Diane D. Blair Center of Southern Politics and Society
& the Clinton School of Public Service Present the 5th Blair Legacy Series Symposium:
“18 million cracks”: The Legacy of 2nd Wave Feminism in American Politics
University of Arkansas, November 13-15, 2013
This year, the Blair Center and the Clinton School have chosen to examine the legacy of an entire generation of female leaders who came of age in the era of 2nd wave feminism and who fought for the ERA, pay equity, women’s reproductive rights, and even ran for public office. In 1973, Diane Blair participated in a famous debate with Schlafly on the State House floor regarding the passage of the ERA. Blair also authored the first Status on Women report issued by the Arkansas Commission on Women and. Such commissions proliferated across the country and began highlighting the substantial gender inequities that affected every aspect of women’s lives. Less than forty years later, another former professor at the University of Arkansas and Diane’s close friend, Senator Hillary Clinton ended her historic run for the Democratic Party’s presidential nomination, she told her supporters, “although we weren’t able to shatter that highest, hardest glass ceiling this time, thanks to you, it’s got about 18 million cracks in it.” The decades that passed between these two important events, dramatically changed the lives of women in America. The 5th Blair Legacy series will consider the impact that this generation of women had and continue of have on such issues as human rights, female candidates, 3rd Wave feminism, labor equity, notions of womanhood and motherhood, popular culture, public policy, and identity politics, to name a few.
Structure and Details:
This academic symposium will once again feature interdisciplinary scholars who will offer working papers on their selected subject in two small group sessions. Drafts of the working papers should be submitted 2 weeks prior to the conference. Revised chapters are due mid-May 2014 and will be edited into a complete manuscript and submitted for publication.
As part of the meeting, the public is invited to a free screening of the PBS documentary project Makers: Women Who Make America at 7 p.m. Thursday, Nov. 14, in the Arkansas Union Theatre. Sara Evans, one of the project’s advisors, will lead a discussion following the viewing, and reception will follow the program.
The two-day symposium will include respected scholars from around the country. The invited participants will work in small groups throughout the conference to produce a manuscript examining second-wave feminism and its ongoing influence on contemporary politics in the United States.
Contacts:
Todd Shields, tshield@uark.edu
Dean, Graduate School and International Education
Director, Diane D. Blair Center of Southern Politics and Society
Professor of Political Science
University of Arkansas
(479) 575-3356
Angie Maxwell, amax@uark.edu
Diane D. Blair Professor of Southern Studies
Assistant Professor of Political Science
University of Arkansas
(479) 575-3356
Participating Scholars:
Christina Bejarano
Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Kansas
Current Chair of the Committee on the Status of Latinos with the Western Political Science Association
Christina Bejarano is associate professor of political science at the University of Kansas and the current chair of the Committee on the Status of Latinos with the Western Political Science Association. Her research examines the intersectionality of race/ethnicity and gender. In addition to contributing book chapters, Bejarano has authored the forthcoming book, The Latina Advantage: Gender, Race, and Political Success (University of Texas Press) and refereed articles with colleagues including, Tracking the Latino Gender Gap: Gender Attitudes Across Sex, Borders and Generations (Politics & Gender, 2011) and What Goes Around, Comes Around: Race, Blowback, and the Louisiana Elections of 2002 and 2003 (Political Research Quarterly, 2007).
Susan Carroll, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science and Women’s and Gender Studies, Rutgers University
Senior Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) of the Eagleton Institute of Politics
Susan Carroll is professor of political science and women’s and gender studies at Rutgers University. She also holds the position of Senior Scholar at the Center for American Women and Politics (CAWP) of the Eagleton Institute of Politics. Carroll is a founder and former president of the Organized Section for Women and Politics Research of the American Political Science Association, and she currently co-edits the CAWP Series in Gender and American Politics, a book series published by the University of Michigan Press. She is the author of Women as Candidates in American Politics (Indiana University Press, Second Edition, 1994). She is the editor of The Impact of Women in Public Office(Indiana University Press, 2001), Women and American Politics: New Questions, New Directions (Oxford University Press, 2003) and co-editor of Gender and Elections: Shaping the Future of American Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2006).
Cecilia Conrad, Ph.D.
Director, MacArthur Fellows Program
Former Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean, Pomona College
Stedman-Sumner Professor of Economics, Pomona College
Cecelia Conrad is vice president of MacArthur Fellows Program. Conrad currently chairs the congressionally mandated Committee on Equal Opportunities in Sciences and Engineering, an advisory committee to the National Science Foundation. She is a board member of the Western Economic Association International and of the American Economic Association’s Committee on the Status of Women in the Economics Profession. Conrad’s research focusing on the effects of race and gender on economic status has been published in both academic journals and nonacademic publications including The American Prospect and Black Enterprise.
Sara Evans, Ph.D.
McKnight Distinguished University Professor of History, University of Minnesota
Sara Evans is the McKnight Distinguished Professor of History at the University of Minnesota. She is the editor of Feminist Studies and a consulting editor for the Journal of American History. Evans’ research specializes in gender analysis, American women’s history and social movements. She is the author of Journeys That Opened Up the World: Women, Student Christian Movements, and Social Justice, 1955-1975 (Rutgers University Press, 2003), Tidal Wave: How Women Changed America at Century’s End (The Free Press, 2003), Free Spaces: Sources of Democratic Change in America, 2nd edition (University of Chicago Press 1992), Born for Liberty: A History of American Women(Free Press, 1989), Wage Justice: Comparable Worth and the Paradox of Technocratic Reform (University of Chicago Press, 1989) and Personal Politics: The Roots of Women’s Liberation in the Civil Rights Movement and the New Left(Vintage Paperback, 1979, 1980).
Stephanie Gilmore
Board Member and Newsletter Editor for the Committee of LGBT Historians
Stephanie Gilmore is an LGBT and feminist activist, educator and writer. She collaborates with an editorial collective for Feminist Studies. Gilmore is a board member and newsletter editor for the Committee of LGBT Historians. She speaks frequently on college campuses about sexual violence, college campus culture and historical and contemporary activism. Gilmore has published numerous articles and book chapters on activism, feminist sex and sexuality and sexual labors. She is the editor of Feminist Coalitions: Historical Perspectives on Second-Wave Feminism in the United States (University of Illinois Press, 2008) and author of Groundswell: Grassroots Feminist Activism in Postwar America (Routledge, 2013).
Valerie Martinez-Ebers, Ph.D.
Professor of Political Science, University of North Texas
Editor, American Political Science Review
Valerie Martinez-Ebers is professor of political science at the University of North Texas. She is also co-editor of American Political Science Review published by the American Political Science Association. Her area of research focuses on race, ethnicity and politics, especially Latino politics. Martinez-Ebers has collaborated on several books, including Latinos in the New Millennium: An Almanac of Opinion, Behavior, and Policy Preferences (Cambridge University Press, 2012), Latino Lives in America: Making It Home (Temple University Press, 2010), Perspectives on Race, Ethnicity and Religion: Identity Politics in America (Oxford University Press, 2009) and Politicas: Latina Trailblazers in the Texas Political Arena (University of Texas Press, 2008).
Catherine Rymph, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of History, University of Missouri
Catherine Rymph is associate professor of history at the University of Missouri. She specializes in recent United States history, with a focus on women’s political history. She is currently researching the history of the United States foster care system. Rymph is author of Republican Women: Feminism and Conservatism from Suffrage to the Rise of the New Right (UNC Press, 2006).
Wendy Smooth, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Women’s Studies and Political Science, Ohio State University
Wendy Smooth is assistant professor of women’s studies and political science at the Ohio State University. She also serves as a faculty affiliate with the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity where she focuses on public policies impacting women and communities of color. Smooth is currently working on a book titled, Perceptions of Power and Influence: The Impact of Race and Gender in American State Legislatures, which examines the impact of race and gender on the distribution of power and influence in state legislatures.
Marjorie Spruill, Ph.D.
Professor of History, University of South Carolina
Marjorie Spruill is professor of history at the University of South Carolina. She is the author of New Women of the New South: The Leaders of the Woman Suffrage Movement in the Southern States (Oxford University Press, 1993). Spruill is the editor of One Woman, One Vote: Rediscovering the Woman Suffrage Movement (NewSage Press, 1995) and VOTES FOR WOMEN! The Woman Suffrage Movement in Tennessee, the South, and the Nation (University of Tennessee Press, 1995). She is co-editor of The South in the History of the Nation: A Reader (Bedford/St. Martin’s, 1999), the three-volume anthology South Carolina Women: Their Lives and Times (University of Georgia Press, 2009, 2010, 2011) and a two-volume Mississippi Women: Their Histories, Their Lives (University of Georgia Press, 2003, 2010).