Culture Shift is a weekly newsletter curated by the HuffPost Culture writers and editors.
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This week we’re talking about a darkly funny true crime podcast, “Fleabag” and the importance of portraying imperfect feminism, and a memoir that’s all about sharing -- and connecting over -- our painful experiences. We’ve also got a great new fiction book to recommend, and a comic that’ll help you better understand the refugee crisis.
Women Often Think They Are Alone In Pain. Here’s Why Sharing Our Stories Helps
Leigh Stein’s memoir Land of Enchantment, published earlier this year, is about many things: abusive relationships, grief, chronic depression, adolescent alienation. Or maybe, to put it another way, it’s about one thing: how much of ourselves we store in each other. (Read more here.)
How Comics Can Help Us Understand The Refugee Crisis
The average American news reader knows something about international refugees. For example, they might know which presidential candidate wants us to increase refugee intake and which vehemently opposes welcoming more into the country. They’re also probably aware of the current Syrian refugee crisis, that a team of refugees competed at the 2016 Rio Olympics, and they have probably formed an opinion on what the United States should or shouldn’t do to help. (Read more here.)
A Dark Comedy Podcast Indulges Your Weird Obsession With Murder
The hosts of “My Favorite Murder,” Georgia Hardstark and Karen Kilgariff, would’ve had no such problem. Together, the pair runs a true-crime podcast about murder cases ― solved and unsolved, new and old ― in which they grant listeners such pearls of wisdom as “go be rude” and “fuck politeness” to avoid extended interactions with potential murderers. (Read more here.)
Why Tearing Women Down Gives Us A Thrill
In Sady Doyle’s sharp new book Trainwreck: The Women We Love to Hate, Mock, and Fear… and Why, she examines the particular pleasure our society has taken, for centuries, in tearing down publicly visible women. Early feminist Mary Wollstonecraft, French revolutionary Anne-Josèphe Théroigne de Méricourt, and Harriet Jacobs, author of Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, all suffered the same calculated public humiliations and dismissals that were later faced in different forms by Sylvia Plath, Billie Holiday, Britney Spears and Whitney Houston. (Read more here.)
TV’s Darkest New Show Depicts An Imperfect Feminism, And That’s A Good Thing
In the first episode of the BBC3 television show “Fleabag,” our anti-heroine Fleabag and her loveably rigid sister Claire meet up to attend a feminist lecture called “Women Speak,” whose proud motto is “opening women’s mouths since 1998.” (Read more here.)
These Women Artists Are Their Own Damn Muses
Artists with sizable ambitions have long been expected to master rendering the nude human form with accuracy and style. As such, it was customary, if not essential, for budding artists to train by drawing and painting nude models. However, until 1863, women ― or “lady” students, as they were called ― were not admitted to life drawing courses at institutions like the Royal Academy in London. Even when they were later admitted, the models that sat for women had to be at least “partially draped.” (Read more here.)
BONUS: Book of the week!
Brit Bennett’s The Mothers, “brims with psychological insight and thoughtful commentary on the pain of loss and what motivates us to take actions maligned with our beliefs.” In short: it’s well worth reading. (Read more here.)
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