Program Highlights
NWSA's 27th National Conference in 2006 introduced a number of new programming mediums that allowed attendees to engage with the conference in different ways. The new Networking Receptions gave space for attendees "to meet [their] peers, and exchange ideas and experiences." Along with a "Meet the Governing Council Members" reception, there were dedicated receptions for students, new faculty, international members, center administrators, and women of color. The conference also featured a series called "Critical Issues in Women's Studies," which "provide[d] opportunities for small groups of conference participants to exchange ideas on theoretical, political, or strategic matters of interest to women's studies practitioners." The two-and-a-half-hour sessions covered topics like "Teaching Race, Gender, Ethnicity in Transnational Perspectives," "Fat Politics: Becoming Conscious of – and Liberated from – Weight-based Prejudice," and Interrogating, "Including, Powersharing [sic] in Women's Studies and NWSA: Political and Organizational Challenges."
Another programming addition – Presidential Sessions – is one that NWSA has continued today. Organizers of the sessions "intended to highlight emerging trends in feminist theory and the field of women's studies or to revisit central questions that have long shaped the field." Those questions manifested in session on local activism, transgender and critical race theories, and the history and future of women's studies. While not new, the 2006 conference also hosted an embedded conference, "Empire, Global Political Conflicts, and Resistance." These panels and workshops featured conversations on topics like the "Ethnographic Engagement of Palestinian Women's Resistance in Everyday Life," "Decolonizing Feminist Pedagogy," and "Resisting, Recreating, and Rewriting Women's Studies: Revisioning Power and Privilege within a Global Context." This subconference also included a plenary by the same name. Below is information about the the embedded and general conferences' plenaries.
"Empire, Global Political Conflicts, and Resistance"
Zillah Eisenstein – "Sexual Decoys in Imperial Democracy"
I will argue that nothing is what it appears as democracy in the U.S.is at great risk. Sexual and racial decoys make it harder to see the right-wing shifts. I argue that this particularly militarist moment disguises itself, unconscionably in women's rights discourse.
Julia Sudbury – "Globalized Punishment, U.S. Empire, and the Challenge of Activist Scholarship"
This presentation maps the emergence of the transnational prison-industrial complex, and explores the relationship between feminist scholarship and activism, and the growing global prison abolitionist movement. The paper examines the critical function of prisons, jails and detention centers in creating a world fit for global capital and suggests that our anti-imperialist visions need to include a commitment to ending all forms of gendered state violence - including incarceration.
"Mothering as Resistance/Activism/Social Change"
Andrea O'Reilly – "Rocking the Cradle; Thoughts on Motherhood, Feminism, and the Possibility of Empowered Mothering"
The oppressive and the empowering dimensions of maternity, first identified by Adrienne Rich have been the focus of feminist scholarship on motherhood over the last three decades. While feminist research on motherhood has focused on many topics, these studies have been informed and shaped by larger inquiries; namely, how do we challenge patriarchal motherhood?; how do we create feminist mothering? My talk will explore these questions. In particular, I will examine how we may challenge and change patriarchal motherhood by way of a theory and practice of empowered maternity.
Gwendolyn Mink – No presentation title or abstract
"Feminist Science Studies"
Banu Subramaniam – "The Roots of Coincidence: Feminism, Nature, and the Politics of Purity"
This talk explores the convergence of rhetoric around the "natural" emerging from the political left and right, feminists and non feminists alike. Using several case studies, the talk describes the racialized discourses surrounding the new reproductive technologies, genetically modified food and invasive species, and examines the dense traffic of meanings between the worlds of natures and cultures.
Jane Zimmer Daniels – "What Do We Know? Where Do We Go?"
Efforts to increase the representation and advancement of women in the sciences and engineering began with legally mandated strategies to increase the number of women in these fields. Often these strategies required women to develop coping skills and uncharacteristic behaviors to survive. More recently, changes to policy and practice are creating educational and work environments that better support the participation and advancement of women. More progressive and inclusive solutions are emerging every day.
Donna Nelson – "Nelson Diversity Surveys on Representation of Women in Science and Engineering"
Highlights of the Nelson Diversity Surveys demonstrate the low representation of women among tenured and tenure track faculty in 15 science and engineering disciplines at US research universities. These faculty data, disaggregated by race, by rank, and by gender, are compared to representation of women among US PhD recipients in corresponding disciplines, and show that the pipeline is often underutilized.