File
Features:
- 2019-2020 Year in Review: A Letter from the Director by Michelle McKinley, Director, CSWS
- Supporting Women of Color at UO by Sangita Gopal, Associate Professor, Department of Cinema Studies
- “She Was a Terrific Advocate”: Joan Acker Inspired Alumnus’ Career and Lifelong Connection to CSWS by Jenée Wilde, Dissemination Specialist, CSWS
- Writing A Death in Harlem: A Conversation with Karla Holloway, Interview by Ulrick Casimir, Career Instructor, Department of English
- Reflections on Gender, Power, and Grief
Faculty Research:
- The Alaska Mental Health Act: Tracing the Development of Public Health and the Nation-State by Kristin Yarris, Associate Professor, Department of Global Studies
- Food Under Fascism by Diana Garvin, Assistant Professor, Department of Romance Languages
- The “Loophole of Retreat”: Seclusion, Privacy, and the Intimate Geographies of Black Life by Faith Barter, Assistant Professor, Department of English
- How I Gained 100 Japanese Grandmothers: Reflections on Intergenerational Conversation Inspired by CSWS by Alisa Freedman, Professor, Department of East Asian Languages and Literature
Graduate Student Research:
- “The Struggle Continues”: Gender-Based Violence and the Politics of Justice and Care in Brazil by Emily Masucci, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology
- “Two Sides of the Same Story”: Colonial Violence and Erasure in the University of Oregon’s (Fallen) Pioneer Statues by Marc J. Carpenter, PhD Candidate, Department of History
- In the Name of Honor? Evaluating the Impact of Weather Variability on “Honor” Killings in Pakistan by Amna Javed, PhD Candidate, Department of Economics
- The Work of Black Feminist Liberation: Writing Erotic Freedom in Black Feminist Fiction and TV by Carmel Ohman, PhD Candidate, Department of English
- Radical Korean Feminism: Women’s Movement Seeks to #escapethecorset by Jane Nam, PhD Candidate, Department of Philosophy
- Witch-Hunting in Colonial Assam by Daizi Hazarika, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology
Highlights from the Academic Year:
- News & Updates
- 2020-21 CSWS Research Grant Award Winners
- Black Thought Matters: Two Online Collections from Hypatia celebrate Juneteenth
- CSWS Website Gets a Facelift
- Looking at Books
Publication Year
2020
Articles
2019-2020 Year in Review: A Letter from the Director
Dear Friends,
The year in review feature is generally an easy column for the Director to write. As the title suggests, I look back with a sense of pride and satisfaction at a year of successful events, celebrate our guest speakers who sparked insightful conversations, and chronicle our community-building activities that strengthened our bonds as feminist scholars on campus. This year suspends all expectations. I even tried to find a "natural" point of pause to begin this retrospective. There simply wasn't an end to the daily onslaught of misery in these times.
Supporting Women of Color at UO: A Look into the Center's Long-Running Faculty Mentorship Program
by Sangita Gopal, Associate Professor, Department of Cinema Studies
The Women of Color (WOC) Project has been a special project under the auspices of CSWS since 2005. The program is comprised of tenure-track women faculty, and our collective has approximately 50 participants, of whom about 30 are active constituents. We represent all the colleges and schools within the UO.
“She Was a Terrific Advocate”: Joan Acker Inspired Alumnus’ Career and Lifelong Connection to CSWS
by Jenée Wilde, Dissemination Specialist, CSWS , Senior Instructor, Department of English
Thomas Beaumont (Class of ’69) first met Professor Joan Acker as an undergraduate sociology and social welfare student at University of Oregon.
Writing A Death in Harlem: A Conversation with Karla FC Holloway
Interview by Ulrick Casimir, Career Instructor, Department of English
Nella Larsen’s classic novel Passing (1929) features one hell of an ending. We know that one of its main characters, Clare Kendry, lies dead after falling from a window, but we don’t know whether she was pushed by her friend Irene Redfield or simply slipped and fell. We know what may have led Irene to do what she may or may not have done, but we don’t know whether the betrayal Irene suspects, between her husband and Clare, even occurred. We know the broad strokes and terminus of the connection between these two women—but the novel ends without the hinted-at intimate dimensions of their relationship ever finding air.
Reflections on Gender, Power, and Grief: The 2019-2020 Lorwin Lectureship on Civil Rights and Civil Liberties
In 2019-20, CSWS launched the theme of “Gender, Power, and Grief” for our Lorwin Lectures and other speaker events. On a daily basis, we bear witness to the state-sponsored violence that renders the loss of certain lives and communities unworthy of grief. Immigrant communities are terrorized and families torn apart or imprisoned for exercising their basic human rights. Our speakers and programming sought to both honor the process of grief and the cultural practices of bereavement.
The Alaska Mental Health Act: Tracing the Development of Public Health and the Nation-State
by Kristin Yarris, Associate Professor, Department of Global Studies
With the support of a Center for the Study of Women in Society faculty grant, I was able to make a productive research trip to Alaska in the summer of 2019 to work on my project, “Mid-Century American Psychiatry and State Formation: A Post-Colonial Analysis of Morningside Hospital and the Alaska Mental Health Act.” The project uses an historical case study of the Morningside Hospital, an inpatient psychiatric facility that operated in Portland, Oregon during the first half of the 20th century, to examine the connections between the development of American Psychiatry and of the U.S. nation-state. The connection to Alaska comes because, for decades while Alaska was a Territory with insufficient public mental health resources, people were sent to Morningside from Alaska to receive psychiatric intervention.
With the support of a Center for the Study of Women in Society faculty grant, I was able to make a productive research trip to Alaska in the summer of 2019 to work on my project, “Mid-Century American Psychiatry and State Formation: A Post-Colonial Analysis of Morningside Hospital and the Alaska Mental Health Act.” The project uses an historical case study of the Morningside Hospital, an inpatient psychiatric facility that operated in Portland, Oregon during the first half of the 20th century, to examine the connections between the development of American Psychiatry and of the U.S. nation-state. The connection to Alaska comes because, for decades while Alaska was a Territory with insufficient public mental health resources, people were sent to Morningside from Alaska to receive psychiatric intervention.
Food Under Fascism
by Diana Garvin, Assistant Professor, Department of Romance Languages
How did women negotiate national politics in their daily lives under Italy’s Fascist regime? In this year’s research with CSWS, I tackled this question, the genesis for my book Feeding Fascism by investigating a new body of evidence drawn from food and foodways. Rarely do scholars endeavor to involve all five senses in their reconstruction of women’s history, perhaps due to the difficulty in sourcing such materials.
How did women negotiate national politics in their daily lives under Italy’s Fascist regime? In this year’s research with CSWS, I tackled this question, the genesis for my book Feeding Fascism by investigating a new body of evidence drawn from food and foodways. Rarely do scholars endeavor to involve all five senses in their reconstruction of women’s history, perhaps due to the difficulty in sourcing such materials.
The “Loophole of Retreat”: Seclusion, Privacy, and the Intimate Geographies of Black Life
by Faith Barter, Assistant Professor, Department of English
How I Gained 100 Japanese Grandmothers: Reflections on Intergenerational Conversation Inspired by CSWS
by Alisa Freedman, Professor, Department of East Asian Languages and Literatures
"The Struggle Continues": Gender-Based Violence and the Politics of Justice and Care in Brazil
by Emily Masucci, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology
For many historically marginalized women, the state and its institutions are not perceived as reliable. State-sponsored violence against women—low-income, afro-descendant, and indigenous women in particular—is a weapon with which the Brazilian state was founded and has maintained power since. The fabric of Brazil is stained by histories of forced sterilization of indigenous and afro-descendant women, of brutal rapes of young women students by military officials during the dictatorship, and recently by the calculated political feminicide of Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman Marielle Franco. Given this legacy, survivors of gender-based violence (GBV) are justifiably apprehensive of appealing to state institutions as they pursue safety and redress.
For many historically marginalized women, the state and its institutions are not perceived as reliable. State-sponsored violence against women—low-income, afro-descendant, and indigenous women in particular—is a weapon with which the Brazilian state was founded and has maintained power since. The fabric of Brazil is stained by histories of forced sterilization of indigenous and afro-descendant women, of brutal rapes of young women students by military officials during the dictatorship, and recently by the calculated political feminicide of Rio de Janeiro city councilwoman Marielle Franco. Given this legacy, survivors of gender-based violence (GBV) are justifiably apprehensive of appealing to state institutions as they pursue safety and redress.
“Two Sides of the Same Story”: Colonial Violence and Erasure in the University of Oregon’s (Fallen) Pioneer Statues
by Marc J. Carpenter, Doctoral Candidate, Department of History
When listening to Native students and community members talk about the “Pioneer” statues at the University of Oregon, I have heard the phrase “two sides of the same story” often enough that I do not know whom to credit. Until June 13, 2020, the Pioneer and Pioneer Mother monuments looked down from their pedestals on anyone passing either side of the President’s office at Johnson Hall. Both crafted by the same sculptor, each statue celebrated a different element of the colonial conquest of Oregon.
When listening to Native students and community members talk about the “Pioneer” statues at the University of Oregon, I have heard the phrase “two sides of the same story” often enough that I do not know whom to credit. Until June 13, 2020, the Pioneer and Pioneer Mother monuments looked down from their pedestals on anyone passing either side of the President’s office at Johnson Hall. Both crafted by the same sculptor, each statue celebrated a different element of the colonial conquest of Oregon.
In the Name of Honor?: Evaluating the Impact of Weather Variability on “Honor” Killings in Pakistan
by Amna Javed, PhD Candidate, Department of Economics
Every year, approximately 5,000 women are murdered globally in the name of honor. These crimes, labeled as “honor” killings, are meant to punish transgressing individuals who are believed to have brought shame to their families by overstepping social boundaries regarding acceptable sexual freedoms. In Pakistan’s context, where the “purity” of a woman is crucial to ensuring a successful arranged marriage, dishonor might result from, among other reasons, coming home late, having an alleged affair, or eloping.
The Work of Black Feminist Liberation: Writing Erotic Freedom in Black Feminist Fiction and TV
by Carmel Ohman, PhD Candidate, Department of English
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to engage creative texts by and about Black women in this historic moment of collective action. Toni Morrison famously wrote that the relationship between artist and reader is central to Black art and storytelling: “it is the affective and participatory relationship between the artist or the speaker and the audience that is of primary importance.” The audience, like the text, needs to work. For Morrison, the engaged, deep-feeling work of reading is part of the work of Black liberation.
I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to engage creative texts by and about Black women in this historic moment of collective action. Toni Morrison famously wrote that the relationship between artist and reader is central to Black art and storytelling: “it is the affective and participatory relationship between the artist or the speaker and the audience that is of primary importance.” The audience, like the text, needs to work. For Morrison, the engaged, deep-feeling work of reading is part of the work of Black liberation.
Radical Korean Feminism: Women's Movement Seeks to #escapethecorset
by Jane Nam, PhD Candidate, Department of Philosophy
South Korea is often deemed the beauty capital of the world, as the cosmetic surgery hub and home to one of the largest beauty industries in the world. Beginning in early 2018, however, thousands of young South Korean women began to cut off their hair, smash their beauty products, and opt for androgynous wear. They are partaking in what they call the Escape-the-Corset Movement, or Tal-Corset, a radical feminist movement calling for all women to take off their figurative corsets. This project is an effort to describe the philosophical meanings behind the experiences of these women, using feminist phenomenology.
South Korea is often deemed the beauty capital of the world, as the cosmetic surgery hub and home to one of the largest beauty industries in the world. Beginning in early 2018, however, thousands of young South Korean women began to cut off their hair, smash their beauty products, and opt for androgynous wear. They are partaking in what they call the Escape-the-Corset Movement, or Tal-Corset, a radical feminist movement calling for all women to take off their figurative corsets. This project is an effort to describe the philosophical meanings behind the experiences of these women, using feminist phenomenology.
Witch-Hunting in Colonial Assam
by Daizi Hazarika, PhD Candidate, Department of Anthropology
My CSWS fellowship allowed me to travel to the India Office Records at the British Library in summer 2019. At the British Library, I focused on the effects of colonial policies on witch-hunting on indigenous women in Assam, India. After spending two months poring over colonial documents, I discovered a strong connection between British colonial laws and an increase in witch-hunting allegations against tribal populations in Assam. My first research finding contests the prevalent view that tribal communities in Assam practiced witch-hunting pre-dating British colonialism. I found the opposite to be true.
My CSWS fellowship allowed me to travel to the India Office Records at the British Library in summer 2019. At the British Library, I focused on the effects of colonial policies on witch-hunting on indigenous women in Assam, India. After spending two months poring over colonial documents, I discovered a strong connection between British colonial laws and an increase in witch-hunting allegations against tribal populations in Assam. My first research finding contests the prevalent view that tribal communities in Assam practiced witch-hunting pre-dating British colonialism. I found the opposite to be true.