Library Research Guides: Gender Studies: Playlists

Women's Equality Day 2020

In honor of Women's Equality Day, which commemorates the passage, ratification, and later certification of the 19th Amendment on August 26, 1920 (and this year is also a celebration of the 100th anniversary thereof), we present a series of playlists honoring the contributions of women, femmes, and trans+nonbinary folks in music across genres (many of which have traditionally excluded or undervalued their work).

We recognize, additionally, that, despite the work of many women of color suffragettes (read more here), the 19th Amendment only guaranteed the right to vote for some (read: white) women; BIPOC women had to wait many years before suffrage was accorded to them, and even then (even today) many people, including BIPOC, remain disenfranchised.

You can read more about the work of IU historians, and the history of suffrage in Indiana, here.

Scroll through to see the playlists we've created.

Image from Getty Images, courtesy of Gabriel Hackett

Retrospective of folk artists from the 60s & 70s. From chart topping artists like Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez to lesser known artists like Linda Perhacs and Elizabeth Cotten, explore the sound of female artists who shaped the course of folk, rock, and pop music into the 21st century.

Tomorrow is My Turn: A Look at Women of Color in Folk Music, Past and Present (Medium: Festival Peak)

"How Joni Mitchell Made Ladies of the Canyon and Galvanized the Singer Songwriter Movement" (Louder Magazine)

"Buffy Sainte-Marie: 75 Things to know about the Canadian Icon" (CBC Magazine)

Elizabeth Cotten- Folkways Spotlight

Retrospective of punk acts, from its inception through recent times. Explore the sounds of femme artists in punk and the ways they evolved the genre.

Blondie, Rock & Roll Hall of Fame Inductee Page

"For Laura Jane Grace, Punk was a Form of Armor" (NPR)

"ESG's Otherworldly Sound" (The New Yorker)

Queer-feminist punk: an anti-social history

Revenge of the she-punks: a feminist music history from Poly Styrene to Pussy Riot

Retrospective of artists (pop, rock, folk, etc.) from the 80s & 90s (and even a few from the early 00s). Explore the ways femme artists influenced the transitional decades from the 20th to 21st centuries.

"Liz Phair is not your Feminist Spokesmodel" (The New York Times)

"From the Archives: Tracy Chapman on NPR" (NPR)

"Erykah Badu: Godmother of Soul" (The New Yorker)

Retrospective of women and femmes in hip hop, from the 80s to today. Explore how femme artists have shaped the sound of hip hop across its evolution.

"Inside the Miseducation of Lauryn Hill" (Rolling Stone Magazine)

"Princess Nokia: 'At My Shows, Girls Can Take Up Space the Way Men Do'" (The Guardian)

"Rapper Kodie Shane: Confident, Young, Black, Queer, and About to Take Over" (Billboard Magazine)

God save the queens: the essential history of women in hip-hop

The new ladies of the canyon; folk and indie artists from the early 00s to today. Explore the influence of "ladies of the canyon" as it plays out in the next generation's music.

"Mitski is the 21st Century's Poet Laureate of Young Adulthood" (NPR)

"Weyes Blood on Stunning New LP, the Titanic Sinking, and Climate Change" (Rolling Stone Magazine)

"Courtney Barnett Talks About Taking on Misogyny and Self-Doubt with Her New Album" (Pitchfork)

Bisexual Awareness Day (9/23)

September 23rd is a day designated for recognizing and celebrating bisexual people, their history, and their community. Bisexuality is the quality or characteristic of being sexually and/or romantically attracted to people of one’s own gender as well as another gender or genders. This playlist brings together songs by, about, and for bisexual people in honor of the B in LGBTQ+! From artists suspected of being bisexual or bicurious (Britney Spears, Harry Styles), to out & proud bisexuals (Janelle Monae, Frank Ocean) this playlist encompasses a variety of genres (punk, pop, indie, r&b) through time. From Billie Holliday to Demi Lovato, bisexuals have always existed, despite attempts to erase their queerness. Enjoy this playlist on Bisexual Awareness Day (September 23rd) or any time you want to celebrate bi pride!

Click through the tabs to see some of the media we've highlighted to celebrate bisexual identity and experience.

Bi: Notes for a bisexual revolution by Shiri Eisner
Call Number: HQ74 .E35 2013
ISBN: 1580054749
Publication Date: 2013
Depicted as duplicitous, traitorous, and promiscuous, bisexuality has long been suspected, marginalized, and rejected by both straight and gay communities alike. Bi takes a long overdue, comprehensive look at bisexual politics, from the issues surrounding biphobia/monosexism, feminism, and transgenderism to the practice of labeling those who identify as bi as either "too bisexual" (promiscuous and incapable of fidelity) or "not bisexual enough" (not actively engaging romantically or sexually with people of at least two different genders). In this forward-thinking and eye-opening book, feminist bisexual and genderqueer activist Shiri Eisner takes readers on a journey through the many aspects of the meanings and politics of bisexuality, specifically highlighting how bisexuality can open up new and exciting ways of challenging social convention. Informed by feminist, transgender, and queer theory, as well as politics and activism, Bi is a radical manifesto for a group that has been too frequently silenced, erased, and denied -- and a starting point from which to launch a bisexual revolution.
Bi Any Other Name by Loraine Hutchins (Editor); Lani Kaahumanu (Editor)
ISBN: 1555831745
Publication Date: 1994-07-01
Bisexual People Speak Out More than seventy women and men from all walks of life describe their lives as bisexuals.
Bisexuality by D. Joye Swan (Editor); Shani Habibi (Editor)
ISBN: 3319715348
Publication Date: 2018-03-19
This pathbreaking volume brings together a diverse body of sexual, behavioral, and social science research on bisexuality. Arguing for a clear, evidence-based definition of bisexuality and standardized measures for assessing sexual orientation, it spotlights challenges that need to be addressed toward attaining these goals. The book's deep trove of findings illuminates the experiences of bisexual men and women in key aspects of life, as well as common mental health issues in the face of stigma, prejudice, and outright denial from the heterosexual and homosexual communities. Throughout, contributors examine the paradoxical invisibility of bisexuality even as society and science have become more inclusive of lesbians and gay men, and emphasize the critical role of thoughtful, respectful support across societal and mental health domains. Among the topics covered: Defining bisexuality: challenges and importance of and toward a unifying definition. Plurisexual identity labels and the marking of bisexual desire. Binegativity: attitudes toward and stereotypes about bisexuals. Female bisexuality: identity, fluidity, and cultural expectations. Romantic and sexual relationship experiences among bisexual individuals. Bisexuality is a substantial reference for psychologists, scholars and graduate students in LGBTQIA+ studies, and clinicians seeking both theoretical and applied perspectives on the research into bisexuality. It also offers instructors a supplemental research-based textbook option for teaching courses related to sexuality and bisexuality.

Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado
ISBN: 9781555977887
Publication Date: 2017-10-03
Finalist for the National Book Award for Fiction "[These stories] vibrate with originality, queerness, sensuality and the strange."--Roxane Gay "In these formally brilliant and emotionally charged tales, Machado gives literal shape to women's memories and hunger and desire. I couldn't put it down."--Karen Russell In Her Body and Other Parties, Carmen Maria Machado blithely demolishes the arbitrary borders between psychological realism and science fiction, comedy and horror, fantasy and fabulism. While her work has earned her comparisons to Karen Russell and Kelly Link, she has a voice that is all her own. In this electric and provocative debut, Machado bends genre to shape startling narratives that map the realities of women's lives and the violence visited upon their bodies. A wife refuses her husband's entreaties to remove the green ribbon from around her neck. A woman recounts her sexual encounters as a plague slowly consumes humanity. A salesclerk in a mall makes a horrifying discovery within the seams of the store's prom dresses. One woman's surgery-induced weight loss results in an unwanted houseguest. And in the bravura novella "Especially Heinous," Machado reimagines every episode ofLaw & Order: Special Victims Unit, a show we naïvely assumed had shown it all, generating a phantasmagoric police procedural full of doppelgängers, ghosts, and girls with bells for eyes. Earthy and otherworldly, antic and sexy, queer and caustic, comic and deadly serious,Her Body and Other Partiesswings from horrific violence to the most exquisite sentiment. In their explosive originality, these stories enlarge the possibilities of contemporary fiction.
Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin
ISBN: 0440328810
Publication Date: 1988-04-01
Set in the contemporary Paris of American expatraites, liasons, and violence, a young man finds himself caught between desire and conventional morality. James Baldwin's brilliant narrative delves into the mystery of loving with a sharp, probing imagination, and he creates a moving, highly controversial story of death and passion that reveals the unspoken complexities of the heart.
Ode to Lata by Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla
ISBN: 1893329135
Publication Date: 2002-02-01
"Banker by day, and denizen of Los Angeles' clubs by night, the protagonist of Ghalib Shiraz Dhalla's first novel is navigating between more than just a day job and an active social life. In Ode to Lata, Ali has left behind a tempestuous childhood in postcolonial Kenya, the overprotective mother who raised him on a steady diet of Hindi cinema, an emotionally abusive bisexual lover, and confused memories of his father's violent death at the hands of his mistress. Now his mother's messages ramble on his answering machine when he wants no one but his one obsession, Richard, to call. Passionate and unflinchingly honest in its narrative, Ode to Lata scavenges the depths of one man's misguided search for love in a world of emotionally-void encounters and tangled memories. All the while, Ali's story is intertwined with the unraveling of his parents' own doomed relationship and the film music of Bollywood's eminent singer Lata Mangeshkar (Diva of Indian film music and the namesake of the book's title). And it is this hopelessly romantic music that scores their tormented lives and goads them to pursue love through chaos and ecstasy."--BOOK JACKET.Title Summary field provided by Blackwell North America, Inc. All Rights Reserved

TV
The Bisexual (Hulu)
Sex Education (Netflix)
The L Word (Hulu)
Broad City (Hulu)

Webseries
Strangers (Facebook Video)
Brown Girls

Movies
Call Me By Your Name (2017)
Brokeback Mountain (2005)
Nowhere (1997)
Appropriate Behavior (2014)
Disobedience (2017)
Moonlight (2017)

Gender Studies

Women's Equality Day 2020

Bisexual Awareness Day (9/23)

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