Gringa: A Contradictory Girlhood (Seal Press, October 2009)

Campus Duck Store, 895 E. 13th Ave., Eugene

Melissa Hart

5 p.m.–5:45 p.m.   Reception

5:45 p.m.   Reading

6:30 p.m.   Signing & Reception

Gringa bookcover

“In the 1970s and early 1980s, mothers who came out as lesbians routinely lost custody of their children to homophobic court systems and outraged fathers,” says author Melissa Hart.  When she was 9 years old, this happened to her mother in Southern California, and Hart and her younger siblings weren’t allowed to live with her again until they turned 18.

Hart documented this era in her new memoir Gringa: A Contradictory Girlhood. CSWS awarded Melissa Hart a grant to work on this book in 2007. Hart teaches journalism at the University of Oregon and memoir writing for U.C. Berkeley’s online extension program. For more information about Hart’s work, visit her website at www.melissahart.com.

Fir Room, Erb Memorial Union.

“Salvation in his Arms?: Racial Reconciliation in a ‘Post’-Racial Era”

a lecture by Rebecca Wanzo, associate professor of Women’s Studies and English at Ohio State University.

Paper summary: Are we in a “post”-race era? How do Hollywood narratives contribute to discourse about a post-racial U.S.? In a discussion of recent Hollywood melodramas that depict white men saving black women, Wanzo explores how racial reconciliation narratives in the 21st century treat therapy as the answer to structural and institutional ills.

Sponsored by  the Department of Ethnic Studies, Women and Gender Studies, and Center for the Study of Women in Society.

CSWS Director Carol A. Stabile has this to say about Rebecca Wanzo’s new book:

“Tracing the invisibility of the suffering of African American women across media, The Suffering Will Not Be Televised offers an important analysis of the many ways in which African American women’s experiences have been excluded from narratives about social violence and victimization. Wanzo’s book serves as a reminder about the necessity of considering gender and race relationally for women’s studies, cultural studies, and studies of crime, media, and culture.” — Carol A. Stabile, author of White Victims, Black Villains: Gender, Race, and Crime News in U.S. Culture

Browsing Room, Knight Library

Sponsored by CSWS, the Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, and the ASUO Women’s Center)

Panel members include:

Rebecca Wanzo, associate professor of Women’s Studies and English, Ohio State University; Jocelyn Hollander, associate professor, UO Department of Sociology; and Mara Williams, graduate student, UO School of Journalism and Communication.

Place: 330 Hendricks Hall, the Jane Grant Conference Room.

Alisa Freedman, assistant professor, East Asian Languages and Literatures, with a specialty in Japanese literature and film, will talk  about her trip to Tokyo to research a new book on Changing Images of Workingwomen on Japanese Television Dramas.  Japanese primetime serials have depicted workingwomen since the early 1990s. More than being mere entertainment, these fictional narratives educate viewers about real social issues and dramatize media discourses. Because of the characters and the ways their stories are told, dramas have an impact on the lives of female viewers. Television attracts a large and diverse audience at home and abroad, and therefore it is a good way to view social values, assess Japan’s global image, and see how popular culture shapes gender norms.

Alisa received a CSWS Faculty Research Grant in the amount of $3910 to support this work. Read about Alisa’s 2009 summer travels in Japan in her blog entry.

Welcome back for the Fall Quarter!

CSWS welcomes new women faculty members to the University of Oregon.
By invitation only.

Gerlinger Lounge

Light lunch

Looking forward to seeing old friends and meeting new ones.

Sincerely,

Carol Stabile, Director
Center for the Study of Women in Society

CSWS Women’s Faculty Gathering, January 2009