W O M E N ' S  .  S T U D I E S

The following feature story appeared in the campus publication MOSAIC in September, 1997.  Although some courses, students, and faculty members referenced in the story may have changed, it still provides a full and accurate picture of the Women's Studies program.  For the most current course information and faculty listing, we encourage you to visit the program's homepage.

Clara Schumann and Women's Studies

Discovering unrecognized geniuses and a different view of life

Clara Schumann, whose own musical talent was overshadowed by the renown of her composer-husband Robert, is one of the female artists Elizabeth A. Freirich '98 discovered during her sophomore year through a course called "Women in the Arts in 19th-Century Europe," taught by Associate Professor of History Kathleen Kete. The course made Freirich wonder why she had never before heard of these female artists and their contributions to art and culture. On a broader level, the course made her question what else had been left out of her education. Freirich says that women's studies courses at Trinity provide some answers and provoke an awareness of "what we have missed as students and as academics in studying our world."

That sense of discovery is one of the most compelling aspects of the field, according to Professor of History and Director of Women's Studies Joan D. Hedrick. Hedrick notes that women's studies uncovers material and areas of scholarship that have previously been ignored and adds to the liberal arts body of knowledge -- and our understanding of the world -- in important ways. She observes, "Data on which generalizations are made may not be complete if women are or have been excluded."

Under Hedrick's leadership, approximately 30 other faculty members from more than a dozen departments provide a comprehensive program that explores the role gender plays across the spectrum of the more traditional fields of knowledge, such as history, politics, sociology, and the arts.

An interdisciplinary and cross-cultural approach

Hedrick notes that the interdisciplinary approach brings a variety of perspectives to bear on an issue or problem. "Interdisciplinary work," she also points out, "is inherently revisionist in that the methodology of one discipline may in some way challenge or expand the questions or the disciplinary focus of another." It is a dynamic, she says, that is bound to provoke critical thinking.

Women's studies at Trinity is not only interdisciplinary, it is emphatically cross-cultural. "Women and Family in the Middle East," "Russian Women's Culture," and other courses allow for the examination of gender as a social construct. "It's just so interesting to see how different it is to be a woman in a different culture," Hedrick says. "What's women's work in one country or culture is men's work in another."

Professor of Sociology Michael P. Sacks is one of a number of faculty members for whom gender is central to both his own research and his teaching. This fall Sacks is teaching a new, advanced-level sociology/women's studies course that examines historic and cross-cultural perspectives on masculinity, the specific forces that shape men's roles, and the dilemmas men face in contemporary society. The course sounds almost like women's studies in reverse, but it is actually an example of how women's studies is helping to open new avenues for the exploration of gender.

For many students, the academic study of gender has very personal ramifications. Demaris DeLaCruz '98, an English major with a minor in women's studies, says the interdisciplinary program "creates a space that otherwise wouldn't exist on campus. It also clarifies issues for me and helps me to see where I stand in defining my personal politics."

The Women's Center

Director of the Women's Center Diane R. Martell cites the large enrollment of the introductory women's studies class as evidence that many students are "hungry" for the opportunity to look at gender as it relates both to academic disciplines and personal issues. She says, "When students want to put what they are learning in classes into action, they come to the Women's Center."

The women's studies program and the Women's Center cosponsor a popular campus lecture series, which will be kicked off this year on September 24 at 7 p.m. in McCook auditorium with a lecture by award-winning author Joan Jacobs Brumberg. Brumberg will talk about her new book, The Body Project, which explores girls' perceptions and feelings about their bodies and themselves.

The personal aspects of the study of gender may be the reason why women's studies has been a target of those critics who claim that it does not qualify as a legitimate academic field of study. Women's studies has been publicly attacked in recent years in such national publications as the Atlantic Monthly and Mother Jones. "I take these criticisms to be highly subjective and not necessarily representative of what women's studies is doing," says Hedrick. Far from feeling discouraged by critics, Hedrick views such backlash as evidence that women's studies has "gotten a fairly secure foothold."

The women's studies program has certainly gained a foothold at Trinity since its introduction in the early 1980s as an experimental endeavor. A special "Convocation 1998" program next fall will celebrate the 15th anniversary of women's studies at Trinity. Hedrick and others plan to invite a distinguished keynote speaker (as yet to be announced) and to develop a number of workshops and related events.

The success of the women's studies program can be measured in numbers; the curriculum has gone from a few scattered courses to upwards of 25 each year, and recent graduating classes have each included about 20 women's studies majors and minors. Hedrick cautions, however, that the integration of women's studies across the curriculum is by no means complete. She says, "We still have a ways to go."

Liz Freirich notes that some students -- mostly males -- still equate women's studies with radical feminism, but that, she says, has more to do with ignorance than with a serious rejection of the field on academic principles. She believes that, with more and more students taking women's studies courses each year, the field is starting to be perceived as increasingly mainstream. "When I first became interested in women's studies, I didn't look at it as something very radical," she says, "but my father did. I remember telling him, 'You'd be surprised by what is included in women's studies.'"

-- Leslie Virostek