She’s tied to the kitchen, by choice. Indigo Paul ponders how she ended up filling her days with domestic labour – and why she’s cool with it. The term came up after chatting to a friend about what I’d been keeping myself busy with. “Oh, I’ve just been at home, working on the garden and … Read more
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden in the latest episode of On the Rag as they examine the topic of boobs from every possible angle. First published November 16, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click here to … Read more
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey, Leonie Hayden and a lineup of incredibly successful New Zealand women as they confront their imposter syndrome once and for all. First published 20 October, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click here to learn … Read more
Summer reissue: Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as they go on an odyssey of women’s rage, and find out how we can channel our anger into good. First published September 15, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click … Read more
Summer reissue: Our feminist webseries On the Rag returns to dissect representation in the media and who is still being left behind when you turn on the telly. First published July 22, 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click here to learn … Read more
Summer reissue: Alie Benge on the book that built a shimmering private world for her and her sisters. First published 10 February 2020. Independent journalism depends on you. Help us stay curious in 2021. The Spinoff’s journalism is funded by its members – click here to learn more about how you can support us from … Read more
Charlotte Muru-Lanning is an ethical consumer, and she wants a hot AF party dress for the festive season. Why is it so damn hard to find something sexy and sustainable? For many, lockdown meant reflecting on our normal ways of doing things, as the pandemic cast a magnifying glass over how cruel, unsustainable and frankly … Read more
All this week we’re looking back on some of the best videos published on The Spinoff in 2020. Today, On the Rag dismantles the dreaded imposter syndrome. For some it appears as a constant whisper, for others it’s a screeching megaphone in the face at the most inopportune of moments. Many of you will be … Read more
In the latest episode of On the Rag, we look at the intersection of gender and design, including this list of women who invented incredible things and then were promptly forgotten about. Women everywhere know the acute frustration that comes when a man steals your suggestion in a meeting and then presents it to a … Read more
Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden in the latest episode of On the Rag as they examine the topic of boobs from every possible angle. Everyone’s got a different attitude to boobs. Complicated. Sexy. Life-giving. Offensive. Sinful. Painful. Functional. Expensive. Extraneous. Essential. Whichever your adjective of choice is, this episode of On the … Read more
Scottish historian Hamish Dingwall is working on a book about New Zealand suffragist Mary Ann Müller and wrote this essay as bait, basically. If you have any sort of archive (letters, photographs, a diary) regarding Mary or her life, no matter how small the snippet, Dingwall would love to hear from you. Email books editor … Read more
Ensemble’s Lofa Totua explores the evolving nature of her understanding of activism, and asks those fighting against injustice about what being an ‘activist’ means to them. The other week I released a fear. The angsty knots of worry and imposter syndrome, untied, finally allowing me to breathe. “Sometimes, activism is as simple as breathing Lofa. … Read more
Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey, Leonie Hayden and a lineup of incredibly successful New Zealand women as they confront their imposter syndrome once and for all. For some it appears as a constant whisper, for others it’s a screeching megaphone in the face at the most inopportune of moments. Many of you will be familiar … Read more
Activist and former politician Sue Bradford has been called an ‘angry radical’ most of her life. Leonie Hayden caught up with her to find out how she uses that anger for good. Watch On the Rag: Anger (full episode) here When I was tasked with thinking of women I admire that have been called “angry” … Read more
Tech start-up Areto Labs noticed online abuse was stopping women from going into politics – so it did something about it. CEO Lana Cuthbertson and creative technologist Jacqueline Comer talk to The Spinoff about their abuse-fighting bot. “Imagine you have a job interview and every day, for a month, you have to walk down a … Read more
Join Michèle A’Court, Alex Casey and Leonie Hayden as they go on an odyssey of women’s rage, and find out how we can channel our anger into good. Have you ever been called a bitch? Hysterical? Stroppy? Do you find yourself suppressing warranted anger to appear more likeable? Mad as hell and don’t want to … Read more
Every story in Bug Week clacks and hums with the anger of women. Here, the author explains why. Content warning: this article references sexual assault and family violence. It seems like a bit of a self-indulgent exercise writing about the genesis of a book. Books are texts, separable from their authors and the biographical circumstances … Read more
A new Twilight book launches today. Its author told Catherine Woulfe about gender politics, anxiety, and the challenges of writing the Twilight story from Edward Cullen’s perspective. Midnight Sun is the original Twilight story, except instead of Bella Swan narrating it’s her vampire love, Edward Cullen. It’s a book that I and the rest of … Read more
Are you sick of that moment towards the end of a film when you realise that not a single woman has spoken to another woman the whole time? Turns out you can test for that. In your real life, we bet you probably speak to a whole bunch of different people. Some of them might … Read more
Our feminist webseries On the Rag returns to dissect representation in the media and who is still being left behind when you turn on the telly. In this episode, On the Rag looks at what we are putting in our eyes and ears as media consumers in Aotearoa. We’ve got more content choices than ever … Read more
In the midst of tragedy, it’s important that we look to those striving to build better futures. The YWCA’s new initiative Y25 is highlighting 25 young New Zealand wāhine going above and beyond to improve their communities. Over the last 12 months, a group of young female leaders have taken on some of the world’s … Read more
The new Neon series about the fight to have gender equality enshrined in the US Constitution is a fun 70s romp with a bitter twist, writes Catherine McGregor. Hindsight is a wonderful thing, they say, and right now that’s especially true for television, which is filled to the gills with historical series attempting to say … Read more
The On the Rag team meet one more time to talk about how the Covid-19 crisis affects women and what you can do to cope. It’s our last podcast for a little while so crack open a bottle of something fizzy and join us as we undergo what is basically a group therapy session. We … Read more
Last night Amy Adams, who is resigning from parliament after 12 years later this year, addressed the House during the third reading of the Abortion Legislation Bill. The historic bill would go on to pass 68-51, removing abortion from the Crimes Act and making it legal to self-refer for an abortion up to 20 weeks. … Read more
The idea of women late in pregnancy ‘nesting’ – preparing the home for the arrival of their newborn – is ingrained in popular culture and reinforced by health-care professionals, but in fact has no scientific basis. We’ve been led to believe women have a biological urge to tidy, clean and prepare the home for their … Read more
Dame Fiona Kidman, legend, has a new book out today. All the Way to Summer is a memory lane of beloved stories, ending with a new one that is leaving readers sobbing. Here, in an essay especially for The Spinoff, she looks back on her life of love. During World War Two I lived on … Read more
What’s the best way to get adults reading? Get them reading when they’re children – and there’s no better place to start than the Unity Children’s Bestseller Chart. LITTLE UNITY, AUCKLAND 1 Māui & Other Legends by Peter Gossage (Penguin, $40, all ages) A massive 4.79/5 on Goodreads! 2 Animalphabet by Julia Donaldson & Sharon King-Chai … Read more
The On the Rag team assemble to dissect the previous month in news, media and feminism. It’s somehow the end of February so we’re here to look back at the month in Women’s Stuff. Uniform shorts are sending young women into counselling sessions at a a local high school, but why? How the hell did … Read more
Crime week: Chris Cessford welcomes a sumptuous crime story starring a ‘rule-breaking badass in a sari’. Sujata Massey kicks off the decade with the first book in a fresh new crime series – the historical, award-winning whodunnit A Murder at Malabar Hill. She introduces Perveen Mistry, in 1921 Bombay’s only woman lawyer and an amateur … Read more