July is International Zine Month! Read a zine! Make a zine! 

This isn’t a feminist/literary link, but NPR has been doing important coverage of the Trayvon Martin case.

Some time ago, Broad! linked to this essay on the Manic Pixie Dream Girl trope on our Facebook page. It made me revisit a piece that Rookie published about the stereotype. Both have got me thinking a lot about the significance of the MPDG trope. As someone who, full disclosure, plays the ukulele and really likes to wear thrifted dresses and bake stuff, I appreciate this insight from the Rookie article: 

“My point is, likening real-life women to MPDGs is offensive. It implies that our habits and interests are affectations designed to attract dudes so we can improve their lives. The Manic Pixie Dream Girl does not actually exist—she is by definition a fantasy. We should restrict the use of the phrase to when we’re criticizing one-dimensional characters in fiction. Otherwise it’s just another way to put women down.” 

Safety Pin Review is literary journal that will not only publish your flash fic/short prose poem online, but will also have someone from their “collective network of authors, punks, thieves, and anarchists” wear it as a patch for a week and document people’s reactions! I think it’s neat. 

In a somewhat similar vein, check out these 10 Guerilla Poetry Projects!