The New England Women's Centers Conference: An Energizing Gathering

Badges ready for check in! Waiting for attendees to register

On November 4 and 5 Lesley University hosted the New England Women’s Centers Conference (NEWCC2011). This was the second conference of its kind. The first one, hosted by Harvard University was a productive and energetic venue to explore issues shared by Women’s Centers, and brainstorm about ideas and solutions for existing and future programming and collaborations.

Administrators, faculty, and students from twenty institutions from the New England region were represented this year. The programming of the conference centered around issues unique to the needs of individual centers, but also touched on wider issues outside the centers, such as community-based collaborations, sexual assault, mentoring and contemporary feminism.

Dr. Amy Rutstein-Riley addresses attendees

The Co-Director of the Women’s Center, Dr. Amy Rutstein-Riley, welcomed the group and reiterated the importance of learning from each other and the exciting opportunity to share in the collective knowledge from all of the centers represented.

Dinner at the Atrium was a nice time to mingle after the first session.

Lesley Women's Center Co-Director Daphne Strassmann checks in with staff during dinner.

The first session took place Friday afternoon and was presented by Naomi Mann and Amy Hunter, two attorneys from the Office for Civil Rights, who went through guidelines addressed in Title IX and how these protections apply to instances of sexual assault. After dinner attendees were treated to a screening of initial cut from the documentary, Left on Pearl. After the screening five members of the film project, which included Lesley’s Eleanor Roffman, Professor and Director of Field Training, Division of Counseling and Psychology addressed questions from the audience. Professor Roffman was interviewed on the documentary about the 1971 takeover of a Harvard University building on 888 Memorial Drive to be the site for a community Women’s Center. This is the same center which stands today on Pleasant St. in Cambridge, and is home to crucial programming for the empowerment of women. The Director of the Cambridge Women's Center Ming Chang, a Lesley alumna, also help lead a discussion about collaborations between community based centers and university- based centers. In celebrating the 4oth year of the takeover of the Harvard building, the panelists brought a piece of important history to life in the documentary, and spoke candidly about what it meant to be a woman during such gender- segregated times.

The first session the following morning was a round table discussion in which all centers describe individual best practices and challenges. This proved to be one of the most helpful aspects of the conference last year. Attendees got a good sense of the wide range of services different centers offer, how each center is structured staffing and funding wise, and how they exist in connection to departments within each institution. The centers also brought along promotional materials to share and exchange, which were available throughout the conference to all participants.

As the conference progressed, attendees immersed themselves in session topics such as: How to work with small budgets ways in which to assess the effectiveness of funded programs, Mentoring models, How to address inclusion of gender in Women’s Centers, and how to collaborate with Community Women’s Centers. Lesley’s Marianne Galvin led the group in a thoughtful and helpful session on how to apply for grants in a session titled: Grant Writing workshop: Proposal Writing Made Easy.

Lesley's Marianne Galvin talked to the group about effective ways in which to write grants.

Discussing the role of Gender in Women's Centers. Nino Testa, a graduate student from Tufts University led the session.

One of the most popular parts of the conference was the plenary in which students are the Keynote Speakers. Lesley’s Professor Arlene Dallalfar, introduced the plenary and Lesley students engaged the audience in a show and tell trivia game of guessing feminist iconic images.

The keynote speakers were asked to respond to the topic of Contemporary Feminism based on a TED talk given by blogger and activist Courtney Martin, titled Reinventing Feminism. In her introduction, Professor Dallalfar spoke about the waves of feminism and drew connections to the Third Wave generation students who were in the audience and those presenting. Students from Harvard University, Lesley University and Tufts University gave thoughtful engaging talks about Race and feminism, Humor in Feminism.

Rachael Cina talking discusses the production of the Vagina Monologues.

Lesley’s Sophomore Rachael Cina recounted her experiences in putting together a sold-out production of the Vagina Monologues last February at the Marran Theater.

At the concluding session of the conference participants expressed gratitude to Lesley for hosting and providing another opportunity to go back energized and filled with ideas to implement in their respective centers.

The new buttons for Lesley Women's Center read: "Celebrate Equality- Live Diversity."

The Millennial Man’s Field Guide to Feminist Mythbusting

Afraid you can’t hold the door or offer to pay for dinner for fear of insulting a feminist? Fear not, they’re not as scary as they seem. Learn what’s true and what’s a myth in our deconstruction of the modern American Feminist. Read the rest here....

Posted by: Daphne Strassmann

Iceland: the world's most feminist country

Iceland has just banned all strip clubs. Perhaps it's down to the lesbian prime minister, but this may just be the most female-friendly country on the planet

• 

Julie Bindel
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 25 March 2010 22.00 GMT

Johanna Sigurdardottir, prime minister of Iceland. Photograph: Bob Strong/REUTERS

Iceland is fast becoming a world-leader in feminism. A country with a tiny population of 320,000, it is on the brink of achieving what many considered to be impossible: closing down its sex industry.

While activists in Britain battle on in an attempt to regulate lapdance clubs – the number of which has been growing at an alarming rate during the last decade – Iceland has passed a law that will result in every strip club in the country being shut down. And forget hiring a topless waitress in an attempt to get around the bar: the law, which was passed with no votes against and only two abstentions, will make it illegal for any business to profit from the nudity of its employees.

Even more impressive: the Nordic state is the first country in the world to ban stripping and lapdancing for feminist, rather than religious, reasons. Kolbrún Halldórsdóttir, the politician who first proposed the ban, firmly told the national press on Wednesday: "It is not acceptable that women or people in general are a product to be sold." When I asked her if she thinks Iceland has become the greatest feminist country in the world, she replied: "It is certainly up there. Mainly as a result of the feminist groups putting pressure on parliamentarians. These women work 24 hours a day, seven days a week with their campaigns and it eventually filters down to all of society."

The news is a real boost to feminists around the world, showing us that when an entire country unites behind an idea anything can happen. And it is bound to give a shot in the arm to the feminist campaign in the UK against an industry that is both a cause and a consequence of gaping inequality between men and women.

According to Icelandic police, 100 foreign women travel to the country annually to work in strip clubs. It is unclear whether the women are trafficked, but feminists say it is telling that as the stripping industry has grown, the number of Icelandic women wishing to work in it has not. Supporters of the bill say that some of the clubs are a front for prostitution – and that many of the women work there because of drug abuse and poverty rather than free choice. I have visited a strip club in Reykjavik and observed the women. None of them looked happy in their work.

So how has Iceland managed it? To start with, it has a strong women's movement and a high number of female politicans. Almost half the parliamentarians are female and it was ranked fourth out of 130 countries on the international gender gap index (behind Norway, Finland and Sweden). All four of these Scandinavian countries have, to some degree, criminalised the purchase of sex (legislation that the UK will adopt on 1 April). "Once you break past the glass ceiling and have more than one third of female politicians," says Halldórsdóttir, "something changes. Feminist energy seems to permeate everything."

Johanna Sigurðardottir is Iceland's first female and the world's first openly lesbian head of state. Guðrún Jónsdóttir of Stígamót, an organisation based in Reykjavik that campaigns against sexual violence, says she has enjoyed the support of Sigurðardottir for their campaigns against rape and domestic violence: "Johanna is a great feminist in that she challenges the men in her party and refuses to let them oppress her."

Then there is the fact that feminists in Iceland appear to be entirely united in opposition to prostitution, unlike the UK where heated debates rage over whether prostitution and lapdancing are empowering or degrading to women. There is also public support: the ban on commercial sexual activity is not only supported by feminists but also much of the population. A 2007 poll found that 82% of women and 57% of men support the criminalisation of paying for sex – either in brothels or lapdance clubs – and fewer than 10% of Icelanders were opposed.

Jónsdóttir says the ban could mean the death of the sex industry. "Last year we passed a law against the purchase of sex, recently introduced an action plan on trafficking of women, and now we have shut down the strip clubs. The Nordic countries are leading the way on women's equality, recognising women as equal citizens rather than commodities for sale."

Strip club owners are, not surprisingly, furious about the new law. One gave an interview to a local newspaper in which he likened Iceland's approach to that of a country such as Saudi Arabia, where it is not permitted to see any part of a woman's body in public. "I have reached the age where I'm not sure whether I want to bother with this hassle any more," he said.

Janice Raymond, a director of Coalition Against Trafficking in Women, hopes that all sex industry profiteers feel the same way, and believes the new law will pave the way for governments in other countries to follow suit. "What a victory, not only for the Icelanders but for everyone worldwide who repudiates the sexual exploitation of women," she says.

Jónsdóttir is confident that the law will create a change in attitudes towards women. "I guess the men of Iceland will just have to get used to the idea that women are not for sale."

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News and Media Limited 2010

By: Daphne Strassmann

This coming Spring: Attend a T.O.P. lecture. You're welcome!

The Theological Opportunities Program (T.O.P.) is an amazing 35 year-old organization, which offers weekly seasonal half-day lectures on Thursday mornings. T.O.P. is a Learning Community of feminist women and men seeking clarity around issues encountered in their daily lives.

Centered around topics which affect all of us, the lectures deliver on some hefty and useful themes. The theme for the Fall 09 session was: Reassessing & Responding in Difficult Times

The Spring session looks to be equally promising and important: The Illusion and Reality of Control

I am planning to attend as many of these as I possibly can. You should too.

The organization's predictable schedule, as well as the convenient location to Lesley, (Cambridge,MA), make the lectures accessible to all.

Keep up with T.O.P by reading their awesome blog