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W3 - Feminist Workshop 2009

W3 - Feminist Workshop 2009
reviewed by Patricia T. Price

How many feminists does it take to change writing pedagogy? About forty, as it turns out. That’s the number of participants in the Wednesday, March 11 pre-conference Feminist Workshop. This all-day annual CCCC event, sponsored by the Committee on the Status of Women in the Profession, is a gathering place for women and men interested in making substantive change in our profession. The members of the 2008-2009 Feminist Collective who coordinated the workshop in San Francisco were Lisa Costello, Layne Craig, Jennifer Fallas, Allison Gross, Emily Hoeflinger, Erin Hurt, and Jessica Ketcham Weber.

This year’s theme was “Crosscurrents in Feminism: Building Coalitions, Sharing Knowledges and Pedagogies, Shaping Networks,” and a recurring thread in the workshop discussions was the need to address disjunctures (real or imagined) between political activism and scholarly activity, between various feminist groups within academia, and between academia and the community at large. Another frequent topic was the desire to establish and expand feminist coalitions, pedagogies, and mentorships.

Workshop participants were asked to consider the following questions:

1. What are the bases for coalitions between academic feminists and feminist community activists, artists, or workers?
2. What coalitions seem to be lacking in academic feminist communities?
3. What are the effects of conflicts within feminist academic communities--i.e. the Andrea Smith tenure case at Michigan--on feminism as a social movement?
4. How do conflicts or coalitions within online communities affect the "real world" structures of feminism, in the academy or in other contexts?
5. What political issues not historically identified with feminism--i.e. immigration, security issues, environmentalism--have feminists been contributing to in productive ways?
6. In what ways have these movements offered alternative models for coalition-building?
7. Which issues are feminist communities overlooking or not doing enough to address?
8. Is feminist pedagogy a form of feminist activism?
9. If feminist pedagogy is a form of activism, what kinds of practices do people use in their classrooms or in their writing?
10. How can feminist mentorship facilitate feminist coalitions and activism?

Feminist Writing 2009 Planning Collective

The morning began with three invited speakers. C. Michelle Kleisath, an anthropologist, told about her admirable (and sometimes dangerous) work among the Shem women of Amado, Tibet. Find out more about Michelle’s work at www.shemgroup.org. Lisa Justine Hernandez described a project undertaken in Guatemala by her students at St. Edwards University in Austin, Texas. Their goal was to end violence against women. Additional information about their project can be found at www.ThisBridgeCalledCyberspace.net. The third presentation was given by a panel of four healthcare workers: Lisa Harris, Jane Hassinger, Michelle Debbink, and Lisa Martin (an OBGYN, a LCSW, a medical student, and a graduate student in Public Health, respectively). Their discussion, entitled “Danger Talk: Narrative Silences, Censorship, Ethical Collisions in Feminist Practice,” revealed some of the difficult ethical conflicts involved in providing medical care as a feminist. Taken together, the three morning presentations gave me renewed respect for women who don’t just call themselves “feminists” but go out into the world, sometimes into unsafe and lonely places, and live as feminists, doing the hard feminist work some of us in academia only sit back and theorize about.

The second part of the workshop was a series of three roundtable discussions. Participants could choose among Table #1: “Exploring Philosophies of Feminist Pedagogies, Table #2: “Negotiating the Personal in Feminist Pedagogy,” and Table #3: “Feminist Syllabi and Assignments.” Table hopping was allowed, of course. Presentations at all three tables were interactive, and, although theoretical foundations were discussed, the emphasis stayed on classroom practice. Every participant provided handouts of syllabi, activities, and assignments. I came away with a satchel full of creative ideas to try. According to the workshop organizers, plans are also underway to collaborate on creating an online archive resource for these materials.

The final portion of the workshop was a consideration of coalitions and mentoring. Again, this portion of the workshop was interactive. Several prominent academic activists discussed their work, sharing techniques for successful local and national feminist coalition building.

The Feminist Women’s Planning Collective is also working together with the Coalition of Women Scholars in the History of Rhetoric and Composition to start a listserv for the feminist community in rhetoric and composition. To join this listserv (rhetcompfem) send a message to subscribe to: Rhetcompfem-request@cwshrc.org

For the 2010 CCCC conference in Lexington, Kentucky, the Feminist Workshop invites proposals for brief presentations (6-9 minutes). Presentations outside of a traditional paper format (multimedia, performative reading, interactive, etc.) are especially welcome. Submit abstracts of no more than one double-spaced page to 4Cfeministworkshop@gmail.com .