09/04/2009
Regular events at the FCWSRC take place on Mondays at 3:30pm and Thursdays at 5:00pm in our seminar room at 83 College Street on the Mount Holyoke College campus in South Hadley.
Talks are free and open to the public. All are welcome. No pre-registration is required. For more information, call 538-2275.
Thursday, October 8 at 5pm
Meredith Cherland
Research Associate (University of Regina)
Harry Potter and the Discourses of Gender: Teaching Critical Thinking
This presentation uses examples from the last four Harry Potter novels to consider these important questions: How do we become the people we are? How do we interact with the popular culture which surrounds us in these postmodern times to construct our own identities? There are ways in which teachers can invite teens to read and write against the grain, to create identities which reach beyond the constraints of the familiar male/female binaries of humanism. Harry Potter provides us with plenty of food for thought.
Thursday, October 15 at 5pm
Perspectives on Feminist Science Studies
Feminist analysis shaped the foundations of science studies as scholars from history, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, literature, and women’s studies brought their expertise to bear on science, technology, and medicine. This panel will feature a new generation of scholars engaged in feminist science studies in the Five College area. Banu Subramanian (University of Massachusetts), Jennifer Hamilton (Hampshire College), Sarah Richardson (University of Massachusetts) and Marjorie Senechal (Smith College) will discuss their research and recent trends in the field of feminist science studies.
Monday, October 19 at 3:30pm
Quinlan Miller
Research Associate (Northwestern University)
How to Handle a Wolf with Both Hands on the Typewriter: Queer Representation and Sex-Positive Feminism in 1950s and 1960s Television Comedy
This presentation demonstrates the central role women played in camp television comedy of the 1950s and 1960s, one of the most provocative and unaddressed cycles of queer representation in U.S. media history. Both as media producers dealing with sexism within the industry and as fictional characters with an “insider” perspective on stereotypes and sexual harassment, women who knew how to handle wolves often questioned the sexist status quo in interesting ways. Explaining how insight into the rich archive of queer gender on TV and the production of comedy programming changes our understanding of the jack-of-all-trades secretaries who appeared on small screens in the postwar period, Miller explores some of the ways in which issues of gender equality and women’s sexual agency were intertwined with queer representation at the time. Note: this presentation is in the form of a pre-circulated paper discussion. Contact fcwsrc@fivecolleges.edu for a copy of the paper in advance.
Thursday, October 22 at 5pm
Ruth Glynn
Research Associate (University of Bristol)
Gendered Perpetration: Women, Terrorism and Trauma in Italy
This presentation examines the traumatic import of women's participation in political violence and terrorism in Italy in the 1970s, with reference to a range of cultural products. It compares media responses to women terrorists with women's own articulation of their militancy in memoir and interview, and explores how female-gendered perpetration challenges and impacts on trauma theory. Note: this presentation is in the form of a pre-circulated paper discussion. Contact fcwsrc@fivecolleges.edu for a copy of the paper in advance.
Our Thursday, October 29 at 5:00pm event with Robin Leeds (Women and the Women's Agenda in the Obama Administration) has been CANCELLED. We apologize for any inconvenience.
Monday, November 2 at 3:30pm
Mary Ellen Cohane
Research Associate (Massachusetts College of the Liberal Arts)
Jane Addams, Eleanor Roosevelt, and the Economics of Peace
The London Economic Conference of 1933 was envisioned by Jane Addams and her ally, Eleanor Roosevelt, as a last, best chance to build an economic basis for an end to war. War, Addams believed, was clearly obsolete in a world where nations depended heavily upon one another for natural resources, for manufactured goods, and for markets for those goods. Therefore, a regularization of international trade, with tight restrictions on currency and commodity speculation, could create an economics that rewarded peace so well that nations would be deeply motivated to solve conflicts via diplomacy, not war. What went spectacularly wrong in l933 can inform us now, as we try to envision a new economics of peace for our time.
Our Thursday, November 5 at 5:00pm event with estheR Cuesta (Documenting the (un)Documented: Narratives of Diasporic Andeans in Southern/Mediterranean Europe) has been cancelled. We apologize for any inconvenience.
Monday, November 9 at 3:30pm
Eleanor Jaffee
Research Associate (University of Albany)
Women, Children, and Consumer-Oriented Outcomes in a Supported Housing Program for Adults with Psychiatric Disabilities
Women with children represent a growing proportion of Americans experiencing homelessness. Traditional research strategies have approached homelessness among people with psychiatric disabilities diagnostically, using clinical tests completed by mental health professionals to determine client progress. Alternatively, this talk will describe a research project drawing the consumer perspective and gender awareness into the analysis of data originally collected via face-to-face interviews over the course of two years for a supported housing program evaluation. Relationships among key variables including gender, presence of children in the household, personal mastery, social networks and subjective quality of life will be explored.
Our presentation by Nada Ali, Thorny Issues and Perilous Coalitions: Gender, Race and Sudanese Exile Politics, originally scheduled for Thursday, November 12 at 5pm has been moved to Thursday, December 3 at 5pm. See December 3 entry below for more information.
Our Monday, November 16 at 3:30pm event with
Seema Thakur (The Implementation of UNSC Resolution 1325 in South Asia) has been cancelled. We apologize for any inconvenience.
Thursday, November 19 at 5pm
Janet Wirth-Cauchon
Research Associate (Drake University)
Feminism and New Theories of Embodiment
Feminism has long challenged the view that women, and by extension their social roles, are determined by their biology. They have argued that the meanings of gender and sexuality are socially created, not biologically or naturally determined. At the same time, they have decried the denial or absence of the body and material processes within social theory and philosophy. This presentation will review the work of some recent feminist thinkers who are turning to a redefinition and reconsideration of the body and “nature” within social thought, and will consider the implications of this work for feminist thought and politics.
Thursday, December 3 at 5pm
Nada Ali
Research Associate (Independent Researcher)
Thorny Issues and Perilous Coalitions: Gender, Race and Sudanese Exile Politics (Ali flyer)
This presentation examines the discourses and practices of the exiled Sudanese opposition in the 1990s from a gender perspective. Drawing on in-depth interviews with male and female politicians and activists, documentary analysis and participant observation, Ali argues that the nature of Sudanese opposition and gender politics in the 1990s has contributed in many ways to recent women's rights violations in Sudan. Ali also explores how racial, ethnic and regional differences posed challenges to coalition-building and solidarity among exiled women's groups. She will reflect on what can be learned from this history, given the upcoming elections in Sudan.
