Activism Log 6

Rachel Collins

Jeannina Perez

WST3015

2 April 2010

Activism:

This week I created an email address specifically for this project, womensholiday@gmail.com. Nina sent us back the finished letter, so now we can begin to actually email and mail the letter to the places on our lists. Like I said before, my states are Alabama through Hawaii. I've already began to compile the email addresses to each school, but there are some schools whose women's studies programs seem to be defunct and without email addresses, with the website just sitting there. We're also decided to table later on this month to collect signatures on the petition. I created an online petition as well. The petition incorporates the language from the letter and I've now started posting it to my facebook and the Women's First National Holiday facebook page as an effort to get more signatures.

Reflection:

In class this week, we discussed Womanism, and the ways in which women of color have branched off from the mainstream feminist movement. It made me think about the role of women of color in the suffrage movement- or, rather, the fact that they didn't really have a role (Perez 3/31/2010). Alice Paul was one of the white women in the mainstream feminist and suffrage movement, and it was partially due to this racial privilege that she was able to enact the changes and leadership that she embodied. I don't think that this fact should detract from our view of her accomplishments and importance in the struggle for women's rights, but I think intersectionality should be taken into account when we analyze all aspects of women's history.

Reciprocity:

While looking for email addresses on the websites of all the schools I'm going to email, I thought about the luck I had in UCF even HAVING a women's studies department, since I didn't come into college with any idea of majoring or minoring in it. I hope that we find other people who have at least heard the name Alice Paul while we're tabling, but if it's anything like talking to people so far, I think most won't. The more I talk to people about it while sending the petition just makes me more motivated to educate everyone that while can during the course of this project.

Works Cited

Perez, Nina. "Womanism." University of Central Florida. 31 Mar. 2010. Lecture.