Academy – Page 16 – Feminism and Religion

Milestones and Musings by Kecia Ali

My first doctoral student defended his dissertation this week. It was a milestone for him and for me. Colleagues – those who participated in the defense and those present when we emerged from our conclave – congratulated us both. One said, only somewhat jokingly, “Congratulations, mom.” I knew exactly what she meant.

This defense, out of sync with the usual spate of May and August completions, overlapped with admissions season and the tail end of next fall’s hiring. I’ve been immersed in applications from potential MA and PhD students. And just this week I’ve fielded emails and calls from three former students (other programs, other primary advisors) now interviewing, more and less successfully, for faculty jobs. Continue reading “Milestones and Musings by Kecia Ali”

What It’s Like To Be A Woman In The Academy: Mentoring Edition by Linn Marie Tonstad

In my first post, I promised to return to the topic of mentoring. Mentoring is a survival strategy for feminists inside hostile or difficult-to-navigate environments; in its best possibilities, mentoring is a strategy for flourishing, not just surviving. But when a mentoring relationship goes wrong, it is so destructive an experience that it may even be characterized as traumatic. Mentoring is also a practice rife with possibilities for abuse: the recent Yale study of gender bias in the sciences shows the extent to which gender alone serves as a significant variable for scientists assessing the possible rewards of mentoring a student.

I have given a lot of thought to mentoring in recent months – as I transition into new mentoring roles in a new institution, as I negotiate changing relationships with current and former mentors, as I reflect on successful and unsuccessful mentoring relationships I’ve been involved in, and as I seek to develop policies and practices that will serve me (and more importantly, my mentees) well. Continue reading “What It’s Like To Be A Woman In The Academy: Mentoring Edition by Linn Marie Tonstad”

What It’s Like to Be a Woman in the Academy by Linn Marie Tonstad

Last fall, I was asked to sit in on the women’s pre-doctoral colloquium at the divinity school where I teach. In the course of a wide-ranging lunchtime conversation, the central question to which the students wanted an answer was: “what is it like to be a woman in the academy?” The question took me by surprise at the time – mostly because I’d expected to be asked more nitty-gritty questions about applying to graduate school, writing samples, and personal statements – but it has stayed with me in the weeks since the lunch as I’ve found myself trying out answers from different directions.

The first answer, and perhaps the most obvious one, is this: there is no such thing as being “a [generic] woman” in the academy (or anywhere else). Continue reading “What It’s Like to Be a Woman in the Academy by Linn Marie Tonstad”

Monthly Highlight: Emilie M. Townes

“In my teaching I want to get students excited about that notion of, you know, you’re not just here to get a Yale degree and have it on your diploma and be able to hang it on your wall…You should be here thinking about what kind of contributions can I make to society….What are you doing that helps enhance the lives of all of us, as opposed to (our) own little idiosyncratic research interests.” – – Emilie M. Townes

Emilie Townes is a pivotal person in the field of Womanist and Christian ethics as well as a foremother and pioneer in Womanist theology. Cornel West of Princeton University said:

“Emilie Townes is the towering womanist ethicist of our time….In this ice age of indifference and evasion, her powerful voice and viewpoint summon us. And we thank her for her vision and courage.”

At an opening address at the Convocation in 2005, Townes stated that there is a need to live in a “deep walking hope” that shapes lives “in ways that are not always predictable, not always safe, rarely conventional” and protests “with prophetic fury the sins of a world, and sometimes theological world views, that encourage us to separate our bodies from our spirits, our minds from our hearts, our beliefs from our actions.” Continue reading “Monthly Highlight: Emilie M. Townes”

Blessings for the New Year on Feminism and Religion by Marie Cartier

I remember being in Korea for the 2009 International Women’s World Congress with Hye Sook Hwang and Inhui Lee and many (many) others and realizing then in ways I had not before, how crucial feminist scholarly friendships are to not just my work –but my sanity. The way we see things and the way we talk about things makes sense in a way that many times the rest of the world does not make sense. I re-member, to use Mary Daly’s phrasing, Hye Sook’s Magu scholarship that awakened in me and many others the Goddess magic of Korea. I re-member Inhui’s work with the female shamans of Korea and their rituals to honor and memorialize with honor the “comfort” women—Korean women used as sexual slaves by the Japanese during World War II. I went to that conference on the urging of Hye Sook and came home from that conference with new lifelong friends—among them Inhui. At that time none of us were doctors—now we all are. Continue reading “Blessings for the New Year on Feminism and Religion by Marie Cartier”

The Future of Christian Ethics by Grace Yia-Hei Kao

The annual meeting of the Society of Christian Ethics is just around the corner (Jan 3-6, 2013). One of my responsibilities will be to meet again with members of the 2020 Future of Christian Ethics task force.

Our “charge” according to the chair of the committee, Charles Matthewes, is as follows:

Continue reading “The Future of Christian Ethics by Grace Yia-Hei Kao”

SPECIAL AAR SERIES Part I: Re-envisioning the Academy as ‘Open Source’ Community by Kate Ott with introduction and response by Mary Hunt

Introduction:

This is one of four papers presented in Chicago at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Religion, November 17, 2012, in a session entitled “Feminism, Religion and Social Media: Expanding Borders in the Twenty-First Century,” organized by Gina Messina-Dysert and chaired by Rosemary Radford Ruether with Mary E. Hunt as the respondent. What follows is the general response followed by, after each of the contributions, Hunt’s appreciative analysis. Two of the papers will be posted here on Feminism and Religion and two will be posted on the Feminism in Religion Forum.

General Remarks by Mary Hunt:

The stated purpose of the panel is to discuss “how digital projects are remapping the feminist theological terrain and creating opportunities for a wide range of voices to participate in ongoing and new conversations related to feminist issues in religion.” These writers have done that and more. Continue reading “SPECIAL AAR SERIES Part I: Re-envisioning the Academy as ‘Open Source’ Community by Kate Ott with introduction and response by Mary Hunt”

Don’t Worry, I Won’t Marry Your Girlfriend: Sexuality, Identity, and the Easy Laugh

No longer having to deconstruct the larger cultural and sexual narratives, heterosexuals who do not support marriage equality or feel threatened by homosexuals return to their one source of power that reinforces the ideology that they are on the right path: the Bible. “Marriage is between a man a woman,” or “A man shall not lie with another man as he would a woman,” becomes the newly reinforced heterosexual rallying cry and the progressive progress that occurred in the past becomes nothing more than a joke.

I must say, I will be the first to admit that the recent outbreak of videos promulgating the idea that gay men will marry a straight guy’s girlfriend or lesbians will marry a straight girl’s boyfriend all for the sake of marriage equality left me stifling my laughter as I attempted to pay attention in class.

However, after the calamity died down I took a moment to reflect upon the intrinsically embedded aspects of misdirected norms of sexuality, gender, and misogyny latent within the laugh lines and the guffaws throughout each video. Continue reading “Don’t Worry, I Won’t Marry Your Girlfriend: Sexuality, Identity, and the Easy Laugh”

There’s Something about Mary by Kecia Ali

Scholarly life – like life in general – requires balancing one’s own priorities with involvement in others’ project and plans. Say yes too frequently and you’ll never get anything written; say no too often and you miss the excitement give and take generates. A recent conversation at the American Academy of Religion annual meeting reminded me how enriching encounters in service to someone else’s agenda can be. I sat down with a scholar in another field working on a book for non-Muslims about how North American Muslims read and understand the Qur’an. We spent an hour talking about passages from Surat Al Imran (the third chapter of the Qur’an) that discuss Mary’s mother, Mary, Zacharias, John (“the Baptist”), and Jesus.

We had set up this meeting well in advance, but I suspect our talk would have been far less interesting had I not been primed by a panel I’d attended that morning, where one presenter spoke about the fluidity of Qur’anic descriptions of God’s participation in the creation of humanity and another read the story of Cain and Abel against the grain. The night before, I had also read a colleague’s work in progress on methodologies of feminist Qur’an interpretation so that she and I could discuss it that evening. Continue reading “There’s Something about Mary by Kecia Ali”

Status and Power at the AAR by Grace Yia-Hei Kao

This weekend is the annual meeting of the American Academy of Religion (AAR).

I’ll be giving a presentation in a panel that I organized in one session and serving as the invited respondent in another. I’ll also be spending approximately one-third of my total conference time interviewing candidates with my colleagues for a faculty position at my institution.

This is all to say that I’ll be attending the AAR with a modicum of status and power.

Continue reading “Status and Power at the AAR by Grace Yia-Hei Kao”