Essays examine the impact of women's studies on scholarship in fields, includ American history, political science, economics, literary criticism, and psychology.

Many nations affirm the principle of gender equality. As women continue to advance in most walks of life, the impression that equality has been reached and that gender issues no longer pose real problems has naturally gained ground. Yet, many cultural, economic, and social barriers remain. Although as many women as men possess the skills necessary to shape social and economic development, women are still prevented from fully participating in decision-making processes. The papers collected in this volume focus on universities as one of the key institutions providing women with the education and leadership skills necessary for their advancement. Equally important is the role universities play in the shaping of a society's cultural fabric and, consequently, of attitudes towards women and their place in society. Both aspects are examined in this volume on the basis of a number of case studies carried out in western and non-western societies.

My mother still wants me to get a 'real' job. My father, who is retired after 44 years in the merchant marine, has never read my work. When I visited recently, the only book in his house was the telephone book.

Contending that the anti-feminist backlash in the academy is part of the broader "politically correct" rhetoric, this collection of writers, academics and activists is a much-needed response to the assault on feminist thinkers and critics in the academy today.

This book explores the capacities and desires of academic women to reimagine and transform academic cultures. Embracing and championing feminist scholarship, the research presented by the authors in this collection holds space for a different way of being in academia and shifts the conversation toward a future that is hopeful, kind and inclusive. Through exploring lived experiences, building caring communities and enacting an ethics of care, the authors are reimagining the academy’s focus and purpose. The autoethnographic and arts-based research approaches employed throughout the book provide evocative conceptual content, which responds to the symbolic nature of transformation in the academy. This innovative volume will be of interest and value to feminist scholars, as well as those interested in disrupting and rejecting patriarchal academic structures.

FINALIST FOR THE NATIONAL BOOK CRITICS CIRCLE AWARD In 1960, Harvard’s sister college, Radcliffe, announced the founding of an Institute for Independent Study, a “messy experiment” in women’s education that offered paid fellowships to those with a PhD or “the equivalent” in artistic achievement. Five of the women who received fellowships—poets Anne Sexton and Maxine Kumin, painter Barbara Swan, sculptor Marianna Pineda, and writer Tillie Olsen—quickly formed deep bonds with one another that would inspire and sustain their most ambitious work. They called themselves “the Equivalents.” Drawing from notebooks, letters, recordings, journals, poetry, and prose, Maggie Doherty weaves a moving narrative of friendship and ambition, art and activism, love and heartbreak, and shows how the institute spoke to the condition of women on the cusp of liberation. “Rich and powerful. . . . A love story about art and female friendship.” —Harper’s Magazine “Reads like a novel, and an intense one at that. . . . The Equivalents is an observant, thoughtful and energetic account.” —Margaret Atwood, The Globe and Mail (Toronto)

Providing a historical framework for understanding how women's studies evolved from women's struggles for access to higher education, this book illustrates the impact that feminist perspectives have made in the academy. Using the disciplines as its organizing principle, the First Edition explores eleven major fields to examine the host of contributions and critiques being made by feminist scholars. This book also probes the emergence of women's studies in the late 1960s as an accomplishment of great historical significance, and presents a vast array of readings by feminist scholars over the past 30 years. For professionals with a career or interest in women's studies, sociology, psychology, history, and/or education.