Me and my WGLs (WomenGirlsLadies) at the Brooklyn Museum! Thank you to all who came out on a rainy Saturday to talk it up about Dads, Dudes, and Doing It. Marco says we look like an all-female band here and it’s true: we wish. (We wish we had a manager, actually, is what we wish! Any takers?!) I’m dressed a little hippy dippy here, like the sole member of the group singing folk, but I’m told I get pregnancy license and hey, it’s what’s comfortable!
I hope everyone had a Happy Father’s Day!
There’s so much Father’s Day goodness out there today I don’t know where to start.
Former NYTimes blogger Marci Alboher asks “Are Dads the New Moms?” over at her new Yahoo blog, Working the New Economy.
Lisa Belkin conducts a two part interview with The Daddy Shift: How Stay-at-Home Dads, Breadwinning Moms, and Shared ParentingAreTransforming the American Family
Michelle Goldberg of ABCNews.com tells us What Laid-Off Dads Want
And I offer “Findings from from the Layoff Lab”— a Father’s Day assessment of recession-era dads — over at The Big Money!Â
You can bet we’ll touch on many of these themes — and more, and from a fresh and feminist perspective — at the Brooklyn Museum tomorrow when the WomenGirlsLadies talk about “Dads, Dudes, and Doing It.” Event is free! We’ll be giving books away! I’ll be wearing straight-up maternity wear! This is one you won’t want to miss 🙂
PS. Time Out New York just listed us as one of the “Ten Best Father’s Day events” in town!
This just in from the New York Observer:
Now, I’m psyched as all get go that The Observer is offering up some free PR for our Women, Girls, & Ladies panel tomorrow at the 92Y Tribeca! But could someone please tell me, what the [bleep] is a “man-bat”? Is that like a wombat? Or is it, like, dyslexic batman? Regardless of what it is, I’ll sure have to go dig deep in the feminist closet to find mine…
(Thanks to fellow WGL Miss Courtney for the humorous heads up.)
My latest post at Recessionwire.com is a preview, of sorts, of the WGLs’ 92nd Street Y event this coming Wednesday. It’s now live, here: Learning from the Ladies.
I’m THRILLED to announce that my nationally touring (whohoo!) intergenerational panel, “Women, Girls, and Ladies” will be appearing on MARCH 18 at the 92nd Street Y in Tribeca.
For a taste, you can check out the piece up today in honor of International Women’s Day over at the Women’s Media Center site, where Gloria Feldt (67), Courtney Martin (29), Elizabeth Hines (33) and I (40 + 3 weeks) each share personal reflections on the economic crisis from our generational vantage point and comment on some of the unfinished feminist business of economic recovery. Hint: It’s a lot about work and life, life and work, work and life….
For more on the March 18th panel, see our WGLs blog or the 92nd Street Y.
Ok, I can write that sensational headline cause I wasn’t there this time. But my fellow WGLs Courtney Martin, Gloria Feldt, and Kristal Brent Zook were, plus the amazing Maria Teresa Peterson (who stepped in for me – thank you MTP!).
For those who haven’t heard of this yet, Women, Girls, Ladies: A Fresh Conversation Across Generations is a traveling panel promoting intergenerational feminist dialogue across the land. We speak at campuses and organizations (and are available to come to YOU! Rebecca Rosenberg, rebecca@parchitamedia.com, is our contact lady). Here is Miss Courtney with a recap for us all:
We had an incredible experience yesterday in Kansas City. First we did a very interactive, intergenerational workshop over at University of Missouri-Kansas City where we met fascinating local women (many of them named Linda?!) from the YWCA, The American Association of University Women, the incredible UMKC Women’s Center staff and board, and so many more.
One of the big insights that came up from that experience was a question:
When do we, as feminists, confront sexism directly and when do we deal with it indirectly instead?
It seemed like so many of the experiences and anecdotes that women of all generations brought to the table were focused on this difficult negotiation. In order to get the progress we so desire, do we swallow some of our ire when a sexist guy says something inane? Or is it our responsibility as loud and proud feminists to call him out regardless of the fall out?
As if that conversation wasn’t rich enough, we still had the big event to come. Yesterday evening we had a panel in honor of Ruth Margolin, Founding Director of the UMKC Women’s Center. There was a huge crowd (300+) in the absolutely beautiful Kansas City Public Library-Plaza Branch. After wine and cheese we migrated into the newly renovated auditorium and got to hear some wonderful words about Ruth Margolin’s fiery character. Apparently she was never afraid of being a loud and proud feminist! It was so special to be having our dialogue in honor of her legacy.
The audience brought up a range of issues; everything from women in the military, pay equity, body image, abortion, Clinton’s infidelity scandal, Sarah Palin, and racial tensions within feminism were a part of the conversation.
Thanks to all who contributed your insights and questions. And thanks to everyone at UMKC, especially Brenda Bethman, for making this really exquisite event and experience possible! And a special, special thanks to Maria Teresa Petersen, who stepped in for the much missed Deborah Siegel with grace and eloquence. Maria Teresa was fantastic. Check out her organization, Voto Latino, here.
*The Kansas City Star did a great write up of the event. So did The Pitch, Kansas City’s weekly, but check out the title! “Meow Mix”? Come on people, this is exactly the point of our panel. When men disagree, it’s called a disagreement. When women disagree, it’s called a cat fight. Thank goodness we’re reclaiming the frame!
–Courtney Martin
Crossposted at WomenGirlsLadies.
Live, from George Washington last Thursday, it’s Girl w/ Pen and two of the young women from the Women’s Leadership Program. (Am I really that short?!) Those WLP gals are not only gorgeous, they’re whip smart. The WomenGirlsLadies and I had an amazing time during the Q&A part of our panel that evening — the questions we got could have kept us all going all night.
Deborah here. Last night Gloria Feldt, Kristal Brent Zook, Courtney Martin and I spoke together at George Washington University’s Elizabeth J. Somers Women’s Leadership Program and I have to say, we all feel tremendously encouraged by the amazing women we met there and just a bit proud of our own little quartet for prompting such great questions and reflections from the audience. Topics of conversation during the Q&A included: race vs. gender in the election, work/family balance, public policy approaches to rape and sexual assault, “opting out,” dealing with anti-feminist crap from insecure boys, beauty standards and their sources, abortion, equality vs. elevating women above men, women in politics, intersection feminism etc.
Thank you to Dean Heller, Sam, and all those that joined us in the conversation. The future is looking pretty bright…This pic is from a previous talk, but photos from GW coming soon!
(crossposted at WomenGirlsLadies)
A podcast of our panel at Central Michigan University (“WomenGirlsLadies: A FRESH Conversation Across Generations”) is now live. And we’re taking the conversation next to Harvard this Friday, so if you’re in the area, please do come!
April 18, 3-5pm
Harvard Hall 20
For more info, please contact the Harvard College Women’s Center. We’ll also be posting notes from the road over at WomenGirlsLadies.
(The photo, L-R: Tara Sathoff-Wells, Central Michigan University Director of Women’s Studies; the four WomenGirlsLadies–Gloria Feldt, me, Courtney Martin, and Kristal Brent Zook; and my new dear friend, CMU Professor Jill Taft Kaufman.)
Oh my gosh–my mother has learned how to post comments at the New York Times! Mom, you make me proud! Renee (aka Mom, pictured left) posted in response to my online convo with Courtney over at Marci’s blog last week, Shifting Careers. Since I’m bursting with pride at Renee’s willingness to learn, and since I also loved what she wrote, I’m reposting her comment here:
“I really enjoyed this discussion between Deborah and Courtney– it touches on so many of the issues that I faced when I entered the work force. It is interesting to me, although a bit disappointing that younger feminists are still trying to achieve things like good child care, flexible hours, and that they ‘appear’ to be asking too much. Sense of entitlement? To me, if it is for valid reasons and causes, it’s fine. Entitlement only for oneself, without working for authentic and reasonable goals to be shared with other women, is not acceptable. Keep up the dialogue!” -Renee
And while I’m at it, I can’t resist posting this comment from some dude who thinks I’m a liar:
“Uh, I’m sorry but Ms. Siegal should not lie about here age. Clearly, she is no older than 29. If you wanna add some legitimacy to this debate a ‘boomer’ would have really been interesting.”
— Posted by Steven Cayce
Well, I AM 39 (as I’m IDed in the post) and for a wider range of generational perspective Steven, I invite you to come hear the panel Courtney and I doing at Harvard with Gloria Feldt and Kristal Brent Zook on April 18. For more on “WomenGirlsLadies: A FRESH Conversation Across Generations,” I invite folks to check out our group blog!
