Arts and Humanities Commons^™

Feminist Attitudes, Behaviors, And Culture Shaping Women’S Center Practice, Angela Clark-Taylor, Emily Creamer, Barbara Lesavoy, Catherine Cerulli Dr.

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

The present article contributes to the growing research on women’s centers to extend and encourage the role of feminism in women’s center within higher education. We provide a brief history of feminism and women’s centers in higher education to illuminate the connections between previous research and our women’s center research on community perceptions of feminisms.

#Themtoo: Two Nfl Team Options For Not Exploiting Women Cheerleaders, Melanie Kelly, Colby A. Murphy, Mary E. Graham

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This paper presents the results of an exploratory study of why and how professional football teams in the National Football League (NFL) use cheerleaders, the vast majority of whom are women. From archival press reports, media guides, and team website content, we examine why some teams choose not to use cheerleaders; and among the majority of teams that do use cheerleaders, the purposes for which they employ them. Based upon the findings, we categorize teams into two groups: (a) NFL teams that do not use cheerleaders but that also fail to capitalize on this potential competitive advantage; and (b) NFL …

Influencing Public Opinion: Activist Public Relations And The Arrest Of Susan B. Anthony, Arien Rozelle

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

The Suffrage movement stands out as an early progressive cause that utilized an integrated approach to public relations in support of a clear objective. The arrest of Susan B. Anthony provided the movement with a huge opportunity to influence public opinion in order to win the right to vote.

Shapeshifting Power: Indigenous Teachings Of Trickster Consciousness And Relational Accountability For Building Communities Of Care, Ionah M. Elaine Scully

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Difficult dialogues are necessary work in order for communities to form coalitions, yet often these dialogues pose challenges for engaging in long-term work for social justice and systemic change. Power dynamics, microaggressions, and discomfort unlearning power and privilege can make long-term collaboration difficult. It is for this reason I discuss thinking of coalitions as communities of care and offer practical strategies for collaborating differently for sustainable action. Using Indigenous epistemology and methodology, Indigenous feminist and Indigequeer scholarship, as well as Indigenous land-based pedagogy and storytelling, I offer interventions using trickster teachings or trickster consciousness which I describe as comprised of …

Contemporary Black Women's Voting Rights Activism: Some Historical Perspective, Alison Parker, Valeria Sinclair-Chapman, Naomi R. Williams

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

As the United States arrived at the brink of the 2020 election, three interdisciplinary scholars engaged in a panel discussion about why and how Black women of all classes have been at the forefront of movements for civil rights and economic justice. Based on their expertise on race, gender, and class, and scholarly backgrounds in history, labor studies, and political science, this paper presents perspectives on the critical role of Black women in simultaneously fighting for the right to vote, while protesting the disenfranchisement of all African Americans from the Reconstruction Era to the present. The paper discusses why and …

Disrupters:Three Women Of Color Tell Their Stories, Dulce María Gray, Denise A. Harrison, Yuko Kurahashi

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This essay is an amplified version of the presentation we made at the 7th Biennial Seneca Falls Dialogues. Our aim is to story back into the world our first experiences and motivations for investing in suffrage and democratic activism. We are three American professors of disciplines in the humanities, who for decades have taught and lived across the United States and have traveled the world. Yuko Kurahashi’s essay tells the story of how Raichō Hiratsuka and Fusae Ichikawa, Japanese activists in their suffrage and peace movements, helped shape her personal and professional life. Denise Harrison talks about the first wave …

Being A Feminist Community During A Pandemic: Our Editors’ Welcome, Jill Swiencicki, Lisa J. Cunningham, Mary E. Graham

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Volume 4, the pandemic issue of The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, features a selection of participants from our 2020 gathering who have transformed their conference offerings into articles for posterity, ones that aim to keep the dialogue going and widen the sphere of feminist inquiry.

Creating Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, Deborah Uman, Barbara Lesavoy

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

After six years of productive collaboration, we realized, somewhat reluctantly, that it was time to hand over the editorial reins to other members of the SFD team. We are reluctant, only because we have so enjoyed working together and with our colleagues on a project about which we feel proud. As we reflect upon our editorial journey, it is especially meaningful to glance back at three extraordinary volumes, each published in the spirit of the journal’s founding principles of feminist agency and voice. We both look forward to supporting the journal as members of the editorial board and are excited …

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, V. 4, 2021 (Complete Issue), Lisa J. Cunningham, Mary E. Graham, Jill Swiencicki

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Table of Contents

Being a Feminist Community During a Pandemic: Our Editors’ Welcome by Jill Swiencicki, Lisa Cunningham, & Mary E. Graham

Creating Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal by Deborah Uman & Barbara LeSavoy

Disrupters: Three Women of Color Tell Their Stories by Dulce María Gray, Denise A. Harrison, & Yuko Kurahashi

Contemporary Black Women’s Voting Rights Activism: Some Historical Perspective by Alison Parker, Valeria Sinclair-Chapman, & Naomi R. Williams

Shapeshifting Power: Indigenous Teachings of Trickster Consciousness and Relational Accountability for Building Communities of Care by Ionah M. Elaine Scully

Influencing Public Opinion: Public Relations and the Arrest of Susan B. …

Let's Change The Subject: Grounding Social Change In Indigenous History And Philosophy, Robert Michael Ruehl

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This article urges altering the discourse around social change. Too often it is antagonistic and negative; it also overlooks continuing colonizing practices and how injustices to Indigenous peoples have helped to shape past and current injustices toward other groups. First, the article foregrounds the religio-political ideology of the Doctrine of Christian Discovery and the boarding-school experience to remind readers about the broader criminal history of the United States toward Indigenous nations and peoples and how colonization is not a thing of the past. Any call for social change should remember this. Second, the article looks at three dimensions of Indigenous …

Mapping Injustice Towards Feminist Activism, Wanda B. Knight, Karen T. Keifer-Boyd

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Strategies for crafting feminist activism begin with a conversation, invites and involves the participation of many people, involves artists and creative communicators, and generates action. The essay is a discussion with examples of how to craft feminist activism from dialogue to committed action—to stop injustice and work toward intersectional justice. We begin the dialogue with intersectional theory and then facilitate a group process of visualization using metaphors of entanglement. The concept of intersectionality considers how hegemonic structures intersect to oppress the lives of racially marginalized communities. The goal of the dialogue is to examine the potential consequences of the interaction …

Media And Social Media Best Practices For Feminist Activist Groups And Organizations, Arien Rozelle

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Feminist organizations and activist groups from the Women’s Suffrage movement to the Women’s March have utilized media relations tactics and techniques to share organizational messages. Over time, the art of media relations has evolved from a tactical role to a strategic necessity, one that is vital to the success of any activist organization or group as they seek to inform, educate and/or persuade their intended audience through the use of media and social media.

This essay identifies best practices for feminist activist groups and organizations to help begin or improve their media relations efforts, ranging from initial hiring, to media …

#Blacklivesmatter: Intersectionality, Violence, And Socially Transformative Art, Denise A. Harrison, Denise Bedford, Laura C. Fong, Linda Hoeptner Poling, Evonne Fields-Gould, Yuko Kurahashi, Dianne Kerr, Alexis A. Blavos

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This paper is designed to elicit dialogue on the impact of the #Blacklivesmatter (BLM) movement and be a call to action in the wake of murder and sustained oppression of the Black body in America. The paper focuses on the intersectionality of the BLM movement using art, “racial” analysis, creative pedagogy, and the theatre of the oppressed. Included is a monologue of a mother whose child has been murdered by a “peace officer” that leads the audience on an emotional journey. In addition, sobering statistics of documented murders of Black transgender women are presented, as are the health effects of …

Doing The *: Performing The Radical In Antisexist And Antiracist Work, Barbara Lesavoy, Angelica Whitehorne, Jasmine Mohamed, Mackenzie April, Kendra Pickett

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

The essay summarizes excerpts from the 6^th Biennial Seneca Falls Dialogue’s (SFD) session, “Doing the *: Performing the Radical in Antisexist and Antiracist Work.” In this dialogue, students read, displayed, or performed excerpts from feminist manifestos that they authored in a feminist theory or women and gender studies course at The College at Brockport. The manifesto assignment asked students to select a contemporary feminist issue, and using text or text with performance, expose and analyze the issue drawing from “The Combahee River Collective” joined with “Trans *: A Quick and Quirky Account of Gender Variability.”” …

We Marched. Now What?!: Positionality, Persistence, And Power As Catalysts For Change, Kaelyn E.L. Rich

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Keynote address delivered on October 20, 2018, at the Seneca Falls Dialogues Bi-annual Conference, Seneca Falls, New York.

Editorial Introduction: We All Write: Reclaiming A Sacred Space, Deborah Uman, Barbara Lesavoy

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

The project of the Seneca Falls Dialogues is founded on hope in the face of continued discrimination and inequities, and the essays in this journal continue to move that agenda forward.

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, V. 3, 2019 (Complete Issue), Deborah Uman, Barbara Lesavoy

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

No abstract provided.

“Gender (As Constant) Labor”: A Consciousness Raising Dialogue On Transfeminist Scholarship And Organizing, Melissa Autumn White

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This co-authored essay draws on student research conducted for an upper-level course called Trans*Studies that was originally presented at the Seneca Falls Dialogues Conference in October 2016. Drawing on Jane Ward's generative concept of "gender labor", our Dialogue highlights the material effects of representational politics, and articulates the need to centre a transfeminist critique of normative regimes of power, including the representation of "women's" history in the United States.

Intersectionality And Feminist Pedagogy: Lessons From Teaching About Racism And Economic Inequity, Lisa J. Cunningham, Pao Lee Vue, Virginia B. Maier

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This paper utilizes Rochester, NY, as a case study to argue that approaching race intersectionally and across disciplines creates a stronger model of feminist pedagogy. It is based on our work in the classroom and on the Fisher Race Initiatives—a series of three interactive workshops we created on our campus to create change in the aftermath of the Michael Brown shooting in Ferguson, MO, and in the subsequent rise of the #BlackLivesMatter movement. Our goals were to promote dialogue on race, to expose participants to factual information on race, and to emphasize the intersectional causes of poverty in the Rochester …

The New Normal: Wgs Programs And Professionally-Driven Students, Kathryn I. Sheffield, Elizabeth Ursic

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

In today’s volatile economic climate, students are increasingly choosing courses and majors that are primarily focused on professionally valuable skills and employment opportunities. This trend poses challenges for Women and Gender Studies programs, calling for a shift in both instructional and institutional strategies within the field. Yet, far from finding this a detriment, we have found that Women and Gender Studies courses have considerable value for professionally-driven students. In addition, we have found that the presence of professionally-driven students in Women and Gender Studies courses present opportunities for WGS programs. This article discusses the instructional and institutional implications of the …

Empowerment Through Dialogue: Women’S Experience With Division Of Labor As A Leisure Constraint In Family Life, Sarah Agate, Joel Agate

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Women in American society experience high levels of stress and the resultant physical and psychological challenges. While leisure is often seen as a context for stress relief, a variety of leisure constraints make it difficult for many women to have this experience. A focus group was conducted with five women who are mothers of young children to explore the division of labor in family travel. This paper reports on the experience of participant empowerment, which occurred through the dialogue that took place. Findings from this study have implications for those seeking to empower people who experience discrimination and marginalization in …

Constructing Sexuality And Fetishizing Women In American History: Debunking Myths In Popular Culture From Pocahontas To The Cold War, Jamie Wagman, Katlynn Dee, Alison Tipton, Adrienne Whisman

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

This paper features recent teaching and scholarship produced in U.S. Women’s History and Women’s History coursework at Saint Mary’s College in Notre Dame, Indiana. We discuss using visual culture analysis and intersectionality in the U.S. History and Women’s History classroom to produce scholarship that interrogates the intersection of race, class, gender and sexuality at a particular historical moment and examines visual primary sources. We give examples of scholarship produced in coursework using these methods, from studying the Lavender Scare and popular culture’s constructions of Democracy that equated communism with homosexuality to the ways in which middle class social reformers used …

Underrepresented: The Lack Of Black Designers Featured In Harper’S Bazaar And Vogue, Tameka N. Ellington

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

During the Fall 2012 New York Fashion Week preview, only two African American designers showcased collections of the 127 designers (Mullins). Spring 2015 Fashion Week showcased 25 African American/African (Black) designers (Superselected), which is a significant increase. However, there is still minimal to no presence of Black designers in high-fashion magazines. There has been lay/popular research on this phenomenon (Kearney; madamenoire; Mullins; Williams; Woodberry), but no academic data has been published regarding this injustice.

Through a Critical Race Theory (CRT) lens the coverage or lack thereof that Black designers receive is divulged. CRT recognizes that racism is engrained in the …

Appearance Discrimination: Lookism And The Cost To The American Woman, Alyssa Dana Dana Adomaitis, Rachel Raskin, Diana Saiki

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Lookism, or ranking an individual based on attractiveness, is a prevalent employment prejudice. Research has shown that looks influence salaries, career growth and even hiring (Warhurst, van den Broek, Hall, & Nickson, 2009). Because it is difficult to prove, there is no legislation that specifically addresses lookism. The current economy gives employers a vast selection of job applicants and candidates for open positions and “beauty premiums” (individuals considered above average with pretty faces) may have a better chance at being hired. According to a Newsweek national survey (2010) of 202 human resource staff which revealed that corporate hiring managers indicated …

Add Women And Stir: Female Presidents In Pop Culture, 2012-2016, Angela Laflen, Michelle Smith, Kristin Bayer, Riana Ramirez, Jessica Recce, Molly Scott

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

In this article, we argue that there was a representational shift in popular culture representations of female presidents following Hillary Clinton’s 2008 primary run, from earlier representations that were entirely preoccupied with gender to more recent depictions that tried to set aside “the gender question.” We explore three representations of female presidents produced since 2012 that can illuminate popular understandings of gender and the presidency between the 2008 and 2016 elections: Veep, State of Affairs, and Scandal. While all three texts attempt to normalize images of female presidents and break from earlier representations by treating a female …

Disrupting The Lean: Performing A 2016 Declaration Of Sentiments, Tambria Schroeder, Barbara Lesavoy, Melissa Brown, Brooke E. Love, Maggie Rosen, Brooke A. Ophardt, Audrey Lai

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Inspired by the spirit of disruption, this article narrates the making of a “2016 Declaration of Sentiments,” invented in a roundtable, “Disrupting the Lean: Performing a 2016 Declaration of Sentiments,” at the fifth Biennial Seneca Falls Dialogues (SFD). We open the essay with a brief theoretical overview that informs manifestos written in a feminist theory or senior seminar course that take up questions of gender equity, labor, and acts of resistance. We follow with excerpts from these manifestos as read in the roundtable, closing the essay with a “2016 Declaration of Sentiments,” collaboratively authored and recited by roundtable participants. Looking …

Remembering Kate Gleason: Introducing A Twentieth-Century Businesswoman To Twenty-First Century Students, Michael J. Brown, Rebecca Edwards, Tina O. Lent

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

In the fall of 2015, the faculty of the Museum Studies Program at RIT mounted an exhibition titled "Kate Gleason, Visionary: A Tribute on Her 150th Birthday." While Kate Gleason’s name is familiar on the RIT campus because the College of Engineering is named for her, this association obscures recognition of her many and varied accomplishments. The challenge we undertook was to contextualize her work in engineering within her other entrepreneurial endeavors in manufacturing, banking, and building, focusing on the innovation and vision that united them. In addition, we wanted Gleason’s career and accomplishments to be compelling and relevant to …

Editorial Introduction: Women Have Achieved This, I Follow: What If?, Deborah Uman, Barbara Lesavoy

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

In turning to questions of gender, economics and entrepreneurship, the 2016 Seneca Falls Dialogues asked participants to explore how various forms of labor and compensation affect individual lives, societal movements, and institutions. One of the sub-themes for the conference was “Arts and Activism,” which led to our choice of keynote speaker Brenda Ann Kenneally and inspired Eastman professor of music education, Philip Silvey, to propose a performance of the University of Rochester’s women’s chorus at the Dialogues. With the full support of the Department of Music at University of Rochester, chaired by Professor Honey Meconi, and the full enthusiasm of …

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal, V. 2, 2017 (Complete Issue), Deborah Uman, Barbara Lesavoy

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Memory. Disruption. Presidential. Underrepresented. History. Empowerment. Sustaining. Intersectionality. Transfeminism. These words capture the breadth and scope of essays in volume 2 and bring us back to the 2016 Biennial Seneca Falls Dialogues conference. Photojournalist, activist, and 2016 Seneca Falls Dialogues keynote Brenda Ann Kenneally uses her artistic work to explore the how and why of class inequity in America. Her project, Upstate Girls, set in Troy, NY, followed seven women for five years as their escape routes out of generational poverty led to further entrapment. Pictured on the journal cover, one of seven upstate girls, is Kayla and mom before …

The 1848 Declarations Of Sentiments: Usurpations And Incantations, Leah Shafer

The Seneca Falls Dialogues Journal

Three video recordings of participants reciting the "1848 Declaration of Sentiments" at the Seneca Falls Dialogues conferences. In the first video titled "Sentiments and Usurpations", an excerpt is repeated over and over until it begins to sound like an incantation. In the second video, "Declaration of Sentiments 2014", still images accompany an audio track featuring the voices of the participants. The third video, "Declaration of Sentiments Wesleyan Chapel" uses the 2014 audio track for an avant-garde exploration of the interior of the Wesleyan Chapel.