The Rock Where We Stand: An Ethnography of Women's Activism in Newfoundland

By: Glynis George

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Synopsis: Bay St. George in western Newfoundland is a region characterized by a boom and bust economy and shaped by the establishment of the Earnest Harmon American Airforce Base. This ethnography explores how women at the Bay St. George Women's Council deal specifically with the issues of single motherhood, child sexual abuse, and domestic violence, and examines the interplay of feminist and Newfoundland identification among these individuals. Drawing on 14 months of participant observation and interviews with women at the Council, George provides a much needed, specifically Canadian contribution to ethno-cultural studies, grass-roots activism, and feminist studies. The research successfully situates the particular concerns and political activism of these women in this rural region of Canada within the larger context of economic restructuring and neoliberal economic and social policies that continue to marginalize women in Canada and around the world. This important study continues the work of feminist ethnographies by such scholars as: Abu-Lughod, Behar, Cole, DiLeonardo, Ginsburg, and Lowenhaupt-Tsing. Avoiding the all too common pitfall of folkorization in rural studies, The Rock Where We Stand represents an innovative and experimental contribution to the field.