March is Women’s History Month, a time to recognize and honor the achievements, resilience, and contributions of women throughout history and today. Our focus this year is aligned with the National Women’s History Alliance theme: Moving Forward Together! Women Educating & Inspiring Generations. This theme highlights the importance of collective progress, inclusivity, and ongoing efforts for equity, as well as the importance of education, which is so fitting for a university!
This year, the Gender Resource and Advocacy Center (GRAC) and the Women’s History Month planning team will recognize Women’s History Month at PNCA and on the Salem campus. We invite you to attend our many events, follow us on Instagram, and submit songs to our playlist. There will be lots of chances to engage throughout the month including a Susan Stryker Reading Group (think “book club” without reading an entire book), Willamette faculty panel, “Reimagining Women’s History” featuring Leslie Dunlap, Teresa Hernández, Janet Lorenzen, Saghar Sadeghian, and Rachel Steck, and a meal together to celebrate of our Women of Willamette, as well as self-care and trivia opportunities.
Celebrations start today and tomorrow with our Women’s History Month keynote speaker, Dr. Susan Stryker. In demand worldwide as a public intellectual, Stryker’s historical research, theoretical writings, media-making, activism, and academic field-building activities have helped shape the conversation on trans issues since the early 1990s. Susan retired from the University of Arizona as Professor of Gender and Women's Studies in 2020. She currently holds a distinguished visiting appointment at Stanford University's Michelle Clayman Institute for Gender Research. She is also Director of the TEN:TACLES Initiative (Transgender Educational Network: Theory in Action for Creativity, Liberation, Empowerment and Service) that brings trans-oriented humanities and cultural studies scholarship to bear on practices of social transformation.
Stryker will deliver her keynote, What Transpires Now: Transgender History and the Future We Need this evening in Paulus Lecture Hall in the College of Law and tomorrow in Mediatheque at PNCA.
Additional highlights: Thanks to everyone who submitted nominations for Women of Willamette. Our honorees will be announced mid-month. Find out more, register for the reading group, and submit songs to the playlist on the poster below. Follow the GRAC on Instagram at thegrac_wu to hear the playlist and view the Women of WU later in the month.
In addition to the Gender Resource and Advocacy Center and Women's and Gender, Studies, the following have supported the keynotes: ASWU, Biology, CAFES, Faculty Fund for Enhanced Student Learning, Hawkinson Fund, Heatherington Fund, History, Office of Institutional Equity, Office of Intercultural Engagement & Inclusion, PNCA Critical Studies, PNCA Student Affairs, PNCA Student Council, Politics, Policy, Law & Ethics, Public Health, SARAs, Sociology, & Willamette College Office of the Dean.
Let’s come together to celebrate, learn, and uplift women’s voices. If you have any questions or require accommodations, please contact jllogan@willamette.edu. We look forward to celebrating with you.