Labnet: Petition support Women's Studies at the University of South Florida

[labnet at lists.labourhistory.net]

From: Eichner, Carolyn [mailto:eichner at chuma1.cas.usf.edu] 



Hello,

 

I am an historian tenured in an autonomous Department of Women's Studies
at the University of South Florida.  We are under threat of losing our
autonomous departmental status, based on a recently released Provost's
Budget Report.  Women's Studies and Africana Studies are the two
departments facing the termination of their independent status.  In
response, my colleagues and I have written a letter of support/petition.
We seek the support of activists and scholars in an effort to
demonstrate the centrality and value of Women's Studies as a legitimate,
autonomous discipline.  I have copied the letter/petition below.  We ask
you to sign in support of our Department by sending your name, e-mail,
and affiliation to usfwst at gmail.com and to please forward the petition
to other potential allies.

 

In solidarity,

 

Carolyn Eichner

Associate Professor

Department of Women's Studies

University of South Florida

Tampa, FL 33617

eichner at cas.usf.edu

 

HELP SUPPORT THE ONLY AUTONOMOUS DEPARTMENT OF WOMEN'S STUDIES IN THE
STATE OF FLORIDA

 

Dear Friends of Women's and Gender Studies:

 

These are hard times for Higher Education in the state of Florida in
general, and for the University of South Florida in particular.

 

We write on behalf of the faculty, students, and members of the
University community concerned with preserving the Department of Women's
Studies.

 

Due to a severe budget crisis, the Department of Women's Studies faces
the potential loss of its status as an autonomous department.  As the
only free-standing Department of Women's Studies in the state of
Florida, and among the oldest in the nation, we believe that curtailing
our autonomy will have a negative impact on our discipline and on our
university as a whole.

 

We ask you to lend your support to us by agreeing to sign the letter
below urging the University to maintain the integrity and independent
status of the Department of Women's Studies.  Please send your name,
e-mail, and affiliation to usfwst at gmail.com.  We will compile all names
and present them to the Administration.

 

Thanks!

 

Sincerely,

 

The Department of Women's Studies, University of South Florida

 

Kim Vaz, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Chair

Marilyn Myerson, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Gurleen Grewal, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Carolyn J. Eichner, Ph.D., Associate Professor

Sara Crawley, Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Nagwa Dajani, M.D., Ph.D., Assistant Professor

Linda Lucas, Ph.D., Visiting Professor

 

__________________________________________________________________

March 6, 2008

 

Dear President Genshaft and Provost Wilcox,

 

We are scholars, students, activists, and community members.  We express
our deep concern at the planned restructuring of Women's Studies at USF
and integration of the Department faculty into other disciplines or the
merging of the Department as a subdivision of another disciplinary unit.

 

USF has been a leader in Women's Studies; the Department of Women's
Studies at USF is among the oldest in the nation, celebrating its 36th
anniversary this Spring semester, and it is the only Department of
Women's Studies in the state of Florida.

We stress the value of Women's Studies as a discipline: In 1991, the
American Association of Colleges identified Women's Studies as "one of
twelve learned disciplines most conducive to the promotion of
undergraduate liberal learning."

 

We are concerned that the University might consider closing or merging
the Department.  This would effectively undermine a discipline that
according to the AAC report, has "transformed knowledge in the
humanities, social sciences and life sciences, challenging
long-established beliefs, contesting dominant paradigms, identifying new
areas of research, and introducing new strategies of analysis."

 

According to the AAC report, "the strength of the women's studies major
lies in its commitment to criticize existing theories and methodologies
and to formulate new paradigms and organizing concepts across academic
fields, its adoption of a complex matrix of gender, class, race, age,
ethnicity, and nationality as fundamental categories of social,
cultural, and historical analysis, its reliance upon interdisciplinary
inquiry in structuring a sequence of coherently interrelated courses,
its unrelenting attention to pedagogy designed to create an equitable
learning opportunity for all students, and its ability to foster the
student's critical and analytical skills."

 

We urge the University not to entertain any drastic plan to eliminate
Women's Studies as an autonomous Department at the University of South
Florida.

 

Yours Sincerely,

 

Please sign in support by sending your name, e-mail address, and
affiliation to usfwst at gmail.com.

 

Carolyn J. Eichner

Associate Professor

Department of Women's Studies

University of South Florida

4202 E. Fowler Ave./ FAO 011

Tampa, FL  33617

eichner at cas.usf.edu

813-974-0987

 

++++++++++

 

 


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