making history November 5, 2008

I wrote a letter tonight to the children I hope to have someday.

I hadn’t dared to hope that they would be reading in their history books about Barack Obama, the first African-American US president-elect – but now that I know they will be, I want them to have a firsthand account too. I want them to know what it was like to be here, the victory shouts and the tears, the prayers and the beautiful faces of the people to whom this meant everything.

I want them to be able to feel the excitement I felt, the inability to sleep, the knowledge that soon we’ll be waking up in a freer world. I want them to smell the air as the winds of changes shift.

And I want them to know why we felt this way, too. I want them to know how it was for us before, and how badly we wanted it to be different for them. I want to tell them how hard we worked – and that it was for them and their future that we did it.

left in the lurch December 8, 2007

I came home today to a letter in my inbox from the former director of my school’s women’s studies program, who’s on sabbatical teaching at Smith this year:

Dear Women’s Studies Students,

Greetings! I wanted to let everyone know my big news: my book has come out! It’s titled “The Women’s Movement Against Sexual Harassment,” and is published by Cambridge University Press. Below is some information about the book and a link for more information (note the review by Susan Estrich .

I hope everyone is well! I have decided to stay an extra year at Smith, which was hard because I will miss seeing many of you next year. But I will be in town on January 16-18 and have mentioned to Dr. C. about organizing a gathering so I hope to see you then.

I still use my old email so stay in touch!

Take care,
Carrie

I’m upset and angry about this… really I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about it. There has always been an über-conservative contingent at my college that’s out to thwart the women’s studies department at every turn.

This professor timed her break year to coincide with the year she came up for tenure – probably wisely, as she’s married to a religion professor and he and their children as well as the entire women’s studies program could have been dragged into a potentially ugly debate.

It may be that she was denied tenure and plans not to come back. It may be that she prefers the liberal atmosphere at Smith to dealing with the prevailing ignorance at a college that desperately needs her. It may be something else entirely. I don’t know.

It just hurts me how high-handed all of this has been. As the students of a controversial field of study, we’re a close group, and we’re used to being treated as intelligent equals by our professors. If the program is in such jeopardy that some of us may not be able to graduate with our intended majors and minors, do we not at least deserve an explanation of what’s going on?