DNF

I was originally so excited for this book but after reading reviews pointing out how cis-centric this is and Kelly Jensen's aphobic comments on twitter, I can't finish this book.

This book could have been so much more, but it fell flat because it was extremely lacking in intersectionality. By and large, it focused on white, allocisheteronormative, abled, etc. women while only including marginalized folks as an afterthought. It also used some outdated and transphobic definitions of bi and pansexual that could have been fixed if someone had bothered to do a Google search to look at the most current definitions on queer advocacy org sites. I would not give this to a teen who wanted to learn more about feminism because it would provide a very skewed and less-than-inclusive view of feminism.

I did not finish this book. The main reason was it was extremely difficult to read on my laptop rather than my kindle. But I also just couldnt get into it as I would normally be able to sit and read a book all in one go.

These essays about feminism were very heartwarming, inspiring and empowering! I felt very understood and not alone :)

Here We Are is for the teenagers in your life. It is for emerging feminists, regardless of age. It’s for feminists who want to learn more about intersectionality.

Featuring writers of colour, LGBTQ+ writers, disabled writers, writers from different religions and writers from different socio-economic backgrounds, Here We Are explores how what it means to be a feminist when gender isn’t the only issue at play. Feminism often means different things to different people, but intersectionality is vital to making it accessible to as many people as possible.

There are too many contributions to mention individually, but a few that really stayed with me include; an essay by Courtney Summers on the need for female characters in fiction to be “likeable”. As if “likeability” is all women and girls have going for them. Kayla Whaley’s letter to her younger self about her physical disability is a painful and necessary read.

This anthology of essays, comics, interviews, illustrations, reading lists and playlists is educational, smart and funny without talking down to the younger audience it is aimed at.

Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World is an inclusive and feminist-as-hell anthology featuring numerous essays on numerous topics and what feminism means to them. It features playlists, reading lists, and illustrations. I believe Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World should be essential reading for feminists.
Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World features powerful pieces from a diverse collection of authors from a variety of socio-economic backgrounds – authors of colour, from different races, religions. There are gay and trans authors, disabled authors etc. Kelly Jensen has made an impressive attempt to collect and put together an intersectional feminist anthology.

There is something in this anthology for most feminists. There are too many pieces in here to review every single piece, no matter how much I want to, but I will highlight some I really loved. I loved Roxane Gay’s excerpt from her book Bad Feminist. Courtney Summers piece on ‘unlikeable female characters’ was also a favourite, where she talks about the demand placed on female characters to be ‘nice’ and ‘likeable’ rather than the messy and complex human beings that women are. Alida Nugent essay titled ‘Pretty Enough’ was very powerful – about how she struggled as a child with her appearance due to the white beauty standards she’s been surrounded by.

There was also a great piece by Angie Manfredi about reclaiming the word fat and about reclaiming her own body. I also really liked Constance Augusta Zaber’s piece about feminism, female image, make-up, and what it means to her as a trans woman. There was also a fantastic, emotional, and powerful piece by Kayla Whaley about her disability. Kaye Mirza also has an insightful and honest piece about how people think her faith and feminism don’t go together, she writes that ‘as long as I practice my faith, to many, I am nothing more but a secondhand feminist’. She talks about the racism and Islamophobia she has faced her entire life from people who think she’s oppressed due to her faith – an important piece.

Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World ended with a great piece by Kelly Jensen on ‘quiet feminism’ that really resonated with me. She talked about how her feminism was quiet and less visible. Her feminism is more about support and being in the background, rather than on the front lines.

‘My feminism was, and still is, lowercase. My strengths, listening and thinking, assessing and supporting, matter just as much as the strengths of the louder, more visible feminists.’

There were so many more great piece – pieces about black sisterhood, pieces about virginity and sex, pieces about girl-on-girl hate, and many others – so I do really suggest you pick this one up, I highly recommend it.

Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World is ‘a scrapbook-style teen guide to understanding what it really means to be a feminist.’ It’s highly important, informative, and a fun resource for teenagers just discovering themselves and their own feminism. So, if you know a teenager – give them this.

5 stars

Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World is an absolutely delightful, insightful anthology comprised of essays, poems, illustrations, comics, playlists, and more, all centered around– you guessed it– feminism. I find books like this to be difficult to review, so I thought I’d switch it up and simply list some reasons I think everyone should read this book!

FIVE REASONS YOU SHOULD READ IT:

-It’s intersectional AF.
Not only does Here We Are address intersectionality and its importance in modern feminism, but the anthology itself just… is intersectional, through and through. From the diverse contributors, to the general stance this book takes on feminist issues, it truly promotes a feminism for all women, not just the exclusionary white feminism we see promoted so often in the media. Among the contributors are trans women, queer women, women of color, women of different socioeconomic backgrounds, women with disabilities, and nonbinary people. This was so refreshing to see, especially given that the anthology is targeted toward teens. It gave me so much hope!

-There’s something for everyone.
Here We Are is definitely more of an introduction to feminism than anything else, but I think that, no matter how informed and engaged you are regarding feminist issues, this anthology has something to offer you. It’s definitely a fantastic, if not totally comprehensive, introduction to what exactly ‘feminism’ is and what it means to different people. I’m a Women’s, Gender, & Sexuality Studies minor, and even though I’ve read lots of the seminal feminist literature, Here We Are gave me totally new things to think about. For example, it definitely brought to my attention some of the interlocking oppressions that I often neglect in my own feminism (for example, why have I never previously thought of mental health as a feminist issue?).

-Anthologies are the vanquishers of book slumps.
I suppose this is more of a general comment on the genre itself, but anthologies, much like short story collections, can ALWAYS pull me out of even the worst reading slump. I’d love to see more anthologies (both fiction and nonfiction) targeted toward a YA audience. They’re great because you can marathon them, or you can savor them over a longer period of time by reading one essay or chapter per day. And, you can always tab your favorite essays and refer back to them later when you’re feeling down or when you simply want to revisit them!

-It features tons of YA authors and public figures you know and love.
It’s likely that you know of and love at least a few of the contributors in this anthology. I love that it features so many beloved YA authors– hearing their thoughts on and experiences with feminism, especially after having read many of their books, was fascinating. (Do YA authors like Laurie Halse Anderson, Brandy Colbert, Malinda Lo, Kody Keplinger, Daniel Jose Older, Nova Ren Suma, or Siobhan Vivian ring a bell?) It also features the words of some pretty influential public figures like Wendy Davis, Roxane Gay, Mindy Kaling, Laverne Cox, and Amandla Stenberg. Plus, in addition to these already-beloved humans, you’re also sure to find new voices to love! I totally went on a Twitter following spree after I finished this book.

-It’s beautifully constructed.
Maybe it sounds vain, but hear me out. Here We Are is described as a “scrapbook-style” anthology, which literally means that it was made to look like the cutest scrapbook or journal ever– complete with pretty fonts, contrasting patterns, bold colors, cute drawings, and even printed tape/stickers to give it a textured look. However, the beauty of its construction doesn’t stop with the aesthetics: I love the way this anthology was organized, too. It was broken down into seven different chapters which covered everything from the body, to gender and sexuality, to relationships, to feminism in pop culture. And, as I mentioned before, this collection contains all sorts of different forms of media, which gave it wonderful variety!

MY PERSONAL FAVORITE PIECES:

I loved the anthology as a whole, but there were a few essays and pieces that made me think even more than the others. Also, a lot of these felt really true to my own experiences with feminism.

-“Bad Feminist: Take Two” by Roxane Gay
-“The Monster Book of Questions and Answers” by Anne Theriault
-“Do Female Black Lives Matter Too?” by Amandla Stenberg
-“Somewhere in America” by Zariya Allen (poem)
-“Opportunity” by Risa Rodil
-“The ‘Nice Girl’ Feminist” by Ashley Hope Perez

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What is Feminism? Does doing certain things mean you're not a Feminist? How can I see myself in Feminism? Being young and trying to be a feminist is tough. Actually, scratch that, being a feminist at any age is tough. When I was younger there was little on feminism, I've always believed women can do anything, but didn't want to use the word 'Feminist' (I wrote about it myself), I truly believe if there were more books like this I wouldn't have gone through that awkward phase of insisting I was a 'humanist' (urgh). Jensen and the writers behind Here We Are have made an incredible book.

I cannot contain my excitement over this book. I want to go out any buy copies for all my friends, female and male nad just urge them to read it. Unlike any feminist book I've read before this collection of essays, stories, art, lists and more will speak to everyone. Jensen and her fellow writers just seem to get what being a modern feminist is, because they aren't trying to tell you what is right. The book is diverse and doesn't shy away from topics such as not wanting children, intersectional feminism, racism, mental illness. While I believe this is aimed at young adults, I learnt a lot from its pages.

When I requested this on Netgalley I didn't expect to like it as much as I did. I hoped it would be good and that it would get the message across, but it did so much more. Women and men from all walks of life have contributed their thoughts on such a variety of issues that I struggle to find flaws in its pages. There were some individual quotes that I didn't agree with, but that's part of the beauty of feminism, we don't all have to agree on everything (something else that was mentioned in the book).

The freedom of expressing yourself in your own way is also celebrated in the book. Artist have taken to creating comic strips, there are poems, songs, general essays, interviews, pictures and artwork, all of which make the message of feminism easier to identify with. By doing so the team of artists and writer have all given a breath of fresh air to self-expression in feminism, something which is definitely needed because not everyone is going to side down and read The Second Sex.

This is a wonderful, smart and encouraging read. I don't think it's for one age or one gender. The ideas, layout and overall message of the book is creativity, acceptance, equality and, most importantly, love. I hope this book goes far because it definitely deserves to. Pick up a copy now!



Thank you so much to the publishers who sent me an advance copy!

I will start by saying that I will not take any part in discussions about feminism here but as usual you are more than welcome to share your thoughts in the comments box if you want to. However I must say there isn't a better time to publish a book about this subject than nowadays. The truth is western society has been changing its paradigms since the middle of XX century and of course it reflects on how we face today's challenges when discussing gender equality. Girls and young ladies are being feed wirh many versions of what feminism is (or should be) today but sometimes the people and institutions feeding them forget the subject's core and what we should be talking about. Feminism is, for all the purposes, no matter how you represent or think about the movement, the search of equal rights to men and women. This is also how I see it and how my own vision reflected on this book.
Here We Are is a collection of essays from different sources to discuss what is feminism. Its target group are young people (even if there is a particular focus mainly on girls - which, from my perspective, mixes the message from the beginning) and it considers all the subjects and concerns about teenagers and youth development nowadays.
I enjoyed the visual art and the structure created in order to make it specially appealing for young people who generally don't read non-fiction. I also appreciated the presence of essays written by men, even if the book was quite unbalanced and gave you more female writers. However one of the aims of this book is also to make girls around the world to know their inner voices matters, that what they think is valid and important and that they have a place in this world. Due to that I can understand the final decision to engage them by this strategy. Other gripping aspect was the presence of pop culture elements to help the readers see how much this subject is underlined in their lives, in so many different spheres we can't imagine it. So having lists of movies, song lyrics or TV shows (I don't want to lie but I have the idea I also saw one of these) which represent good feminist examples, showing they don't need to become different people or very engaged activists to stand up for themselves and protect their rights, is also something very enlightening.
I found very intelligent the divided structure to the various aspects, making it easier to dive in when different doubts arise. Even so, the last few essays lacked the cohesive structured presented on the first ones and seamed to be put together just to fill an empty space.
As much I understand the need to create space and encourage the girls (and boys) to stand up for themselves, to have ideas, to discuss them and to look for better, equal and fair futures, I found that many essays focused on emancipation - which is one of the many pillars of the feminism but not the only one (which caused me some itchy feelings when reading the book) - stepping aside from other aspects.
Another positive remark is the approach to the different stages of feminism in History and I think the descriptions will make young readers better prepared to deal with the challenges associated with the concept and the label itself.
I would be lying if I didn't told you I have also learned a few things during this reading, like the concept of intersectionality feminism which - for me - before reading this book and getting closer to the subject wasn't really a matter of discussion (not because it didn't matter but because I faced all the challenges presented to women on the same big package). I was forced to admit to myself that's because I don't fit in any other labels that pull someone to the middle of a big judgmental and fierce bowl of thoughts.
Finally, I'm not American neither do care much about public personalities but I understand the importance of role models and therefore, having essays written by people who these teenagers are aspiring to turn alike in the future was important as it's a hint of hope and encouragement to become better citizens and more prepared to deal with their future challenges.

This anthology contains essays and art covering gender, sexuality, identity, feminism, intersectionality, privilege, relationships with friends, family, significant others, and faith. They are personal, meaningful, poignant, and provide a variety of experiences and POVs. They also feature some of my favorite humans and YA writers. An excellent primer for teens and young adults, one I wish I had growing up in a small town w/ little exposure. Thanks to #netgalley for the ARC, and Kelly for curating this.

I'm really excited to read this book. I still am. I just can't read pdf files and as there is no option to send to my Kindle, I'm afraid I won't be using this website to read this book. No worries, will buy my own copy! Hope this book does really well and sorry I couldn't read/review in a normal way!

I received an eARC of this book via the publisher, Algonquin Books for Young Readers, and Netgally in exchange for an honest review.

I don't think anyone that knows me fails to notice that I'm a feminist, and I believe intersectionality in that identity is incredibly important. So when I heard about this book, I knew I wanted to read it.

Because of the scrapbook-style format of this book, I found the loading times on my computer to be a little bit of a pain in the ass. It's just image-heavy, which I'm sure looked beautiful in print, but drove me a little nuts reading on Adobe Digital Editions. It would freeze every time a rhinestone was on the page, which was fairly often, because it's a cute decorative thing.

This collection was great. I’d cried once, in mostly happy tears, by page 40. Anne Theriault, I’m looking at you and “The Monster Book of Questions and Answers.”

Designed and written for teenagers, Here We Are is exactly the collection I wish I'd had when I was a teenager, repeating some of the garbage I'd heard from my extended family and small town friends. There's something in this collection for a wide variety of people, told in really compelling ways. Some of these pieces were familiar to me because they'd been published before, and some were brand new, but achingly familiar in my heart. I think the interviews with Laverne Cox, Laurie Halse Anderson and Courtney Summers were my favorites, because they were so incredibly important.

There's honestly something for everybody in the Here We Are collection, and everyone can learn from this - unless you're a meninist or MRA, in which case, I'm not sure why you're on this blog at all. Even if you are, maybe you can take a look at why we identify as feminists.

I highly recommend this collection to everyone, but I recommend it as a physical book. The technical issues I had with it were enough for me to take this to a four star rating. You can pick up a copy through Amazon, Indiebound or your other favorite bookseller!

four stars and one empty one meant to signify a four star review

Disclaimer: All links to Indiebound and Amazon are affiliate links, which means that if you buy through those links, I will make a small amount of money off of it.

This collection is EXTRAORDINARY. I am 100% going to get my hands on a finished copy so I can dive back into this book whenever I need it (which is probably a lot).

It is perhaps never possible to adequately collect enough perspectives to present all aspects of feminism in its entirety, but this book comes damn close. Here We Are: Feminism for the Real World covers a wide range of intersectional feminist topics, featuring authors of all colours, races and religions, gay and trans authors, authors of all shapes and sizes, those with physical and mental disabilities, as well as the able-bodied. It is a truly fantastic work that deserves to be read and celebrated by all.

Here We Are is an incredibly amazing and thoughtful collection of essays all about feminism. As someone who has read a lot on this topic, it was nothing new, but it's definitely one of those books that I wish was required reading. It not only teaches you a lot, but it's also a very fun read, because it also features comics, lists, and poetry. I'd definitely recommend this to ANYONE.

I suppose I should start with one of those disclaimers about how I received a free electronic copy of this from NetGalley and Algonquin Young Readers. However, I also preordered two hard copies with my own money (OK, someone else’s money in gift card form) even before that request was approved. But why wait a whole three weeks when I could read it earlier than that? That’s how excited I am for Here We Are: 44 Voices Write, Draw, and Speak About Feminism for the Real World. It turns out that this book is everything I wanted, and more.

I really like this trend of telling me how many contributors there are in the title of the work, because it saves me from having to count. Suffice it to say, I’m not going to review each piece individually. I will point out that Kelly Jensen has clearly made the effort to be as inclusive and intersectional as possible in this book. Here We are features pieces from white women, Black women, Indigenous women, trans men and trans women, straight women, gay women, and even that rarest of breeds, yes, the straight white male. The contributors are of various ages, professions, and socioeconomic backgrounds. Indeed, pretty much the only thing that unites all of them is that they are in this book, and they identify as feminist.

Readers won’t see themselves in every contributor and every piece in Here We Are. And that’s kind of the point. The essays and other pieces in this collection seek to give advice, sure. Beyond this, though, they simply provide perspectives. Readers won’t see themselves in every contributor, but they will hopefully identify with some of the contributors. And they will get a chance to hear from voices whose experiences are very different from their own. For example, Constance Augusta Zaber’s “Dragging Myself into Self-Love” would surely resonate with many boys:

> Looking back, I can recognize how hard puberty must have been for them, but at the time, I envied those girls. I envied their pierced ears, their lip gloss, their long hair, their shoes that weren’t boring old sneakers. **I was envious that they were allowed to make choices with clothes and makeup that were off limits to me.** By the eighth grade, I’d been exposed to the idea that gender roles were created by humans and were more arbitrary than natural (thank you, Internet!), but that sort of abstract information is useless in the face of classmates who would mock a boy for having a purple backpack.

(Emphasis mine.) Although I perform gender in a fairly standard, masculine way, I definitely understand where Zaber is coming from and can identify with chafing at some of the restrictions placed upon people who perform gender as male. For boys who are considering that they might be trans or nonbinary or agender or simply prefer more fashion choices, this is an essay that tells them they are not alone. For the girls who are the primary target audience of Here We Are, it’s a glimpse into how feminist thought and action benefits all people, regardless of gender.

Here We Are is unequivocal in its inclusiveness:

> Feminists can identify as female, male, transgender, gender queer, or any other way they wish to. They can choose to choose no identity at all or choose one identity today and a different one next week. What physical parts individuals have or do not have has no bearing on their feminism nor on their right to be part of the feminism party. All that matters is that they believe in equality for every individual. Whether you identify as a trans man, move fluidly among genders, enjoy having sex freely, or prefer not to have sex at all, you belong here and you matter.

(Yeah, a little asexual representation there. Not a whole lot, unfortunately, but a little. Also, in case you’re reading this and wondering: yes, there really are feminism parties. They are every second Thursday, and like the dark side, we have cookies, although we don’t have imperialist oppression of entire planetary systems.)

Mikki Kendall also puts it very well in her essay, “Facets of Feminism”, when she says, “A feminism that is exclusionary, that makes objects out of some women and saviors out of others, is implicitly harmful.… An inclusive feminism is a more effective feminism.” And earlier in this chapter, the book reminds us that liking problematic media doesn’t disqualify you as a feminist either, that “it’s from these problematic representations that great feminist dialogue emerges”, and then cites one of my favourite problematic shows, Supernatural. This is a salient point to remember in an age that bombards us with media representation that is often simultaneously problematic and entertaining, and I appreciate that Here We Are takes the time to counter the myth that feminism means hating men, hating yourself, or indeed, hating everything—it does not.

The word feminist is certainly more in the popular mind than it was when I was a teenager in the early noughties. My adolescence straddled the divide between pre- and post-social media, as well as pre- and post-smartphone; in Grade 8 it was all about the LiveJournal and the GeoCities, and by the time I was graduating high school Facebook had thrown open its doors to the general public and the iPhone had just heralded the beginning of the smartphone era. In this environment, feminism was something we didn’t really discuss too much as teenagers. I ran with a pretty smart group of kids (after my first high school closed in Grade 10, I took to eating lunch in the band wing with the “band geeks”, despite my lack of musical talent, because lots of them were from my old school and it seemed preferable to the noisy cafeteria). We were reasonably enlightened, I’d like to say, and we talked about these kinds of issues. But textbooks and theories and that kind of academic rigour were not yet on the horizon, so we didn’t always have the language required to grapple with them.

This book is much more accessible. It covers pretty much everything and anything related to feminism to one degree or another. I appreciate that it has separate chapters on sex and relationships, since these are very different but often conflated concepts. I like that it has a combination of personal essays, reprinted essays, interviews, comics and drawings, and lists. The “scrapbook style” book is not a form I want to read all the time, but I acknowledge its appeal. As an adult and a professional and (gasp) an intellectual, I can read all the academic theory books about feminism that I want. I can’t really put those into the hands of teenagers, however, and expect them to have the same eye-opening experiences that I do. Instead, Here We Are is a book with ideas, stories, and advice they can take an act on immediately.

Even as feminism becomes more popular, it also becomes a commodity. Corporations are happy to co-opt feminist slogans and terminology if it means they can sell feminism. “Buy this thing to make you more feminist!” “Buy this thing to support our feminist initiatives!” Buy, buy, buy. “Buy this to learn the ultimate secret to feminism…” Except there is no secret. There is no one, right way to be feminist. There is no feminist checklist that, if followed, will make you the perfect, unprivileged, unbiased, feminist person.

OK, I lied. There is a secret. Do you want to know what it is?

Most young people are already feminists.

They might not know it, and if they know it, they might not readily admit to it (because that can come with a social cost they are unwilling to pay). But young people, by and large, believe in their own empowerment. They believe in equality for all genders. They don’t understand what the fuss is about if you love someone of the same gender—or if you don’t fall in love at all. The stories we see in the news about proms being shut down because a girl wants to bring another girl, or wear a tuxedo, or wears a dress that is too short—it’s not other teens shutting down these events, creating this fuss. It’s the adults who are unwilling to open their minds and change their views. I can’t remember who said this, but young people are always on the winning side of history.

Here We Are embraces this youth power and energy rather than talking down to it. It sees the feminist, good and bad and hidden and out, in everyone and speaks to them. It’s a little bit Oprah, I guess: “You can be feminist! And you can be feminist! And you can be feminist!”, but I don’t see this as a bad thing. The worst thing we, adult progressives and feminists and allies, can do at this point is to ignore, condescend, or silence young people trying to speak up, learn about, and claim a feminist identity. Here We Are is a book for youth that is proudly, loudly feminist and tells young people that they can shout about (or not, as they choose) being feminist too. I think that’s pretty cool.

This is a quick and easy introduction into the world of feminism. I would highly recommend this collection to every young woman, and hopefully early enough in her life to create a large impact for her.
Even as someone who has read a lot of feminist literature I felt inspired, even if it didn't blow open my perspective.

I absolutely super-duperly hugely loved this collection of art, poems and essays from all kinds of people about 21st Century feminism.

It made me feel all the feels and I'm pretty sure my heart broke multiple times throughout this book.

This is such an important book that I URGE everyone to read. If you're not into feminism or you don't like to label yourself as one, it's still an influential read to hear about others experiences and way of lives in today's society. Gah, just go read it.

I'm so glad this was my first read of 2017!