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Dancing Backwards Dancing Backwards is a history of the ground-breaking accomplishments of women in political life in Canada, including more than two dozen women in leadership roles. Following a thematic and chronological format it encompasses aspects of political leadership in areas beyond electoral politics, including the judiciary. Dancing Backwards weaves these biographies into an accurate and thoroughly readable history of the sometimes painful progress women have made in all aspects of society during the past 130 years. Senator Carstairs has an insider's knowledge (and one national bestseller under her belt), while Higgins has a remarkable feel for cultural nuances thanks to years of writing for theatre and film. Dancing Backwards is illustrated with dramatic black and white portraits by Joshua Stanton |
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Review in Herizons Magazine, Summer 2005 Reviewed by Penni Mitchell Perhaps there are other books that chart Albert Einstein's theory of relatively on a continuum of human progress that includes the founding of the London Medical School for Women in 1875 and the patenting of the Internal combustion engine. If there are, I have not read them. Dancing Backwards is a unique story about early Canadian Feminist politics that is entertaining and engaging. Sharon Carstairs, government leader in the Senate, started out as a history teacher and her vow to public service is at the heart of her co-authorship of Dancing Backwards. Tim Higgins is a natural storyteller whose writing credits include TV documentaries. The pairing of the two works well. What Carstairs and Higgins deliver is not a typical history lesson where the spotlight is focused on one person and simply lists their accomplishments. Rather Dancing Backwards, combines elements of history, science, social developments, culture and feminism as well. The result is, at times, a confounding view of history. This is entirely appropriate, as even feminist often tend to view historic events through a singular lens. For example, it is widely held that early feminists were racist and greedy opportunists who sought to deny the federal vote to 'undesirable aliens.' At the time, however, the entire country was mired in a controversy over conscription, and the debate over extending the federal franchise to some female relatives of men serving overseas (at the time many sought to deny the franchise to those perceived as 'the enemy') was one segment of a large and uncomfortable chapter in Canada's past. Dancing Backwards dreams of a political stage more comfortable with women in leading roles. It takes it's title from Anne Richards, former governor of Texas, who said, "Being a woman in politics is like being Ginger Rogers. You have to do all the same dance steps as Fred Astaire, but you have to do them backwards and in high heels." Despite their abilities, women are still rarely permitted to lead on the political stage. Maybe it would help if every male politician in Canada was required to dance backwards in high heels, just to see how the other half lives. Or maybe they should just read this book. Penni Mitchell is Managing Editor of Herizons |
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NATIONAL POST, Saturday, May 26, 2005 By Charlotte Gray "Patriarchy, pragmatism and politics" Dancing Backwards is an original and interesting book. Starting with the first wave of feminists in the late 19th century and tracking the emergence of women in the political mainstream to today, the authors tell the story of the women's movement and its impact on Canadian society. It is a contemporary approach to writing history, since its structure is aimed at those who rely on Web sites and videos for information. There is a continuous narrative, but each of the book's seven chapter's kick off with a brief dramatic script, delivered by a fictional character (a flapper for the 1920s, a lawyer for the 1980s). These mini-scripts are followed by the kind of timelines that high school teachers love, showing the major political, social and technological events of the period. Embedded in the test are one-page biographies of "firsts," such as Mary Ellen Smith (who became Canada's first female Cabinet member in British Columbia, in 1921) and Beverly McLaughlin (appointed Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Canada in 2000). One of the more intriguing aspects of Dancing Backwards is the authors' determination to set women's fight for equality within the intellectual context of their time. This plunges the narrative straight into the Victorian argument between environmentalists and eugenicists, as Western reformers like Louise McKinney and Nellie McClung pushed temperance alongside women's rights. The approach also gets inside the mindset of Alberta's Emily Murphy, who in addition to petitioning the Privy Council in Westminster on the Person's Case, as one of the Famous Five, also voiced opinions that are appallingly racist by today's standards. More controversially, the authors try to explain the split in the late-20th-century women's movement-between radical feminists who fulminate against the patriarch and pragmatic feminists working within elected politics-as an inevitable consequence of postmodernism. The authors' bias against those feminist academics who have steered women's studies into identity politics and the victim mentality in unvarnished: "Whatever the quality of the research produced (like postmodernism itself, the jury's still out), this kind of feminism seemed to have little practical effect, other than this: It provided (and continues to provide) convenient targets for people who have no interest in seeing women and men as equals, and it produced ever more highly educated female graduates who saw politics as a patriarchal conspiracy and declined to become involved." Such a conclusion is hardly surprising, given the backgrounds of the two authors. Sharon Carstairs has had more than her share of knock in the real political world, first as leader of the Liberal Party in Manitoba and subsequently as a Senator and government minister in Ottawa. She has seen the way politics is played (her 1993 autobiography was titled Not One of the Boys) and experienced all the frustrations of women in politics, including endless media comment on voice and appearance. Tim Higgins is a Winnipeg-based actor, director and scriptwriter. Until the final chapter ("On the Brink of the Twenty-first Century"), they eschew jargon and include lots of irresistible details. (As women abandoned corsets and bared their knees, the amount of material in a women's outfit dropped from about 17 yards in 1914 to less than nine yards in the late 1920s, causing panic in the textile industry.) The story told in Dancing Backwards is rooted in Liberal values, as one quickly gathers from repeated references to works by Eric Hobsbawm and Richard Gwyn. And by the end, it has morphed from lively narrative into a call to arms. First, the authors widen their focus to look at what rampant privatization and globalization have done on other continents, which have seen collapsing currencies and a winner-take-all mentality that can only hinder the struggle for gender equality. Nest, they appeal for volunteers to continue the campaigns for better daycare, maternity leave and pay packets. The final paragraph is a plea for "a third wave of feminists-women who are willing to step through the doors that have been opened by women we've met in this book." There is much to criticize in Dancing Backwards, from its sweeping generalizations to its surprising omissions (neither Flora MacDonald nor Monique Begin get the attention they deserve). It is opinionated and a bit cranky. But it is also a spirited and honourable attempt to engage readers in an account of recent history that puts women in the centre, rather than on the margins, of life. Charlotte Gray covered federal politics for Saturday Night for eight years before turning to popular history. Her most recent book is The Museum Called Canada. | ||
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