Amari is a rising junior interning at Sanctuary for Families this summer.

Throughout my life I have been fascinated by mythology and science fiction. My favorite  literary and television heroines have run the gamut from Aphrodite to Buffy the Vampire  Slayer. Despite their years of separation, both the goddess and the slayer have been  characterized as “femme fatales” due to the extraordinary powers they possess and  cunning they exhibit. As my own sorority line name is Femme Fatale, I have developed a  keen interest in the origins of this archetype and its presence in contemporary society.  Why must a female stock character who possesses any variety of agency or power over  men be branded as fatal?

In Helen of Troy: Beauty, Myth, Devastation, Ruby Blondell discusses the origins of modern society’s relationship to female beauty. Through a review of Greek mythology, Blondell explains how beauty and other forms of female agency, like intelligence, have been tied to negative attributes, such as deceit and devastation. Today, I believe that our society ascribes these same negative characteristics to female beauty, intelligence and sexuality.

Perhaps this is why today we see terrorist groups, like the Boko Haram militants, targeting educated girls, such as the students of Nigeria’s Government Girls Secondary School. Or perhaps this is why most sex workers and sex slaves are treated as criminals. Or maybe this explains the phenomenon of slut-shaming.

This summer I hope to learn more about the cultural mechanisms behind the censure and criminalization of women in all spheres of society. Be it in the corporate workplace or the high school hallway, many women find their ideas ignored, their skills suppressed and their confidence stymied. The cultural expectations that discourage female leadership and empowerment may also be tied to those that encourage slut-shaming and female circumcision. I am excited to work with Sanctuary for Families, an organization that empowers women to move forward from the problems that society’s expectations have cast upon them.