craft aspects of the first book in the series, but most of those evaporated in the second installment, and I was able to do what I really wanted to do throughout the entire first book, which is be absolutely in love with everything these books are trying to be.

(Also in context of the whole “wow these are awesome because CHARACTERS OF COLOR,” the cover model for Cat bothers me. I’d be interested to see if Elliott had any say in this. Sometimes her admirable desire to be non-anachronistic and internally consistent makes it hard for me to visualize the people she is describing — and of course human history has just gone differently in this world and certain interracial mixes are way more common there than here, so this adds to the estrangement effect — BUT STILL, I picture Cat and Bee and definitely Andevai as darker-skinned than this cover model, and with a facial structure slightly less recognizably euro/western.)

animationart:

New BRAVE Clip. 

Holy hell I need this in my life yesterday and also crossover/fusion fic where Merida and Deryn are bestest best ladyfriends EVER. 

“I shoot for my own hand!”

brb falling in love with fictional ladies after knowing them for approx. 2 minutes

(via avatarsnowy)