Chair's message
Hello to our alumni, faculty, students and community supporters! I am excited to launch our new departmental newsletter. I’m particularly pleased to announce that across 2022, we’ll be celebrating the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Women’s Studies College at the University at Buffalo.
The Women’s Studies College, originally located at 108 Winspear Avenue, was one of the first concrete institutional changes at UB that resulted from incredible early activism on the part of students, faculty and staff.
As a result of the dedication and work of successive generations, women’s studies at UB has helped to lead sweeping changes across UB, academic disciplines, and the country. Research and teaching across five decades has exposed entrenched inequalities and social hierarchies of sex, gender, race, class, and sexual orientation, and promoted more equality and justice, both here in the United States and globally. Our current faculty and students continue to lead the way, and you’ll find a few of their stories in this newsletter.
We would also like to hear your stories! We are building an oral history archive of the experiences of students and faculty that have been involved in women’s studies during the last 50 years at UB. Please send us your stories: What are your favorite women’s studies memory? What was your favorite class or classes and why? Or, your favorite professor and what did you learn from them? In our discipline, we know the importance of personal stories and the profound connections between the personal and political. Please contact us if you would like to do an oral history interview so that your experiences can be included in our archive. Help us build a rich history to launch us into the next 50 years!
I’m also excited to announce the creation of a “50 for 50” campaign. In order to support our students and faculty members in their scholarly pursuits, we’ve set a goal of raising at least $50,000. Please think about donating $5, $50 or even $500, and let us know why! Are you donating in the name of a favorite professor or to remember a specific event?
Finally, mark your calendars! I would like to invite you to Democracy Wide Open: Critiquing the Present, Imagining the Future, Feb. 17-19, 2022. It will launch a full year of anniversary events. You won’t want to miss any, so please sign up to receive announcements about upcoming events.
We’ve had an incredibly exciting few years. In 2018, after eight years without our own department, we relaunched women’s studies with a new name of Global Gender and Sexuality Studies (GGSS) that captures the current breadth of our research and teaching. We’ve established stand-alone MA and PhD programs, started a new minor in sexuality studies, and expanded our undergraduate minors and majors. We stand on the shoulders of those first student and faculty activists as we continue to grow and evolve. I look forward to continuing to share our news and hopefully to hear your stories!
Gwynn Thomas, PhD
Chair and Associate Professor
Department of Global Gender and Sexuality Studies