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 The 20th Annual Women's Studies Conference

 

"Women and Labor:

At Home, At Work, Around the Globe"

 

 

To be held on the campus of Southern Connecticut State University

Friday and Saturday, April 20 and 21

 Hotel Reservations

 

Keynote speakers:

Dolores Huerta

Lilly leDbetter

Dolores Huerta's feminist seed was planted by her mother's independence and entrepreneurial spirit. Huerta's mother, Alicia, encouraged the cultural diversity that was a natural part of her upbringing in Stockton, CA. Huerta found her calling as an organizer while serving as a leader of the Stockton Community Service Organization (CSO). She founded the Agricultural Workers Association, launched the National Farm Workers Association with César E. Chavez, and was instrumental in the enactment of the Agricultural Labor Relations Act of 1975. Within women's liberation, Huerta initially dismissed the 1960s women's movement as a "middle-class phenomenon". She consciously began to challenge gender discrimination within the farm workers movement.

For more information on Dolores Huerta and her activism, please visit http://www.doloreshuerta.org

Listen to why Dolores Huerta decided to change her life in this interview.

 

The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, the first piece of real legislation Barack Obama signed as the 44th President of the United States, helps ensure that workers discriminated on the basis of gender have a fair chance to sue their employers. The Act was signed into action on January 29, 2009. Lilly Ledbetter became a woman's equality activist after the Supreme Court ruled against her in the case of Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company.

For more information on Lilly Ledbetter and the case of Ledbetter v. Goodyear Tire and Rubber Company, please visit

  http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1874954,00.html

Listen to an interview with Lilly Ledbetter telling her story.

 

 

INVITATION FOR PROPOSALS ON INTERDISCIPLINARY SCHOLARLY

AND CREATIVE WORK

 

CLICK TO DOWNLOAD PDF


Our 20th annual conference addresses one perennial struggle in women's movements across the globe: labor.  As we witness this spring the surge of labor movements in the U.S. as labor is challenged-specifically, unionized & feminized labor, we also receive findings, just released in May 2011 by Ms. Foundation for Women, that women are bearing the brunt of today's economic crisis.  More than ever, women's labor is at the forefront of our struggles.  In a different part of the world, we continue to observe women's critical contribution to what is now called the Arab Awakening.  Yet we, too, see little representation of women in the wake of the Egyptian revolution.  By all accounts, the report cards on women and labor have made less than significant progress over the decades.  In this annual conference, we invite colleagues and activists to take a close look at all issues concerning women and labor, in both private and public domains as well as globally and locally.  Employed as a category of analysis in women's and gender studies, feminist analyses of gender and labor do not simply travel throughout diverse communities and academic disciplines in the U.S., but they also travel globally, generating significant connections with other fields.  With this conference, we will have an opportunity to examine the body of activist and scholarly feminist work on women and labor.  What aspect of labor continues to be the struggle that women share across the race, ethnicity, class, sexuality, nationality divide?   How might we begin to talk about women and labor without collapsing the multicultural, heterogeneous, global and transnational within us?  How have women contributed their labor artistically, culturally, and politically, in our communities as well as around the globe?  What challenges do women and girls across races, classes, religions, and cultures face in an increasingly globalized world?  Going forward, what might labor as a site of knowledge production further benefit our work and struggle in the human community?  What are some of the best practices? 
 
PROPOSAL FORMAT: Faculty, students, staff, administrators, and community activists from all disciplines and fields are invited to submit proposals for individual papers, complete sessions, panels, or round tables.  Poster sessions, performance pieces, video recordings, and other creative works are also encouraged.  For individual papers, please submit a one-page abstract.  For complete panels, submit a one-page abstract for each presentation plus an overview on the relationship among individual components.  For the poster sessions and artwork, submit a one-page overview.  All proposals must include speaker's/speakers' name(s), affiliation(s), and contact information (address, E-mail, & telephone number).  Please also indicate preference for Friday afternoon, Saturday morning or Saturday afternoon; all attempts will be made to honor schedule requests.
 
PANELS: Each 75 minute session usually includes three presenters and a session moderator, but individual presenters may request an entire session for a more substantial paper or presentation. Presenters are encouraged, though not required, to form their own panels.  The conference committee will group individual proposals into panels and assign a moderator.   Please indicate in your contact information if you are willing to serve as a moderator.
 
POSTERS, ART DISPLAYS, AND SLIDE PRESENTATIONS: A poster presentation consists of an exhibit of materials that report research activities or informational resources in visual & summary form.  An art display consists of a depiction of feminist concerns in an artistic medium.  Both types of presentations provide a unique platform that facilitates personal discussion of work with interested colleagues & allows meeting attendees to browse through highlights of current research.  Please indicate in your proposal your anticipated needs in terms of space, etc
 
In keeping with the conference theme, suggested topics include, but are not limited to:

Women, Technology, & Labor                                       

Motherhood & Labor

Women & Labor Movements                                        

Working Women and Childcare/Elder Care

Sexism& Racism in Labor                                              

Single, Childless Women's Labor

Women and Sex Labor                                                 

Women, Labor, & Heterosexist Privilege

Women & Child Labor                                                 

Women's Labor & Leadership

Gender, Race, Class & Labor                                         

Women, Health, and Labor

Women's Movements & Labor                                      

Ethnography & Women & Labor

21st Century Slavery                                                       

Women, Labor, Academe

Then and Now: Women and Labor                               

Women's Labor and the Arab Awakening

Women, Community, & Labor                                      

Women and Care Economy

Indigenous Women and Labor                                       

Women & Domestic Labor                  

Women & Emotional/Care Work                                  

Women and Unions

Women, Labor, and Resistance                                       

Women and Volunteerism

Women, Immigration, Labor                                         

Women's Labor in Fashion Industries

Labor and Violence against Women                                

Women & Food Production/Industries 

Women and Unemployment                                          

Girls, Young Women and Labor Market

Wage Gap and Glass Ceiling                                          

Women, Labor, and Artistic Expression

Women, Labor, Incarceration                                         

Women's Labor across/between Worlds
 
We also invite your ideas and suggestions.  Conference sessions will juxtapose cultural, generational, and geopolitical perspectives for the collective re-examination of narratives on women and labor.  Expect serious fun through meals and performance, with women, girls and their allies speaking of their struggles and power.
 
 
Submission Deadline:  Postmarked by December 1, 2011
 
Please submit proposals and supporting materials to:
 
Women's Studies Conference Committee
Women's Studies Program, EN B 229
Southern Connecticut State University
501 Crescent Street
New Haven, CT 06515
 
Or via E-mail to:
 
womenstudies@southernct.edu, with attention to Conference Committee.  If you have any questions, please call the Women's Studies office at (203) 392-6133.
Please include name, affiliation, E-mail, standard mailing address, and phone number. Proposals should be no longer than one page, with a second page for identification information. Panel Proposals are welcome.
 
The Annual Women's Studies Conference at SCSU is self-supporting; all presenters can pre-register at the discounted presenter's fee.  The fee includes all costs for supporting materials, entrance to keynote events, and all meals and beverage breaks.

               

 

                 


Past Conferences