Past Conferences
September 2020: Engaging Global Challenges: Women, Voting, and Representation.
In response to the COVID-19 Pandemic, our 2020 conference consists of a virtual mini-series designed to educate and empower individuals around voter rights and representation. While virtual, we are thrilled to still have the honor of hosting both 2011 Nobel Peace Laureate Leymah Gbowee and Peabody Award Finalist and CNN New Anchor Brooke Baldwin, as well as a host of other distinguished scholars and activists.
This virtual conference focused on the challenge “Women, Voting, and Representation” in commemoration of one hundred years since white women’s right to vote in the United States was recognized in 1920, and 55 years since the Voting Rights Act officially allowed women of color to exercise their right to vote.
Despite the legal recognition of women as political actors, to date, women continue to be underrepresented in most political institutions across the globe. Today, women compose only 24% of the world’s parliamentarians, despite constituting at least half of the world’s population. Glass ceilings remain firmly in place for all other political decision-making positions, ranging from ministerial positions to governors, to heads of states. Current issues regarding voting access and political participation are urgent both in the US and around the world, and worth merit both analysis and response through a gender lens.
2020 Conference Schedule At A Glance
Constitution Day Throughout the week of September 14-18, the Gué Pardue Hudson Center for Leadership and Service will be conducting a social media campaign through their Instagram and Facebook pages called “Know Your Rights, Use Your Voice”. This campaign will highlight the history of voting rights in the US along with opportunities for students to register to vote.
Pray the Devil Back to Hell Film Screening
Pray the Devil Back to Hell is the gripping account of a group of brave and visionary women led by Leymah Gbowee, who demanded peace for Liberia, a nation torn to shreds by a decades-old civil war. Combining contemporary interviews, archival images, and scenes of present-day Liberia the film recounts the experiences and memories of the women who stood up to their country’s tyrannical leader and brutal warlords, in order to bring peace to their tormented country. There will also be a facilitated discussion from a member of Leymah Gbowee’s foundation at the conclusion of the screening.
Ensuring Women’s Rights in Post-Crisis Reconstruction Efforts and Constitutions: Strategies from the Local to the Transnational
Revolutions and political upheavals offer important opportunities for women’s rights groups to make history by organizing collective actions in demand for gender-equitable laws and constitutions which affords women full citizenship and equality. Domestic women’s rights groups however are rarely alone in such struggles, and often form ties beyond their borders with transnational women’s movements to learn about other countries’ experiences. This panel, composed of experts and practitioners in the area of post-conflict reconstruction and constitutional reform from the Middle East and Africa, will present a comparative analysis of some of the recent and on-going local and transnational strategies for ensuring greater respect for women’s political rights.
Panelists: Aili Mari Tripp, Wangari Maathai Professor of Political Science and Gender and Women’s Studies, University of Wisconsin–Madison
Palwasha Kakar, Senior Program Officer, Religion and Inclusive Societies
Hekma Yagoub, Human Rights Lawyer, Sudan and UK
EGC 2020: Picturing Political Power: Images in the Women’s Suffrage Movement
For as long as women have battled for equitable political representation in America, those battles have been defined by images. Picturing Political Power offers a comprehensive look at the connections among images, gender, and power.
Allison K. Lange is an associate professor of history at the Wentworth Institute of Technology. She received her PhD in history from Brandeis University. Lange’s book, Picturing Political Power: Images in the Women’s Suffrage Movement, was published in May 2020 by the University of Chicago Press. The book focuses on the ways that women’s rights activists and their opponents used images to define gender and power during the suffrage movement.
Violence Against Women in Politics: A Global Phenomenon with Dr. Mona Lena Krook
Join us for this live book discussion with Dr. Mona Lena Krook (Rutgers University) on her upcoming publication Violence Against Women in Politics: A Global Phenomenon (Oxford University Press 2020).
Bio: Mona Lena Krook is Professor of Political Science and Chair of the Women and Politics Ph.D. Program at Rutgers University. Since 2015, she has collaborated with the National Democratic Institute on its #NotTheCost campaign to stop violence against women in politics.
Keynote Leymah Gbowee – “Can We Transform the World By Unlocking Young Women’s Political Power?”
Please join Nobel Peace Laureate, Leymah Gbowee, in discussing today’s global challenges as they relate to democracy in the US and around the world. In the middle of this heartbreaking global pandemic, global citizens—regardless of race, gender, status, and accomplishments— are being alerted to rethink life, interactions, and attitudes toward “the other” and many more. This moment in our global history has forcibly reminded us of the inevitable truth – we are more connected than we are divided and our humanity is tied in ways that we have sadly allowed ourselves to forget. As we navigate this moment, she will remind us how our voice, actions and vote can bring us closer when the dust settles.
Huddle: How Women Unlock Their Collective Power with Brooke Baldwin
CNN news anchor Brooke Baldwin explores the phenomenon of what she calls the “huddle,” when women get together–in politics, Hollywood, activism, the arts, sports, and everyday friendships — to provide each other support, empowerment, inspiration, and the strength to solve problems or enact meaningful change. Whether they are facing adversity (like workplace inequity or a global pandemic) or organizing to make the world a better place, women are a highly potent resource for one another.
Suffer and Grow Strong Book Release Brunch with Carolyn Curry ’66
Join us for this “Brunch and Book Talk” with Agnes Scott Alumna Carolyn Curry ’66 as she discusses her recent book release “Suffer and Grow Strong: The Life of Ella Gertrude Clanton Thomas 1834-1907”
Women In Public Service Panel
This panel will discuss the importance of being politically and civically engaged. Panelists will share their political journeys and advice to Scotties who are interested in making positive change within their community.
Moderator: Zion Martin, IGNITE Agnes Scott Chapter President
Panelists: Audrey Maloof, Former Candidate for GA State Legislature, IGNITE Alum; Amira Daughtery: Agnes Scott Alum, community organizer, co-founder of “We Collective”; Regina Lewis-Ward, Candidate for GA House of Representatives
History of Women’s Constitutional Rights in the Muslim World
This panel will investigate the role and potential of national constitutions in Muslim contexts on women’s rights and status. It will study the historical promises and pitfalls of constitutional norms and strategies for promoting gender equality, with a comparative focus on the constitutional contexts of Afghanistan, India, and Iran. It aims to uncover how women’s inequality and subordination are constructed and framed in law, with attention to how differently situated women are impacted differently in supposed objective legal framings. Deeper understandings of such structures will enable us to better move towards justice and equality.
Moderator: Mona Tajali
Panelists: Prof. Vrinda Narain, Faculty of Law, McGill University; Dr. Fatemeh Sadeghi, Faculty of Law, McGill University, Prof. Homa Hoodfar, Anthropology and Sociology, Concordia University.
