Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons^™

Teaching About Women's Lives To Elementary School Children, Sandra Hughes

Women's Studies Quarterly

As sixth-grade teachers with a desire to teach students about the historical role of women in the United States, my colleague and I created a project for use in our classrooms which would maximize exposure to women's history with a minimum of teacher effort. This approach was necessary because of the small amount of time we had available for gathering and organizing material on the history of women and adapting it to the elementary level.

Since textbook material on women is practically nonexistent, we decided to have the students use the biographical approach. Each student was to read a biography …

Newsbriefs, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Graduate Programs In Women's Studies, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

The following report is the latest addition to a continuing series of reports on graduate opportunities in Women's Studies, of which the first two reports may be found in the Fall 1978 (Vol. VI, No. 4) and Winter 1979 (Vol . VII, No. 1) issues of the Women's Studies Newsletter.

Women's Studies Programs offering graduate degrees were asked to respond to the following questions:

1. What is the curricular shape and major emphasis of your program? How flexible is it? How many (and which) credits and other requirements must be completed for the degree? Name your degree(s).

2. What …

Teaching Lesbian Poetry, Elly Bulkin

Women's Studies Quarterly

In all that has been written about teaching women's literature, about classroom approaches and dynamics, there is almost no discussion of ways to teach lesbian literature. As a teacher, you hesitate to write about it in detail (if at all) for the same reasons you hesitate to emphasize it—or even discuss it—in class and out: the fear of losing your job, of being denied tenure; the fear that, regardless of your sexual and affectional preference, you will be dismissed by your students as "just a lesbian." You may be concerned that students who feel hostile, skeptical, or even friendly toward …

Teaching Women's History To Men In Prison, Diane Tarmy Rudnick, Sayre Phillips Sheldon

Women's Studies Quarterly

"To me, real feminism means working together with other people to try to change the balance of power and wealth, working for everybody's right to human dignity."—Inmate at Massachusetts Correctional Institute, Norfolk

With all the problems of getting women's history accepted in traditional institutions, why try to introduce it in an environment that we could expect to be unsympathetic? The idea, when it was first suggested to us, sounded improbable.

As we discussed it, possibilities began to emerge. We were each giving courses at Boston University on women's history in America: one emphasizing the economic and social aspects, the …

Introduction To Women's Studies: New Textbook Being Developed At Hunter College, Nancy Dean, Sarah B. Pomeroy

Women's Studies Quarterly

The National Endowment for the Humanities has awarded a grant to the Women's Studies Program of Hunter College for the writing of a textbook and instructional manual for the basic course, "Introduction to Women's Studies." Unlike other comprehensive women's studies textbooks which are described as multidisciplinary but are actually collections of individual chapters, each written from the perspective of a single discipline, Hunter's books will be thoroughly interdisciplinary, with each chapter written collectively.

The nine authors, from four divisions of the college—Humanities and the Arts, Social Sciences, and the professional schools of Nursing and Education—are: Ulku Bates, Nancy Dean, Florence …

Back Matter, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Your Mind — Use It Or Lose It: Women's Studies In A Nursing Home, Dorothy Kilton

Women's Studies Quarterly

The following article, an example of student work, was sent in by Anne R. Barrett, Coordinator of the Women's Studies Nursing Home Education Project sponsored by the Women's Studies Program at the University of New Hampshire. Written by one of the elderly participants in the project, the essay, Barrett feels, "captures the spirit of our program most eloquently."

Barrett reports that she and her colleagues "are absolutely delighted with the outcome of the project. It is even more successful than we had originally anticipated. The average age of our students is 87, and we have added a new course this …

Teaching Research Methods In Women's Studies, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

"Research Methods in Women's Studies" is a two-credit-hour, 300-level course taught in the School of Library and Informational Science at the University of Missouri-Columbia. One objective of this course is to ensure that students become regular, successful users of a library. The other is to introduce them to the wide variety of women's studies resources which are available at UMC and to make them aware of resources in other research collections, some of which may be available through interlibrary loan.

Reaching Out To The Community: The Mothers And Daughters Conference At Suny/New Paltz, Nancy Schniedewind

Women's Studies Quarterly

Last spring we held an intergenerational Mothers and Daughters Conference at SUNY/New Paltz that was attended by over 350 people, many of them grandmothers, mothers, and daughters from the same families. The impetus for the weekend conference had come from a group of women's studies faculty and students who, the Mother/ Daughter Relationship among Black mother / daughter relationship to a feminist during a discussion of the significant changes in our lives that involvement in women's studies had catalyzed, had begun to consider how exciting it would be if our mothers could share some of our new perspectives. At the …

Readers' Speakout, Cathryn Adamsky, Anne Thorsen Truax

Women's Studies Quarterly

Readers are invited to send in comments—about the Women's Studies Newsletter, about the National Women's Studies Association, or about any issue of concern to feminist education—in the form of letters or brief essays of opinion (up to 700 words). We will print letters only with the written consent of the writer. Please send to the editor two copies of your letter or essay, along with a self-addressed, stamped envelope.

Dear Elaine Reuben:

The Association for Women in Psychology wishes to call your attention to a case that we think should be of considerable interest to the National Women's Studies …

Feminist Publishing In Israel, Marcia Freedman

Women's Studies Quarterly

Israel has a population of 3½ million people who, for the most part, speak, read, and write an ancient, patriarchal language recently revived and fortified by an infusion of new terms and even some new syntactic constructs. The result of this self-imposition of a parochial language upon a people who, as a people, had been at home in at least one European language as well as Yiddish and Ladino, was to transform the People of the Book into a rather ill-informed and culturally isolated society. The few channels of information from the West that do existmainly films and books-are institutionally …

Introducing Manushi: An Indian Feminist Journal, Tobe Levin

Women's Studies Quarterly

"Liquor, the slaying of women and Shudras ... are all minor offences," according to Manu, the Hindu lawgiver. "To rape is human," asserts Mr. Joshi, Chief Minister of the province of Madhya Pradesh.

V. Meera calls on these voices of tradition to open her article, "Prisoners of Inequality: Sexual Abuse of Dalit Women," in an excellent new feminist bimonthly magazine called Manushi: A Journal about Women and Society. Manushi, whose title means "woman" in Hindi, first appeared in January 1979, as the pioneer publication of its kind in India. It is produced in Delhi by an independent feminist collective …

Back Matter, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Newsbriefs, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Women's Studies And Science, Anne Fausto-Sterling

Women's Studies Quarterly

The following paper was originally a talk delivered at the Research Conference on Educational Environments and the Undergraduate Woman, sponsored by HERS , New England, at Wellesley College last year.

One manifestation of the rigid division of sex roles in our society is the fact that relatively few women are scientists, especially physical scientists and mathematicians. My interest in addressing the subject of women and the science curriculum stems from my desire to change this situation, to allow equal access of men and women into science. The college curriculum is only a small part of this problem. The different socialization …

A New Newsletter For Women's Studies In India, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

A Newsletter has been initiated in India by the Research Unit on Women's Studies. It contains information on the condition of women in India, on feminist activities, and on the progress of women's studies there, as well as international news. Its purpose is to provide a communications link "with individuals and institutions both in India and abroad."

Women's Studies At Emma Willard School, Edith Prescott

Women's Studies Quarterly

In our Fall issue (Vol. VII, No. 4), we published an article by historian Anne Firor Scott about Emma Willard, the pioneer feminist who founded the Troy Female Seminary in 1821. In the following article, a teacher at the school-now called Emma Willard School after its illustrious founder-brings us up to date on its continued progress in the area of women's education.

Centers For Research On Women, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

The following annotated listing was kindly supplied by Mariam Chamberlain of The Ford Foundation. Reprints may be obtained by sending a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the Women 's Studies Newsletter, Box 334, Old Westbury, NY 11568, or to the National Women's Studies Association, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742.

Face-To-Face, Day-To-Day, Racism Cr, Tia Cross, Freada Klein, Barbara Smith, Beverly Smith

Women's Studies Quarterly

The following consciousness-raising guidelines were developed as a way of enabling feminists to explore and understand their own racist feelings and behavior through the use of a uniquely feminist tool. "The CR format," the authors explained in a preface which originally appeared, along with the guidelines, in the Cambridge, Massachusetts, newspaper Sojourner (4:9 May 1979), "encourages personal sharing, risk-taking, and involvement, which are essential for getting at how each of us is racist in a daily way, and it encourages the 'personal' change that makes political transformation and action possible." Although the authors caution "that these guidelines are not instant …

Women's Studies Programs - 1980, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

Most of the programs listed below are interdisciplinary; i.e., they combine courses in literature, language, or culture with work in sociology, anthropology, economics, political science, history, philosophy, psychology, biology, and related fields. Many offer interdisciplinary courses as well as internships. Some programs offer minors (denoted by Min) or certificates (denoted by Cer); others offer major concentrations in women's studies or award A.A., B.A., M.A., or Ph.D. degrees. Programs listed without a specific label offer or coordinate elective courses. Where no coordinator, director, or chairperson is listed, the program may be in the process of organization, or it may have …

A Note On Jewish Women's Studies In The United States, S. F.

Women's Studies Quarterly

As Israeli feminists attempt to connect with the women's movement outside Israel, Jewish feminists in the United States are attempting to connect with them and with the Jewish heritage both groups share. Due to the peculiarities inherent in that heritage, "Jewish Women's Studies" in the United States is as much in its infancy as feminist publishing in Israel. This past year, however, at the First Annual NWSA Convention, a session on Jewish Women's Studies: Theory and Practice took place, as well as a roundtable discussion on Feminism and Judaism, and a spontaneously organized Shabbat service that was inspiring for those …

Front Matter, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

No abstract provided.

Editorial: Toward Women's Studies In The Eighties: Part Two, F. H.

Women's Studies Quarterly

Toward Women's Studies in the Eighties: Part Two

In the last issue, we outlined a new challenge: infusing women's studies into general education and basic skills programs. Here, in an issue that includes a number of lists, we will offer one more editorially: a list of "understandings." The list below names the areas in which women's studies has developed "streams" of courses (disciplinary and interdisciplinary), and classifies areas of scholarship from which research agendas are emerging:

Nwsa News And Views, Elaine Reuben

Women's Studies Quarterly

FROM THE NATIONAL OFFICE

By Elaine Reuben "Summing up the seventies," or looking ahead to the decade now beginning, I cannot adopt the weary/wary tone of most columnists and commentators.

The 1980 listing of women's studies programs in this issue reflects a ten-percent increase in the number of programs since the last compilation, with related growth in the number of certificates and degrees programs offer. NWSA's survey sought and obtained more detailed information than in the past, and we anticipate being able to maintain and provide such data more efficiently in the future.

The Finance Committee, Barbara Hillyer Davis

Women's Studies Quarterly

One of the many challenges to the NWSA in Lawrence came from the Association's Finance Committee, who, after a summary of the Association's financial history, made several specific recommendations based on their reflection about the relationship between our past financial behavior and our continuing effort to understand ourselves as a feminist organization. The recommendations should be the beginning of a discussion among all our members of the relationship between feminism and money.

The Finance Committee recommended that the NWSA as an organization dedicate itself to developing an attitude of fiscal responsibility in the Coordinating Council and the membership as a …

The Membership Table, Donna Whittlesey

Women's Studies Quarterly

In the month before the First NWSA Convention, the National Women's Studies Association doubled the number of memberships received in the first four months of the 1979 dues year. On the first day of the Convention, 100 more members joined, followed by another SO to 75 in the remaining days of the meeting, when we were not able to staff the membership table full time. Returning to the National Office, we found we had received approximately 5O additional memberships, and numerous requests for membership information.

As of June 1979, this year's NWSA membership was already more than twice the total …

Readers' Speakout, Peter Petschauer, Sandra Zagarell, Edith Prescott, F. H., Jeanne Ford, Annette Kolodny

Women's Studies Quarterly

Dear Ms. Howe:

Your Women's Studies Newsletter's report on feminism in Germany is interesting (Vol VII, No. 1, Winter 1979), but I have some problems with Ms. Zagarell's report. Although one questions in certain quarters what men have to say, one may not question as readily my devotion to research on feminism in Germany.

I have problems especially with the last paragraph's assertions (p. 26). Although some see Emma and Courage as "excellent sources of information on the German women's movement,"they are not so "on German women's lives," or the other points asserted. The journals may indeed be a revolutionary …

Editorial: The Convention Issue: A Time To Reflect And To Look Ahead, The Feminist Press

Women's Studies Quarterly

THE CONVENTION ISSUE: A TIME TO REFLECT AND TO LOOK AHEAD

For the first time since we began publishing in 1972, we have devoted an entire issue to a single subject: the First Annual Convention of the National Women's Studies Association. Our motivation was dual: this was an historic occasion and we felt a responsibility to record history; this was the first of a series and we wanted to begin the necessary reflection for the Second Convention, to be held May 16-20, 1980, on the Bloomington campus of Indiana University.

We made this decision only slowly, as the events of …

Visions And Revisions: Women And The Power To Change, Elaine Reuben, Florence Howe, Barbara Smith, Charlotte Bunch, Arlie Hochschild, Amy Swerdlow

Women's Studies Quarterly

This final panel, summing up and looking ahead at the end of the First NWSA Convention, borrowed part of its title from the collection of essays on feminism and education Women and the Power to Change [1975]. Contributors to that volume, and other writer-organizers joining them here, were asked to reflect on their work of the early '70s and to offer their analyses—and their visions—for the '80s.