March 20, 2013, 5:00 p.m., in Mandel G03
The Suppressed Desires of Mabel Dodge Luhan: Sex, Syphilis, and Psychoanalysis in the Making of Modern American Culture
Lois Rudnick
Lois Rudnick is professor emerita of American Studies, University of Massachusetts Boston, where she taught American literature and culture for 36 years, 26 of which she chaired the American Studies Department. She has published numerous books and articles on modern American culture, and the artists and writers colonies of Santa Fe and Taos, New Mexico, including her multiple award winning Utopian Vistas: The Mabel Dodge Luhan House and the American Counterculture (1996).
This talk is sponsored by the American Studies Program and the Women’s and Gender Studies Program
March 6th, 2013
The 18th annual Tillie K Lubin Symposium will be held on Thursday, March 7th at 5pm.
“Who Owns the World?: Gender, Wealth and Inequality” will have a panel discussion featuring Srimati Basu, Professor of Women’s and Gender Studies, University of Kentucky; Mariko Chang, Independent Consultant and Author of Shortchanged; and Thomas Shapiro, Pokross Professor of Law and Social Policy, Director of the Institute on Assets and Social Policy at the Heller School.
Sponsored by Women’s and Gender Studies.
February 26th, 2013
The Brandeis University Office of the Provost (in conjunction with the Office of the President, Women’s and Gender Studies, African and Afro-American Studies and the Heller School for Social Policy and Management) is honored to host the first ever Anita Hill Annual Lecture on Gender Justice.
The inspiration for the series came from the energy generated by the ‘Anita Hill 20 Years Later’ conference produced last October by the lecture series’ sponsor, feminist activism group Soapbox Inc. Brandeis will be the first host, with the lecture taking place at a different college or university each year. Juhu Thukral has been selected as the inaugural Anita Hill Gender Justice Lecturer from a strong and diverse pool of applicants.
Ms. Thukral, the Director of Law and Advocacy at The Opportunity Agenda, has worked to protect the human rights of women for over 20 years. She is a passionate advocate for the rights of low-income and immigrant women in the areas of sexual health and rights, gender-based violence, economic security, and criminal justice. She has also repeatedly shown courage and leadership in defending the human rights of women engaged as sex workers.
The Anita Hill Annual Lecture on Gender Justice will take place on Wednesday, January 30 at 5:00 p.m. in Rapaporte Treasure Hall, with reception to follow. Juhu Thukral will present “Gender. Sex. Money. New Frontiers in the Fight for Sexual Rights.”
January 22nd, 2013
The 9th Annual Eleanor Roosevelt Lecture (November 1, 4:30 in the Rapaporte Treasure Hall) will feature Professor Isabel Wilkerson, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author of The New York Times’ bestseller, “The Warmth of Other Suns.”
Wilkerson won the Pulitzer Prize for her work as Chicago Bureau Chief of The New York Times in 1994, making her the first black woman in the history of American journalism to win a Pulitzer Prize and the first African-American to win for individual reporting. Wilkerson has also won the George Polk Award, a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, and she was named Journalist of the Year by the National Association of Black Journalists.
Wilkerson has spoken on the topics of migration, social justice, urban affairs and 2oth Century history at universities across the country and in Europe. She has appeared on national programs such as CBS’ 60 Minutes, PBS’s Charlie Rose, NPR’s Fresh Air with Terry Gross, NBC’s Nightly News, MSNBC, C-SPAN, and others.
Her talk is entitled “The Decision of their Lives: Caste, Gender and the Great Migration.”
The Eleanor Roosevelt Lecture Series was created in 2004 to honor Eleanor Roosevelt’s commitment to social justice and her important place in women’s history.
Sponsored by the Women’s and Gender Studies Program with co-sponsors AAAS, History, the Mandel Center for the Humanities and Journalism.
October 24th, 2012
President Lawrence and Provost Goldstein hosted a luncheon on October 10 to honor faculty who have given 25, 30, 35, 40, 45, and 50 years of service to Brandeis University.
Division of Social Sciences faculty honored at the luncheon included: Tom Doherty (25 years), Shula Reinharz (30 years), Mick Watson (35 years), Steve Whitfield (40 years), Greg Freeze (40 years), Robert Art (45 years), Art Wingfield (45 years), Donald Hindley (50 years) and David Hackett Fischer (50 years).
Congratulations to our social sciences faculty!
October 23rd, 2012
Anthropologist Janet Bennion (Lyndon State College of Vermont) draws on her twenty years of fieldwork among fundamentalist polygamous Mormons to challenge media portrayals of Mormon women, which have focused on the potential for abuse and oppression within both the mainline church and fundamentalist sects. She argues that some “sister wives” find fulfillment and even empowerment through their domestic arrangements. In this lecture, she will be joined by renowned historian Laurel Ulrich (Harvard University) to look beyond the official patriarchy and find the subtle feminisms Mormon women embody.
Free and open to the public | RSVP to hbi@brandeis.edu
CO-SPONSORED BY THE WOMEN’S AND GENDER STUDIES PROGRAM, THE POLITICS DEPARTMENT, THE RELIGIOUS STUDIES PROGRAM AND THE FEMINIST SEXUAL ETHICS PROJECT
Thursday, 10/25, 7 p.m.
Hadassah-Brandeis Institute
Epstein Building
Brandeis University
515 South Street
Waltham, MA 02454
Parking in Epstein Lot
October 22nd, 2012
On Thursday, October 11 at 5 p.m. in Shiffman 219 Michael Nava will read from his forthcoming novel, The City of Palaces.
Attorney and writer Michael Nava is the author of a series of seven novels involving lawyer Henry Rios and as the co-author of Created Equal: Why Gay Rights Matter to America. For 15 years, from 1986 to 2001, the Henry Rios novels used the mystery genre to explore timely social and political issues involving ethnicity and sexuality.
The City of Palaces is set before and during the Mexican Revolution, and is Nava’s first novel in more than a decade.
October 1st, 2012
DESERT ROOTS: JOURNEY OF AN IRANIAN IMMIGRANT FAMILY, by Mitra K. Shavarini
In an age of global migration, Desert Roots offers an intimate view of one family’s immigration story and reminds us how potent the call of the homeland is to those who leave theirs behind.
In this true story, readers understand the struggles many Iranians—those living in Iran and abroad—have faced. Universal themes are threaded throughout the story: a mother trying to raise her children in a new country, a father disappointed in what life ultimately has in store for him, immigrant children ashamed of their roots, and proud nationalist ancestors. Themes of loss, regret, and tragedy, as well as perseverance and resilience, are part of this book’s broader narrative.
The author traces her family’s roots back across a century, to the time when the family surname was adopted by her great-grandfather, Abolghassem “Shemr” Karbassi, one of Iran’s greatest carpet masters. His story is at the heart of this family lore: a staunch nationalist, he hated the British for controlling his land . . . and for stealing his sons. Shemr was a xenophobe whose passion for his country has parallels in today’s West-wary Iran.
Desert Roots is timely. News of Iran continues to be pervasive in the global media. Americans who are seeking to understand Iran’s history and its tenuous relationship with the U.S. are equally eager to understand the human side of the Iranian people. Desert Roots offers readers a rich tapestry of personal, familial, and political history, woven into the vivid background of the author’s family immigrant experience.
Desert Roots appeals to both an academic audience—those involved, for example, in Immigrant, Cultural, and Ethnic Studies, Middle Eastern Studies—and a general-interest audience—readers who gravitate toward works such as Amy Tan’s Joy Luck Club, Jhumpa Lahiri’s Unaccustomed Earth, Tara Bahrampour’s To See and See Again: A Life in Iran and America, Khaled Hosseini’s Kite Runner, and Iraj Pezeshkzad’s My Uncle Napoleon.
For excerpts and reviews please visit www.desertroots.net.
About the Author:
Mitra K. Shavarini is a lecturer in Peace, Conflict, and Coexistence Studies and Women’s and Gender Studies at Brandeis University. Her research focuses on women’s education in Muslim societies. Her work has appeared in Harvard Educational Review, Teacher’s College Record, International Journal of Middle East Studies, and Women’s Studies International Forum.
Shavarini is also the author of Educating Immigrants: Experiences of Second Generation Iranians (2004) and the coauthor of Women and Education in Iran and Afghanistan: An Annotated Bibliography (with Wendy R. Robison, 2005). She holds a doctorate from Harvard’s Graduate School of Education.
June 18th, 2012
Miss Representation: a documentary film by Jennifer Siebel Newsom
Part of Women Take the Reel, a film festival celebrating Women’s History Month
Cosponsored by the Graduate Consortium in Women’s Studies
Thursday, March 29, 2012
7-9 pm
Golding 110
March 25th, 2012
Location: Epstein Building, Lecture Hall
Using examples from work at the Brandeis Women’s Studies Research Center, this event will explore the process of memoir writing, discussing choices of focus, where and how to start, and what to include or omit. Audience participation is welcome.
Panelists include Frinde Maher and Mary Mason.
Sponsored by the Women’s and Gender Studies Program.
March 25th, 2012
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