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| Center for the Study of Women in Society | |
|---|---|
| Name | Center for the Study of Women in Society |
| Formation | 1973 |
| Type | Research center |
| Headquarters | University of Oregon |
| Leader title | Director |
Center for the Study of Women in Society is an interdisciplinary research center founded in the 1970s at the University of Oregon to support feminist scholarship, public policy analysis, and community-engaged projects. It promotes research on gender, sexuality, race, class, labor, health, and culture by convening scholars, artists, and activists across the humanities and social sciences. The center has hosted fellows, conferences, and publications that intersect with major movements and institutions in the United States and internationally.
The center was established in the early 1970s during the aftermath of the Women's Liberation Movement and amidst debates influenced by figures associated with Second-wave feminism, Betty Friedan, Gloria Steinem, Adrienne Rich, Audre Lorde, and organizations such as National Organization for Women and Combahee River Collective. Its founding paralleled initiatives at institutions like Barnard College, Radcliffe Institute, Smith College, Wellesley College, Brandeis University, and UCLA. Early years involved collaborations with scholars connected to University of California, Berkeley, Harvard University, Stanford University, Columbia University, Princeton University, Yale University, University of Michigan, and University of Chicago. The center’s programming responded to legal and policy shifts including debates around the Equal Rights Amendment, the Title IX regulatory framework, and rulings from the Supreme Court of the United States affecting reproductive rights such as Roe v. Wade and later cases that shaped public discourse. Over decades, it intersected with international developments involving actors like Simone de Beauvoir, bell hooks, Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, and institutions including United Nations, UN Women, World Health Organization, and The World Bank on gender-related research agendas.
The center’s mission emphasizes intersectional feminist inquiry drawing on methodologies linked to scholars associated with Judith Butler, Michel Foucault, Pierre Bourdieu, Kimberlé Crenshaw, Nancy Fraser, and Joan Wallach Scott. Research areas include reproductive justice debates involving activists and legal scholars such as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Dorothy Roberts, and Martha Nussbaum; labor and care work tied to work by Arlie Russell Hochschild, Evelyn Nakano Glenn, and Dolores Huerta; health disparities connected to studies by Paul Farmer, Sander Lefkowitz, and Elizabeth Blackburn; and cultural analyses in dialogue with creators like Toni Morrison, Maya Angelou, Alice Walker, and Susan Sontag. The center fosters comparative projects referencing national contexts like United Kingdom, Canada, India, South Africa, Brazil, Mexico, Japan, France, and Germany and connects to archives such as Schlesinger Library, Library of Congress, Bodleian Library, and British Library.
Core programs include a visiting fellowship modeled after programs at Institute for Advanced Study, Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, and Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences; an undergraduate and graduate seminar series connected to departments such as Department of Sociology (University of Oregon), Department of History (University of Oregon), School of Law (University of Oregon), and programs like Women's Studies and Gender Studies at peer institutions including New York University, University of California, Los Angeles, Duke University, Brown University, and Northwestern University. Public-facing initiatives have partnered with arts organizations like Museum of Modern Art, Portland Art Museum, Whitney Museum of American Art, and festivals such as Portland International Film Festival. Other initiatives include policy workshops engaging stakeholders from American Civil Liberties Union, Planned Parenthood, Family Planning Association, and community groups like Black Lives Matter and Latino Justice PRLDEF.
The center maintains affiliations with the University of Oregon, collaborates with research centers such as Oregon Humanities Center, Center for Latino/a and Latin American Studies, National Women's Studies Association, Modern Language Association, and international networks such as European Consortium for Political Research and International Sociological Association. Partnerships have extended to foundations and organizations including Ford Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, Open Society Foundations, and philanthropic arms like Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for research initiatives. It has worked with legal clinics, hospital systems, and cultural institutions including Oregon Health & Science University, Portland State University, Reed College, and local nonprofits.
Directors and affiliated scholars have included faculty and fellows whose networks span to prominent intellectuals and activists: connections link to Susan Brownmiller, Eileen Boris, Nancy Cott, Estelle Freedman, Linda Gordon, Patricia Hill Collins, Chrystia Freeland, Sally Haslanger, Martha Minow, Lois Benjamin, Kimberly Phillips-Fein, Heidi Hartmann, Carol Gilligan, Sara Ahmed, Donna Haraway, Ruth Yeazell, Evelyn Fox Keller, Elaine Showalter, Gertrude Stein, Hannah Arendt, Simone Weil, Iris Marion Young, Kathleen Blee, Lila Abu-Lughod, Nadine Strossen, Rita Dove, Annette Gordon-Reed, Claudia Rankine, Henrietta Lacks, Marsha P. Johnson, and Sylvia Rivera. Visiting fellows have arrived from institutions such as Smithsonian Institution, Getty Research Institute, Library of Congress, National Archives, and international universities like University of Cambridge and University of Oxford.
Funding streams combine university support, competitive grants from entities like National Endowment for the Humanities, National Science Foundation, private philanthropic grants from Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and Ford Foundation, and donor gifts tied to trusts such as Gates Trust and corporate philanthropy. Governance includes a board or advisory council composed of faculty, community leaders, and representatives from partner organizations including alumni networks from University of Oregon, legal advisors with ties to American Bar Association, and nonprofit leaders connected to YWCA and YWCA USA.
The center’s work has influenced scholarship cited alongside major publications and prizes associated with Pulitzer Prize, MacArthur Fellowship, National Book Award, and has informed policy briefs used by advocacy organizations including Planned Parenthood Federation of America, ACLU Foundation, National Women's Law Center, and international agencies such as United Nations Development Programme and World Health Organization. Its conferences and colloquia have featured panels intersecting with debates around landmark texts like The Feminine Mystique, Gender Trouble, The Second Sex, and involved cultural partnerships producing exhibitions with institutions such as Museum of Modern Art, Tate Modern, and Portland Art Museum. The center’s archival projects collaborate with repositories including Schlesinger Library and Bancroft Library to preserve activist records linked to movements like Civil Rights Movement, Stonewall riots, Chicano Movement, and labor organizing by United Farm Workers.
Category:Research centers