[Herstory] April CWLU Herstory E-Zine

[herstory-admin at cwluherstory.org]

Hello: Welcome to the April issue of the CWLU Herstory E-Zine. Please 
send us news tips about upcoming events you know about. Also, don't 
be shy. Send us news about yourself and what you are doing. Feminist 
networking is part of what we are about. Forward our E-Zine to 
colleagues and friends who may want to subscribe.

Remember: Buy online from Women and Children First Books or the 
History Channel.com using the links from our homepage. The links are 
the History Channel.com and Women and Children First logos. It's a 
great way to buy gifts like books, videos, music or other items. We 
will earn a small but much needed commission.

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Judy Norsigian of Our Bodies, Ourselves spoke at the University of 
Illinois at Chicago

March 26th was a special day for Chicagoans interested in women's 
health. The UIC Center for Research on Women and Gender along with 
other sponsors held a conference commemorating the 30th anniversary 
of the ground breaking women's health book, "Our Bodies, Ourselves". 
Originally stapled together on cheap newsprint at 35 cents a copy, 
the book has been revised countless times and is currently translated 
into 19 languages.

Keynote speaker Judy Norsigian was one of the original members of the 
Boston Women's Health Collective (now called Our Bodies Ourselves) 
which first published the book. Other conference speakers included 
Courtney Bell of the Chicago Women's Health Center, Evette Cardona of 
Amigas Latinas, Kathleen Ennen of the Illinois Nurses Association, 
Claudia Fegan of the Health & Medicine Policy Research Group and 
Beatriz Ponce de Leon of the Illinois Caucus of Adolescent Health.

A number of former CWLUers attended the conference and some later 
joined Judy Norsigian and other conference attendees for  dinner at a 
local Italian restaurant. Herstory Project members were able to 
discuss how best to document the history of the women's health 
movement in Chicago with Judy Norsigian, who was very supportive of 
their efforts.

***************************
Jennifer Abod visited Chicago to promote her film, "The Edge of Each 
Other's Battles: The Vision of Audre Lorde"

Audre Lorde (1934-1992) was the author of 15 books  and  was poet 
Laureate of New York State from 1991-1993. She consistently 
challenged all forms of discrimination in the social movements  she 
herself participated in: Black Arts and Black Liberation, Women's 
Liberation, Black Feminism, and Lesbian and Gay Liberation. A staunch 
internationalist, she connected women across the U.S.A., the 
Caribbean, Europe, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. She died 
in 1992 after a courageous 14 year struggle against breast and liver 
cancer.

The Women in the Director's Chair Film Festival presented "The Edge 
of Each Other's Battles" on March 23rd along with a special guest 
appearance of film maker Jennifer Abod. The documentary was 
emotionally and intellectually engaging , as we see how Audre Lord 
constantly challenged herself and those around her not to succumb to 
society's ugliest prejudices.

Many of the younger people in the audience were not familiar with 
Audre Lorde and spoke out during the discussion period about what an 
extraordinary  person she was and how they needed to become familiar 
with her work.

Jennifer Abod is eager to get the video out to film festivals, 
conferences and schools. Visit Jennifer's website at 
http://www.jenniferabod.com for details. The Herstory Project plans 
to add a review of the film to our site.

Jennifer was one of the members of the New Haven Women's Liberation 
Rock Band. Her sister Susan was in the Chicago Women's Liberation 
Rock Band. Both are longtime friends and supporters of the CWLU 
Herstory Project.

***************************
Canadian filmmaker seeks "empowered" virgin stories

Paula Kamen, author of "Her Way: Young Women Remake The Sexual 
Revolution", reports that a Canadian filmmaker is interested in doing 
a documentary  on celibacy and virginity and would like to interview 
young women about their choices in that area.

According to Paula, you don't have to  be a virgin to talk to her.The 
people interviewed have to just able to tell "interesting or unusual" 
stories about their own choices in that realm, and have felt 
"empowered" about their decisions in some way.

Contact Paula at paulak2289 at aol.com if this sounds like something you 
might be interested in.

***************************
New essays at JoFreeman.com

Longtime feminist writer Jo Freeman has posted two new  essays: an 
article on the recent Code Pink anti-war demonstration in Washington 
and an article on women in the 1912 election. The Code Pink article 
has original photos Jo took at the demonstration and the 1912 piece 
has photos and graphics from the time period.

Jo will be a featured speaker at the Nordic American Studies 
Conference to be held in Trondheim, Norway, Aug. 6-9.

Her book, "At Berkeley in the Sixties" is due out this fall. We will 
be publishing a short excerpt on the Feminist Salon soon.

Visit her website at http://www.jofreeman.com. Jo is prolific and 
original writer and is constantly adding new material.


***************************
"Life's a Stitch" is now a musical production

"Life's a Stitch" edited by Anne Safran, is a hilarious book of 
women's humor. Now Anne has teamed up with Adryan Russ, Kay Cole and 
others to turn the collection into a full fledged stage musical 
complete with a chorus called "The  Stitches". It opens  June 14, 
2003,  at the Alex Theater in Glendale, CA. The musical "Life's a 
Stitch", like the book, will be a benefit for breast cancer research.

CWLU Herstory Project members Estelle Carol and Bob Simpson have 
several of their feminist labor cartoons in the book.


***************************
Announcing a writing contest: Women's Voices in WarZones

Since Sept. 11, 2001 there has been constant public reference to 
concepts of terror, war, and security, but little debate about their 
meaning, which differs from place to place and person to person. And 
the voices of women and girls, both within the US and in the rest of 
the world, have been conspicuously absent from the discussion.

To bring forward women's ideas on this subject, and enable them to be 
heard in the public arena, Women's WORLD, a global free speech 
network of feminist writers, is initiating a writing contest which 
will be co-sponsored by the The Nation Institute, whose mission is to 
defend freedom of expression and strengthen the independent media. 
The subject is Women's Voices in War Zones and the deadline is May 1. 
That's short notice, but we were delayed in getting out this 
newsletter.

Visit  http://www.wworld.org  for more details. The president of 
Women's  WORLD is Meredith Tax ( a former CWLUer).


***************************
SO WHAT'S NEW ON THE HERSTORY SITE?

We added an article from "Black Maria" (a literary magazine 
associated with the CWLU) about life in women's prisons to the 
Consciousness  Archive. The article has a very powerful poem 
called,"No, Lady. Prison didn't improve me none."

Sterilization abuse was an important issue for the CWLU which 
actively supported the Committee to End Sterilization Abuse (CESA). 
We added the original Statement of Purpose from CESA to the Health 
Archive. We also added  a  document from the Committee for Puerto 
Rican Decolonization about sterilization as a socio-political weapon 
in Puerto Rico.

We updated our Feminist Salon with several new articles including:

- an article on the 30th anniversary of "Our Bodies, Ourselves"
- a research paper on women's sexuality and aging
- a research article on mifepristone
-  a letter from Chicago's own Kathy Kelly who spent the Iraq war in 
Baghdad as a volunteer for Voices in the Wilderness
- a news article on the importance of women's friendships to physical 
health (special thanks to Betsy Martens for passing that on)
- a news story on the  debate over abortion in Nicaragua
- A 5000 year old poem from an ancient Iraqi woman lamenting the scourge of war

Last month we had nearly 40,000 pages viewed by visitors. Not all of 
the site gets a lot of hits though. We  were forced to suspend our 
Feminist Calendar because of low visitor traffic. We will bring it 
back for Women's Month next year. We think a Chicagoland feminist 
events calendar is a good idea, but we would need more support from 
other feminist organizations. Feel free to e-mail 
infogal at cwluherstory.org if you have ideas .

The Feminist Majority recently announced a free  daily news service 
that may be added to any web site on the Internet. We now subscribe 
to it on the CWLU Herstory homepage.  If you would like to add 
feminist news and activist alerts to your website, it only takes a 
couple of lines of computer code. Visit http://www.feminist.org for 
more info.

***************************
BOOK!

"Common Sense and a Little Fire: Women and Working-Class Politics in 
the United States, 1900-1965" by Annelise Orleck (Univ of North 
Carolina  Press)

Her book is about the powerful and neglected role of women in the 
emergence of organized labor, the New Deal welfare state, adult 
education, and the modern women's movement. (Thanks to Judy Antrobus 
for bringing this to our attention.

***************************
WEB SURFIN' WITH THE HERSTORY PROJECT

Here are some web links of interest to feminists. Please send us your 
favorite links. The Internet is a huge place and it's easy to miss 
the buried feminist treasures.
_____________________________________
http://www.cluw.org/

The Coalition of Labor Union Women has been a voice for working women 
nearly 3 decades. A number of CWLUers attended its founding 
convention here in Chicago in 1974.
______________________________________
http://www.seeingblack.com

Seeing Black is a well organized alternative site for Black news and 
opinion. Of particular interest to feminists are the excellent 
cultural interviews and reviews by Esther Iverem.
______________________________________
http://www.dgarts.com/

Dream Girl Magazine is an art site devoted to young women-- with 
articles, interviews and cool projects to do at home. A good place to 
visit if you are looking for something to do on a rainy day.

***************************
FEMINIST EVENTS AND ACTION CALENDAR

Women and Children First Bookstore has some fine events scheduled for 
the remainder of April including  appearances by Julie Goldberg  and 
Azar Nafisi as well as a Cave Canem Poetry Reading. Please visit 
http://www.womenandchildrenfirst.com for a complete schedule.

______________________________________
Celebrating 100 Years of School Nursing: Learning for the Future from 
a Challenging Past

Program & Presenters:
Welcome and remarks by Dr. Sheila Haas, Dean.

MC Helen Ramirez-Odell.

Slide presentation by Wendy Burgess and Karen Egenes on the 
historical beginning of school nursing up to the founding of the 
school nurse program by Madeline Roessler in the Chicago Public 
Schools in 1951.

Dramatic Reading from "Working Without Uniforms: School Nursing in 
Chicago 1951 - 2001" featuring Loyola alumnae featured in the book 
(readers- Mary Wehrle, Brigid Gerace, Dorothy Marks).

Greetings from Gov. Rod Blogojevich, Mayor Richard Daley, CPS-CEO 
Arnie Duncan (tentative).

Panel: Healthy Children 2010?
Phyllis Pelt, Director: School Nurse Certification Program at UIC.
Margie Schapps (tentative) from Illinois Women's Health Coalition.
Myrna Garcia, Director, Student Health Service, Chicago Public Schools.
Mary Maryland, President, Illinois Nurses Association.
Joanne Kouba, Registered Dietician, Loyola University
Questions & Answers/Discussion


Saturday, April 26, 2003 (8:30 a.m. to 1:00 p.m.)
Loyola University Lake Shore Campus, Coffey Hall, McCormick Lounge, 
100 W Sheridan Road (6400 N) at Lake Michigan.

$25 requested for materials, continental breakfast and lunch.

Sponsors: Loyola University Niehoff School of Nursing and Working 
Women's History Project.

Contact Susan Straus, President, Working Women's History Project at 
773 472-2585 for more details.

______________________________________
Lesbian & Gay professionals interested in networking?

The Event Network organizes social events for professional lesbians 
and gay men to meet one another at fabulous places all over Chicago. 
The next event will be at PASHA.

WEDNESDAY APRIL 30, 6 pm - 11 pm
642 N. Clark, Chicago, IL
312.397.0100
Tickets: $15 pre-registered, $20 at the door
Pre-register at http://www.glevent.com or call Kathy at 773.279.1755.

______________________________________
Estrogen Fest!

Estrogen Fest is a woman created theater experience not to be missed. 
Creation, Construction, Consumption. No crying. No male-bashing. This 
is what female energy is all about.

All performances at:
Gallery 37 Center for the Arts
66 East Randolph Street,
Chicago, Illinois 60601	 

FEMALE IDENTITY 3: SHEER STRENGTH
MAY 1-3, 8-10
music by Stephanie Wells May 1-3
Music by Stephanie Rearick May 8-10
Mindy Meyers Silver "I"s
Susan McLaughlin-Karp Her Kind
Babes with Blades Charlie's! Angels!
Susan Nussbaum & Tekki Lomnicki Parade
Katrina Kelley The Flower Also Rises
Elizabeth Lentz & Rachel Bunting Two Girls and a German Frau Mierka 
Girten Whoops, You've got a disease! Camane Ensemble with Susan 
Padveen Mother/Daughter Daughter/Mother Amanda Delheimer Birth of 
Rhythm

Plus visual art by
Jenée Garretson
Linda Gebhardt
Kristina Gosh
James Mesplé
Cybele Moon
Sheila Myrcik
Kristen Neveu
Kelly Pelka
Alison Siple

Visit http://www.estrogenfest-chicago.com for more info. Among the 
participants in Estrogen Fest is former CWLUer Susan Nussbaum.

______________________________________ 
Join NARAL for a celebration of our right to choose  focusing on 
young women who want to become pro-choice activists

On April 30th, all across America, pro-choice supporters will gather 
to commemorate the recent 30th Anniversary of Roe vs. Wade. In 
Chicago the speaker will be Ruth Surgal, formerly with the Abortion 
Counseling Service of Women's Liberation  better known as JANE.

April 30th, 7:30 pm
Early to Bed (feminist sex shop)
5232 N. Sheridan Rd, Chicago, IL

______________________________________
Near West Side Stories: Struggles for Community in Chicago's Maxwell 
Street Neighborhood

Near West Side Stories by Carolyn Eastwood is an insightful book that 
catches the essence of the lives of the area's Jewish, Italian, 
Mexican, and African-American inhabitants and most importantly, 
characterizes the exceptional flexibility and dynamic aspects of work 
"alternatives" in the Maxwell Street neighborhood.

Carolyn Eastwood will read from her book and sign copies.

Thursday, May 8 2003
6-6:30 Reception
6:30-7:30 Discussion
UNITE! Hall
333 S. Ashland, Chicago, IL
Free admission
Sponsored by the Center for Working Class Studies

  ***************************
LOOKING FOR A JOB OR INTERNSHIP?

Pre-doctoral Teaching Fellowships at Hobart and William Smith Colleges

The Fisher Center for the Study of Women and Men at Hobart and 
William Smith Colleges is pleased to announce one or possibly two 
Pre-doctoral Teaching Fellowship for the academic year of 2003-2004. 
We are seeking teaching fellows whose areas of expertise lend 
themselves to our Center's theme for next year of Education, Gender 
and Globalization.

Contact:
Betty M. Bayer
Director, The Fisher Center for the Study of Women and Men
212 Demarest Hall
Hobart and William Smith Colleges
Geneva, NY 14456-3397

Phone (315) 781-3130
Fax (315) 781-3348

Email: fishercenter at hws.edu
Visit the website at 
http://www.hws.edu/academics/community/fishercenter/events.asp

______________________________________
Grant Writer needed at the San Francisco Women's Building

Primary duties include developing proposals for corporate, private 
foundation and government grants; researching new sources of funding 
and maintaining the grant calendar;  submitting Letters of Intent and 
proposals, plus maintaining communication with funders and potential 
funders.

Our focus is on providing women and girls with the tools and 
resources they need participate fully in society. We are strongly 
committed to a diverse work community, women, people of color, 
lesbians strongly encouraged to apply.

To apply: Send resume, cover letter, writing sample and references 
to: Susan King, Development Director, 3543 18th Street, SF, CA 94110; 
email to: development at womensbuilding.org or fax: 415-861-8969. Visit 
the website at: www.womensbuilding.org. Position open until filled.

______________________________________
The Feminist Majority Foundation maintains a constantly updated 
database of employers looking for feminists. Visit 
http://www.feminist.org and look for "Career Center" on their 
homepage. They also have a place to post your resume if you are 
looking for a job. They have recently upgraded their career section 
with some very useful features, so check it out if you are on a job 
search.

***************************
Looking for a Service?

Sandi  Wisenburg offers group classes as well as personal coaching 
for fiction and non fiction writers.  Sandi is a widely published 
local feminist author whose new book "Holocaust Girls"  has attracted 
a lot of favorable attention.

Contact her at:
S.L. Wisenberg
Visiting Scholar, Gender Studies
Northwestern University
Evanston, IL 60208
wisenberg at nwu.edu
slwisenberg at juno.com
http://www.slwisenberg.com


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Well that's it for this month. Please send us any news about former 
CWLUers, upcoming events and feminist happenings. We depend on you to 
be our eyes and ears. Do you need research assistance? Do you provide 
a service? Do you need a service? Do you have a cool project you need 
help with? Are you looking for a job? Do you have a job to offer? Let 
us know and we'll try to include it. Feminist networking is part of 
what we are about. E-mail infogal at cwluherstory.org with your 
contribution.






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CWLU Herstory Website Project
http://www.cwluherstory.org
PO Box 548
Oak Park, IL 60303-0548
708-386-7197
A Project of the University of Illinois
Center for Research on Women and Gender

"I myself have never been able to find out precisely what feminism is:
I only know that people call me a feminist whenever I express 
sentiments that differentiate me from a doormat."- Rebecca West