Barnard Center for Research on Women episodes:

• September 16, 2009New Feminist Activism

  BCRW has long been interested in supporting social justice movements that reach

  beyond the limits of traditional feminist activism. In past semesters, we have hosted

  programs that have taken up a variety of intersectional projects that join feminist

  activism and analysis with other progressive movements, including reproductive justice,

  workplace rights across the economic spectrum, and the links between sexual and

  economic justice, to name a few. This panel on New Feminist Activism will explore

  how young feminist activists are engaging with struggles for justice in areas such as

  education, the environment, and race and class. By using new forms of media and

  building alliances, these activists (and many others like them) are creating a strand of

  feminist activism that is fundamentally concerned with social justice and social change.

  Panelists include: Mia Herndon, Executive Director of the Third Wave Foundation,

  a feminist, activist foundation that works nationally to support young women and

  transgender youth; Debra Cole, a member of Domestic Workers United, an

  organization working for fair labor standards for nannies, housekeepers, and other

  domestic workers in New York; and Rinku Sen, President and Executive Director of the

  Applied Research Center, a racial justice think tank and home for media and activism,

  publisher of Color Lines magazine, and the author of Stir It Up: Lessons in Community

  Organizing and The Accidental American: Immigration and Citizenship in the Age of

  Globalization.

  ...more

  

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• April 02, 2009Laura Flanders and Patricia Williams

  There is no question that the results of the 2008 U.S.

  presidential election were monumental. For the first time in the

  nation's history, an African-American man has been elected to the

  highest political office in the country. The presidential campaigns

  themselves were also full of other important milestones in the fight for

  truly diverse political representation. Hillary Clinton obtained over 18

  million votes in the Democratic primaries, and for the second time a

  woman was chosen as the Vice Presidential candidate for a major

  political party. Now that the dust has settled from last November's

  election, it is time for feminist scholars and activists to regroup and

  begin a conversation about the impact of these events and the changes

  they represent. Have the politics of civil rights changed fundamentally?

  At all? Has the meaning of feminism broadened? Or narrowed? Will these

  changes set the stage for future movement toward justice in the United

  States? Patricia J. Williams, renowned legal scholar and expert on race

  in the U.S., joins Laura Flanders, Barnard alumna and feminist

  activist and journalist, in this conversation about the election and its

  implications for future political alliances, possibilities, and risks. The

  discussion, introduced by Janet Jakobsen and moderated by Ann Pellegrini,

  took place on April 2, 2009 at Barnard College.

  ...more

  

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• February 28, 2009Sarah Franklin

  Sarah Franklin delivers the keynote address at the 2009

  Scholar and Feminist Conference. Increased demand for assisted

  reproductive technology (ART) and transnational adoption has been

  propelled by a number of factors, including the development of new

  technologies and changes in familial form - such as childrearing in

  second or third marriages; lesbian, gay, and transgendered families; and

  delays in childbearing and subsequent difficulties in conception - that

  make ART helpful. Other relevant factors include environmental changes

  that have negatively affected fertility levels, new levels of

  transnational migration and interaction that have fueled awareness of

  babies available for and in need of adoption, and concerns about genetic

  diseases and disabilities. Effectively, the various imperatives and the

  desires, both cultural and personal, that the use of ART fosters and

  responds to, have created a "baby business" that is largely unregulated

  and that raises a number of important social and ethical questions. Do

  these new technologies place women and children at risk? How should we

  respond ethically to the ability of these technologies to test for

  genetic illnesses? And how can we ensure that marginalized individuals,

  for example, people with disabilities, women of color, and low-income

  women, have equal access to these new technologies and adoption

  practices? And, similarly, how do we ensure that transnational surrogacy

  and adoption practices are not exploitative? These questions and many

  others on the global social, economic and political repercussions of

  these new forms of reproduction were the focus of this year's Scholar

  and Feminist Conference, "The Politics of Reproduction: New Technologies

  of Life," which took place on February 28, 2009 at Barnard

  College.

  ...more

  

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• February 28, 2009Global Dimensions of ART

  Iris Lopez introduces and moderates this panel

  discussion on "Global Dimensions" of ART practices which features

  speakers Dana-Ain Davis, Laura Briggs and Claudia

  Castaneda. Increased demand for assisted reproductive technology (ART)

  and transnational adoption has been propelled by a number of factors,

  including the development of new technologies and changes in familial

  form - such as childrearing in second or third marriages; lesbian, gay,

  and transgendered families; and delays in childbearing and subsequent

  difficulties in conception - that make ART helpful. Other relevant

  factors include environmental changes that have negatively affected

  fertility levels, new levels of transnational migration and interaction

  that have fueled awareness of babies available for and in need of

  adoption, and concerns about genetic diseases and disabilities.

  Effectively, the various imperatives and the desires, both cultural and

  personal, that the use of ART fosters and responds to, have created a

  "baby business" that is largely unregulated and that raises a number of

  important social and ethical questions. Do these new technologies place

  women and children at risk? How should we respond ethically to the

  ability of these technologies to test for genetic illnesses? And how can

  we ensure that marginalized individuals, for example, people with

  disabilities, women of color, and low-income women, have equal access to

  these new technologies and adoption practices? And, similarly, how do we

  ensure that transnational surrogacy and adoption practices are not

  exploitative? These questions and many others on the global social,

  economic and political repercussions of these new forms of reproduction

  were the focus of this year's Scholar and Feminist Conference, "The

  Politics of Reproduction: New Technologies of Life," which took place on

  February 28, 2009 at Barnard College.

  ...more

  

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• February 28, 2009Marginality and Exclusivity in ART Practices

  David Eng, Rayna Rapp, Faye Ginsburg and Michele Goodwin

  discuss "Marginality and Exclusivity in ART Practices" in this panel

  discussion moderated by Lesley Sharp. Increased demand for assisted

  reproductive technology (ART) and transnational adoption has been

  propelled by a number of factors, including the development of new

  technologies and changes in familial form - such as childrearing in

  second or third marriages; lesbian, gay, and transgendered families; and

  delays in childbearing and subsequent difficulties in conception - that

  make ART helpful. Other relevant factors include environmental changes

  that have negatively affected fertility levels, new levels of

  transnational migration and interaction that have fueled awareness of

  babies available for and in need of adoption, and concerns about genetic

  diseases and disabilities. Effectively, the various imperatives and the

  desires, both cultural and personal, that the use of ART fosters and

  responds to, have created a "baby business" that is largely unregulated

  and that raises a number of important social and ethical questions. Do

  these new technologies place women and children at risk? How should we

  respond ethically to the ability of these technologies to test for

  genetic illnesses? And how can we ensure that marginalized individuals,

  for example, people with disabilities, women of color, and low-income

  women, have equal access to these new technologies and adoption

  practices? And, similarly, how do we ensure that transnational surrogacy

  and adoption practices are not exploitative? These questions and many

  others on the global social, economic and political repercussions of

  these new forms of reproduction were the focus of this year's Scholar

  and Feminist Conference, "The Politics of Reproduction: New Technologies

  of Life," which took place on February 28, 2009 at Barnard

  College.

  ...more

  

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• February 28, 2009ART: Where are We Now?

  Debora Spar gives opening remarks and introduces the

  first panel discussion of this year's conference, which includes

  panelists Lori Andrews, Wendy Chavkin, Leith Mullings and Loretta Ross.

  Increased demand for assisted reproductive technology (ART) and

  transnational adoption has been propelled by a number of factors,

  including the development of new technologies and changes in familial

  form - such as childrearing in second or third marriages; lesbian, gay,

  and transgendered families; and delays in childbearing and subsequent

  difficulties in conception - that make ART helpful. Other relevant

  factors include environmental changes that have negatively affected

  fertility levels, new levels of transnational migration and interaction

  that have fueled awareness of babies available for and in need of

  adoption, and concerns about genetic diseases and disabilities.

  Effectively, the various imperatives and the desires, both cultural and

  personal, that the use of ART fosters and responds to, have created a

  "baby business" that is largely unregulated and that raises a number of

  important social and ethical questions. Do these new technologies place

  women and children at risk? How should we respond ethically to the

  ability of these technologies to test for genetic illnesses? And how can

  we ensure that marginalized individuals, for example, people with

  disabilities, women of color, and low-income women, have equal access to

  these new technologies and adoption practices? And, similarly, how do we

  ensure that transnational surrogacy and adoption practices are not

  exploitative? These questions and many others on the global social,

  economic and political repercussions of these new forms of reproduction

  were the focus of this year's Scholar and Feminist Conference, "The

  Politics of Reproduction: New Technologies of Life," which took place on

  February 28, 2009 at Barnard College.

  ...more

  

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• February 12, 2009After Proposition 8: The Future of Marriage Politics

  Lisa Duggan, Richard Kim, Katherine Franke and Dan HoSang discuss

  the politics of marriage in the wake of Proposition 8 in this panel

  discussion introduced by Ann Pellegrini. This event was co-sponsored by

  the NYU Center for the Study of Gender and Sexuality, the American

  Studies Program, the Gender and Sexuality Studies Program, the

  Department of Social and Cultural Analysis, and the Religious Studies

  Program (FAS, NYU); the Department of Performance Studies at NYU; The

  Nation Magazine, and the Barnard Center for Research on Women. The discussion

  took place on February 12, 2009 at NYU.

  ...more

  

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• February 09, 2009Dean Spade

  Dean Spade, legal expert on transgender issues and

  founder of the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, discusses what trans politics

  can mean in the current political context and how we might understand

  strategies for trans legal equality in these times. What role does or

  should radical gender politics play in a historical moment marked by

  trends of privatization, labor and environmental deregulation, and the

  elimination of health and welfare programs, all of which contribute to

  an overall upward distribution of wealth and decreasing life chances for

  the poor? Neoliberalism's hallmarks are cooptation and incorporation,

  meaning that the words and ideas of resistance movements are frequently

  recast to become legitimizing tools for oppressive political agendas.

  What can trans activists and our allies learn from these trends and how

  can we conceptualize trans strategies that prioritize those who are the

  objects of the violence produced by neoliberalism? This lecture took

  place on February 9, 2009 at Barnard College.

  ...more

  

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• October 30, 2008Angela Davis

  Delivering this year's Helen Pond McIntyre '48

  lecture less than one week before Barack Obama's presidential election,

  Angela Y. Davis presents a new and wide-ranging vision of

  the interconnections among issues of race, class, gender,

  sexuality, and prison abolition. Davis provides a critical exploration of concepts of

  civil rights and progress at a time of history-making political change. This lecture

  took place on October 30, 2008 at The Great Hall of Cooper Union. (There is a short break

  in the recording at around 59:35. We apologize for the disruption.)

  ...more

  

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• October 02, 2008Women for Afghan Women

  Fahima Vorgetts, Manizha Naderi and Esther Hyneman

  discuss their involvement with Women for Afghan Women (WAW), a

  grassroots civil society organization founded in April 2001, with

  offices in New York City and Kabul, dedicated to securing the rights of

  Afghan women. This discussion, titled "Women for Afghan Women: Two

  Models for Successful Grassroots Work in Afghanistan" took place on

  October 2, 2008 at Barnard College.

  ...more

  

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