Dia de los Muertos Brown Bag!

This week's Brown Bag is the most interactive one of the semester and should be a ton of fun.  As November 1st is "The Day of the Dead", this Brown Bag is titled "Dia de los Muertos: Remembering Beloved Women" and will help everyone to celebrate important women who have passed.  As Dia de los Muertos is more of a celebration of the lives of those who have passed instead of a mourning of their loss, this occasion will be cause to celebrate all the women in our lives and around the world who have inspired us.

The Brown Bag will start with a panel of 1 professor (Carmen Serrano, Spanish Professor) and 5 students (Renyelle Jimenez, Crystal Sawh, Xavia Publius, Christine LaBoy, and Michelle VanVeen) who will read poetry and talk about the women in the poems, or the women who wrote them. Then the Brown Bag will break from the traditional discussion - students will be able to go around the center making crafts, such as decorated matchboxes to add to the shrine, decorated skull cookies, bookmarks, and clay skulls.  There will also be tissue paper flowers to make and to add to the shrine, as well as candy to eat! 

This is one exciting Brown Bag that you won't want to miss! As always, it will be in the Center for Women's Studies (Basement of East Hall) at 11:30am and there will be FREE lunch. I hope all can attend!

-Breanna Pendleton

BB Introduction 10/25: Mentors in Violence Prevention Bystander Program

Tuesday's Brown Bag is a student panel presentation facilitated by Dean Brown and Mark Thompson talking about the Mentors in Violence Prevention (MVP) Bystander Program.  The MVP model was conceived at Northwestern University in 1993.  From the website:

The [MVP] Model is a gender violence, bullying, and school violence prevention approach that encourages young men and women from all socioeconomic, racial and ethnic backgrounds to take on leadership roles in their schools and communities. The training is focused on an innovative "bystander" model that empowers each student to take an active role in promoting a positive school climate. The heart of the training consists of role-plays intended to allow students to construct and practice viable options in response to incidents of harassment, abuse, or violence before, during, or after the fact. Students learn that there is not simply "one way" to confront violence, but that each individual can learn valuable skills to build their personal resolve and to act when faced with difficult or threatening life situations.

With all the hubbub going on around campus surrounding bias-related incidents, this certainly promises to be a relavent and insightful brown bag.

Support for Move to Broaden Defintion of Rape

I am not sure if any of you have seen the recent movement to broaden the definition of rape.  Many police officials and women's organizations have pressured the FBI to change the antiquated definition by which officers classify rape and sexual offenses.  The current definition is 80 years old and states that rape is “the carnal knowledge of a female, forcibly and against her will”.  This definition does not take into account sexual-assault cases that involve anal, oral, or penetration with an object as well as those who are drugged, under the influence, and men who get raped.  For example, the New York Police Department reported 1,369 rapes but only 1,036 fit this narrow definition of the F.B.I's annual Uniform Crime Report.  As of right now, the government has decided to broaden the definition to include anal, oral, and rape of male victims.  The decision still has to go through a full advisory board that meets in December.  Everything looks promising at this point.  It is a step in the right direction and will help past and future victims. 

BB Introduction: A Change of Heart

Holly Near, born in 1946 in California, started singing publicly at the age of eight. She has appeared on stage, on television and on film. Near decided on a career in the music industry in order to connect with audiences about the social conditions of the world. She chose to do this by starting her own independent record label, a very unusual career move for artists at the time especially women. She used this label as a medium through which to produce and promote politically conscious music and artists. She is considered to be one of the founders of the "women's music" movement. With her years of music and social activism behind her, I'm sure tomorrow's Brown Bag will be informative and inspiring.

Renyelle Jimenez

Wanted: Gender Outlaw for Crimes Against Attribution

                In honour of coming out week, and in continuation of my story, which I shared at the coming out brown bag, I wanted to talk about the opposing force that necessitates coming out: attribution.

                When you first see a person, you automatically take in their attributes and compare them against your framework for identifying people.  This is natural, stemming from the nature of our conceptual faculty.  From there, you draw conclusions about a person based on how you’ve experienced these categories.  You interact with the new person on the basis of these conclusions.  This is problematic to the extent that these conclusions are false for the new person.  This is the epistemic basis of racism, sexism, etc.

                The problem of being transgender/transsexual is not even that people draw false conclusions; it’s deeper.  It is that people don’t even conceptualize me properly, and when it comes to people, if the premises are false, the conclusions are necessarily false.  I can’t clear my face every day, because it irritates my skin, so I will often go through my day with facial hair, which outs me as male bodied.  Because I’m male bodied, it is assumed that I’m a man, and since I’m attracted to men, I’m a gay male.  This is my gender attribution.  For most people, gender attribution and gender identity match.  Mine doesn’t.

                Because I’m attributed as a “guy”, I therefore have to come out as—well, what?  I’m not a woman either.  And these are the only two categories most people recognize.  My project is even harder than just passing as a woman; I have to revolutionize the very conceptual framework that says there are only two ways to present your gender.  I have to come out as a gender outlaw every time I carry a purse when I haven’t cleared my face.  Every time I wear a skirt and sing tenor; every time I talk about my past as a gay male; every time I talk about the straight boys I’m crushing on,  I fight against every tide of attribution that says I shouldn’t exist.

                And so here I am, out and proud: a gender outlaw.  Catch me if you can.

Xavia Publius