'Feminists United' strive to make changes
By Rachel Schwartz
Joining the ranks of Santa Clara clubs this year is a group of women who want to work to support women's issues and causes through changes in curriculum and awareness projects.
Feminists United was founded this year as an offshoot of the group Looking at Women's and Gender Issues. Club members elected to change the name this past summer in part because of difficulties with the previous name, but also because they felt it was important to have the title "feminist" included in the name.
"Our roles as individuals cannot be dictated to us by any preconceived and confining notions about girls or boys. Feminism is the liberating notion that we are each free to be you and me," senior Meghan Hennessey wrote on the club's Web site, http://scufu.org.
A main project that the group has taken on this year is to separate the ethnic studies and women's and gender studies requirement in the College of Arts and Sciences so that students would have to take one of each rather than having the option to choose between the two.
"It's an essential part of a whole education, being aware of women's issues, feminist issues, rather than just hearing the word feminist and thinking, 'Oh my gosh, those crazy feminists,'" Hennessey said.
The core requirement project began last year as a project in club members Hennessey's and Sarah Bonnel's Feminist Visionary Ethics class. They hope to meet with the core committee this quarter to present their proposal.
Another goal FU hopes to accomplish this year is de-stigmatizing the word "feminist."
"A lot of the time it seems that when people hear the word, they think of an angry lesbian that dresses like a man," senior Jen BeVard said.
One way that the club hopes to combat this negative connotation is by selling T-shirts with the slogan "This is what a feminist looks like-" printed on them to show the diversity within feminism. The shirts are available for purchase on their Web site.
"The word 'feminist' is not confined to any single definition," BeVard said. "I think that is really what the shirt is about."
In addition to the T-shirt, the group has planned a photographic campaign featuring the same slogan of Santa Clara feminists. The exhibit, which is planned to go on display in March as part of Women's History Month is a continuation of a photography project started last year by Jenny Jigour.
Next month, the club will be promoting the performances of BeVard's one--act production of "Far Away." Rather than casting the play in the traditional format, with one male and two female roles, BeVard cast the show with three female actors.
"We've been conditioned to see gender as this male/female dichotomy and I think that it is much more complicated than that," BeVard said. "I wanted to find a way to incorporate my feelings about gender and get people to think about it in a new way."
FU meets every Monday night at 7 p.m. in front of the California Mission Room. Club members stress that they run their organization cooperatively, not with a hierarchal structure.
"We wanted to make it everybody's club, not just the person in charge and the person telling you what to do," Hennessey said.
Junior Sarah Bonnel also feels that the clubs structure allows members to spearhead specific issues that they feel strongly about.
"What it means to be a member of FU really depends on the person," she said.