Women's History Month

The College of Arts and Sciences, in collaboration other units across our campus, acknowledges Women’s History Month. Throughout the month of March, the College is offering a student-centered calendar of events and programming that honors the diverse histories and achievements of women. Taking a broad, intersectional, and decolonial approach, our Women’s History month programming introduces the campus to cutting edge research on issues of gender, sexuality, feminism, and queer theory, and offers events that engage racial, social, political, environmental, and reproductive justice.

Women’s History month also recognizes the ground-breaking role that the University at Buffalo played in the founding of women’s, gender and sexuality studies across the globe. Launched in 1972, as a result of student and faculty activism, the Women’s College created a unique intellectual space that propelled research into women’s diverse histories, created powerful new knowledges that fundamentally challenged women’s erasure and inequality, and maintained activism and direct action in pursuit of a more just and equal world. This tradition continues with the College of Arts and Sciences Department of Global Gender and Sexuality Studies, an interdisciplinary home for students, faculty and the community. The knowledge, analysis and engagement produced in women’s and gender studies is as critical today as it was 50 years ago. This work continues to combat structural sexism, the devaluing of women’s labor, particularly that of Black, Indigenous and People of Color (BIPOC) women as we have seen during the recent COVID-19 pandemic, and the deep-seated gender-based violence which endangers the lives of sexual minorities every day.

12-1:30 p.m. on Zoom

In honor of the late Isabel Marcus, the Department of Global Gender and Sexuality Studies presents: Global Feminist Activism and Democratic Politics: Conversation with past Isabel S. Marcus International Fellowship Awardees: Elif Ege (PhD 2019), Maria Fernanda Glaser (PhD 2016), and Gabriella Nassif (ABD)

About the speakers:

Fernanda Glaser is a Fulbright scholar from Chile who has a doctorate from the UB Department of Global Gender Studies. She is a feminist activist and an organizer in grassroots and NGOs working for social justice and women’s rights. Today, she works at the National Institute for Human Rights (NIHR), where she serves as a social scientist in the northern city of La Serena.

Elif Ege is a recent PhD graduate in the Global Gender Studies program. She completed her BA in Political Science and International Relations in Bogazici University, Turkey, and her MA degree in Sociology, in Koc University, Turkey. She wrote her dissertation on the Kurdish and Turkish women’s movements in Turkey and their multi-tiered collaborations and negotiations around the international norms and standards of women's rights across local, national and global levels of feminist activism.

Gabriella Nassif focuses on issues of labor, gender and development in the Arab region with a specific focus on Lebanon. She has spent the last few years living between Buffalo, N.Y. and Beirut, Lebanon where she works with the Institute for Women's Studies in the Arab World (IWSAW) and teaches undergraduate courses at the Lebanese American University. In Beirut, she has worked as an independent research consultant to a number of organizations, including UN Women, UN Development Programme (UNDP), and the UN Population Fund both in Lebanon and the regional office in Cairo.

4:10–5:40 p.m.

Join Katsi Cook, Akwesasne Mohawk midwife, for a special presentation on the invaluable lessons she received through the work, activism, inspiration, and presence of John Mohawk.

Serving as an ambassador to the landscape of Indigenous women and girls leadership circles, Katsi holds the values, vision and purpose of the Spirit Aligned Leadership Program, imparting her knowledge of Indigenous communities and decades of culture-based program design, direction and implementation. She is an advocate of Indigenous women’s health across the lifecycle, drawing from a longhouse traditionalist perspective the idea of Woman as the First Environment. She has based previous work in the First Environment Collaborative, working at the intersections of environmental health and justice and reproductive health and justice research and policy. Her groundbreaking environmental research of Mohawk mothers’ milk revealed the harmful generational impact of toxic pollutants within the St. Lawrence River. In 1992, Katsi became the founding Aboriginal midwife of the Six Nations Birthing Centre, the first and only freestanding birth centre in Canada at that time. Its practices are grounded in the concept of the Haudenosaunee Creation story.

Sponsored by the Department of Indigenous Studies

5 p.m.                                                               

A virtual panel discussion addressing issues such as work/life balance, transition from graduate school to a career and achieving success.

Featured speakers: 

Didar Asik, PhD, Postdoctoral Scholar, Department of Chemistry/Biomedical Engineering
University of California, Davis, CA

Angela Batt, PhD, Research Scientist 
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency National Exposure Research Laboratory
Cincinnati, OH

Aparajita Dasgupta, PhD
Senior Scientist Process Development
Pfizer, Inc.
Andover, MA

Ivonne Ferrer, PhD
Analytical Leader
Corteva Agriscience
Vacaville, CA

Fatin Samara, PhD
Professor of Environmental Sciences
Department of Biology, Chemistry and Environmental Sciences
American University of Sharjah
United Arab Emirates

Glorimar Vicente-Crescioni, PhD
Sr. Manager Quality Control
AML Quality Control Technical Resources
Amgen Manufacturing Limited
Juncos, Puerto Rico

Sponsored by the Department of Chemistry

3-4 p.m.                                                               

Baldy 200G

Lima-Neves will visit UB in the final week of March, 2022, to offer a lecture following the book that she published last year, Kriolas poderozas: Cabo-Verdean women writing, remembrance, resistance and revolution. This work documents the work and stories told by Cabo Verdean women to refocus the narratives about Cabo Verde on Cabo Verdean women and their experiences. The contributors examine their own experiences, the history of Cabo Verde, and Cabo Verdean diaspora to highlight the commonalities that exist among all women of African descent, such as sexual and domestic violence and media objectification, as well as the different meanings these commonalities can hold in local contexts. Through exploring the literary and musical contributions of Cabo Verdean women, the Cabo Verdean state and its transnational relations, food and cooking traditions, migration and diaspora, and the oral histories of Cabo Verde, the contributors analyze themes of community, race, sexuality, migration, gender, and tradition. Dr. Lima-Neves will also visit with students to discuss her scholarship and teaching, and share advice from her personal experiences as a Cabo-Verdean woman in the United States.

About the speaker
Terza Silva Lima Neves is associate professor of political science and chair of the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Johnson C. Smith University.

Sponsored by the UB Office of Inclusive Excellence, the Gender Institute, the Humanities Institute, the Department of Romance Languages and Literatures

7 p.m.

Catherine Fisher Collins is a distinguished educator, author, and member of the New York State Board of Regents. She has dedicated much of her personal and professional life to promoting the twin issues of good health and a sound education, with a special emphasis on the needs of underserved youth/women and individuals in Western New York. She is a forceful and passionate advocate in promoting the success of all students in New York state. Her talk will focus upon the health issues confronting women and African Americans in western New York and policy implications.

Part of the UB Department of Africana and American Studies Spring 2022 Lecture Series.