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Part of Current Feminist Conversations Series

Discussion held by bell hooks, Oberlin College, author of Ain't I a Woman: Black Women and Feminism, Feminist Theory: From Margin to Center, and Talking Back during the Scholar and Feminist XVI. Talk focuses on Black women's health and the strong black woman ideal. Part of the Afternoon plenaries at the Scholar and Feminist Conference XVI. The recording cuts out and comes back in. Papers presented or name of session: "Making the Public Private: Black Women and Self-Recovery".

In this interview, Ellen MacKay discusses her early life including her high school studies, her undergraduate years at Barnard College, and her appreciation of the theater—all of which helped direct her course of study. MacKay details her most influential courses and instructors, including an undergraduate Feminist Text course with Ellen Chesler and a graduate course on early modern theater with Jean Howard, which led to her personal pursuit of a greater knowledge of history, literary criticism, and feminist theory. Jean Howard, along with Julie Crawford and Rachel Adams, became both a mentor and role model for MacKay and led her to pursue a graduate certificate at IRWGS. MacKay discusses the inspiration and guidance she received under these women and others. Additionally, MacKay addresses the influence IRWGS's Feminist Pedagogy workshop had on her career.

DiGangi begins this interview by discussing his decision to attend Columbia University, stating that he began to engage with New York City's LGBTQ subculture as a high school student. DiGangi describes initial exposure to gay studies and feminist theory in an undergraduate class with Professor John Archer. From there, DiGangi attended an IRWGS course co-taught by Jean Howard and Martha Howell. As a graduate student at Columbia, the field of sexuality and LGBTQ studies was expanding, and DiGangi and others sought a space to address it. Out of this need arose the Lesbian and Gay Studies Reading Group. With immense support and encouragement, the Lesbian and Gay Studies Reading Group accrued speakers ranging from Martin Duberman, the first director of the Center for Lesbian and Gay Studies at CUNY Graduate School, to theorists and critics such as Eve Sedgwick, Wayne Koestenbaum, Douglas Crimp, and Judith Butler. DiGangi describes the ways in which the Lesbian and Gay Studies Reading Group became a legitimate institution within the Columbia community, and the resources it provided to queer students navigating the academy. DiGangi discusses how, in 1995, he helped to organize a conference on activism and academia, and defended a gay student dismissed from the PhD program.

Victoria Rosner begins this interview by discussing her undergraduate years as a member of one of the first co-ed graduating classes at Columbia University. She addresses the underrepresentation of female professors and their experience both in the classroom and as employees of the University. As a graduate student of English Literature at Columbia she encountered more female professors and developed a close relationship with her advisor Carolyn Heilbrun, who resigned shortly after in response to the decision not to tenure Susan Winnett. Rosner addresses both the exciting and destabilizing nature of being a student at this time. Upon reading Nancy K. Miller's book Getting Personal: Feminist Occasions and Other Autobiographical Acts, Rosner developed a relationship with Miller as well as Columbia Professor Jean Howard. Rosner explains how these connections led her to adopt an interdisciplinary and feminist approach to her scholarship.