We Have Brains Collab topic: Magazines and You
Please put on your imagination caps. You have been granted the position of editor for a new feminist magazine. Your budget is not a problem, allowing you to be picky about writers and advertising. What would this magazine look like? Who would be your target audience and why? What types of articles would you have and who would write for them? What would be featured on the cover? To follow up on the question from last week, if popular culture figures such as Christina and Britney (or pink, jessica simpson, avril l. and so on) wanted to be on the cover, what would you cite as your standards and would they be featured?
I'm hoping this hasn't been covered - the topic I was going to post was done last summer. If it has, I apologize!
This week's topic would be a dream come true for me - to be able to build a Feminist 'zine from the ground up. Physically, it would be made of materials used on Yes! Magazine - recycled paper, soya based inks, nothing glossy. It would be of normal size, so it fits in a tote bag, and there would be a paperless edition available on the 'net in both ebook and pdf form offered at a drastically reduced subscription price. Covers would go to people who had accomplished something of interest and benefit to women and the world. Angelina Jolie's work as a good will ambassador for the UN would make the cut. Nothing Britney or Christina has done would be worth killing a tree. I'd rather choose people like Starhawk for the cover though, someone who works tirelessly and get sneered at by the press if she gets mentioned at all.
There would be a legal section covering Constitutional, and civil concerns, and I'd beg top female attorneys to contribute - Gloria Allred would be thoroughly sick of my calls until she agreed to work with us. I'd also look for retired Female Judges. There would be a section for issues affecting women in the third world, another for women of color, one for very young womenand another for Women and Religion which would include all religions, and there would be something about Women's Religion in every issue. I'd ask Marija Gimbutas, Margot Adler, Diane Stein, Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Robin Morgan, Naomi Wolfe, Toni Morrison, Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg, Mavis Leno to contribute. I'd also make it as easy as possible for emerging writers to participate. I'd feature a High School and a college student activist and/or writer in every issue. There would be a section highlighting women running for public office, as well as women running movements like Code Pink and the V Day campaign. I'd want it to be a sort of clearinghouse for Pro-Women social and political movements. We would put a lot less emphasis on being PC than a Ms. does, but be a little more grounded than some of the younger 'zines. Representations of women in the media would be a major focus, as would women's sexuality.
And then, sadly, I woke up.
Miss World from the album Live Through This by Hole



















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