Interview with Beverly Shuman

All right. Would you like to introduce yourself first? Wait a minute. Let me.

OK, My name is Beverly Schumann. I'm a professor of women's studies at 1000 University for 32 years. All right.

So my first question is, what was your first interaction with feminism? Well, now, I graduated high school in 1965, and that was a time where there are a lot of movements and feminist movement

was one of them. But it went over my head. I wasn't really paying attention to it. I was just graduating high school.

I went to go to college. I went out to University of Maryland, College College Park and I didn't have any idea. I wasn't goal oriented.

I wasn't oriented toward a specific job or field or anything. I was just a freshman and taking courses. By the time it was my second year, I was ill and had to leave

school and had surgery and all this. And I didn't go back to college until after I was married and had all four of my children. So I went back to a program at Goucher, which is very close by,

to Towson, and they had a program for returning students called Goucher 2. So again, I hadn't paid much attention to feminism. So I was just, you know, taking the courses.

And one of the courses that I had was by a professor, Jean Bradford, and it was called motherhood and daughterhood. And I took the course because I was a mother and a daughter. So I said, OK, that sounds interesting.

That's what did it. I, you know, books that I had read of Woman Born got me interested in people whose experiences were the same as mine, even though I didn't have many of the experiences that

turned women to feminism. Some of them. So that's what got me started. And then when I went, when I graduated, Goucher went to

University of Maryland for master's degree. They didn't have a a, a department of Women's studies, but they had American studies and you can take what you want there.

So by that point I was very interested. Yeah. OK. So I know you said that you didn't really face a lot of the

things that, like, would turn people into feminists. But is there any type of discrimination that you've ever felt or like experienced or faced that might relate to why you got interested in this?

I can't really say so because now if I was raised at a time like my mother thought, like all you had to do was get married and your husband would take care of you. So she, even though she herself was a working woman, that was

not a goal that she had for me. She thought that the right thing to do would be to get married and take care of your children and your husband would support you.

So I I hadn't gone into the labor force, OK, So I didn't find that kind of discriminate. I had like a job. I worked for an orthodontist, you know, was his assistant.

But I wasn't working to support myself. So other than that, I didn't. I really didn't have the experience many women have to turn them to feminism either.

You know, I didn't experience racism. I didn't experience homophobia. I didn't experience, you know, the glass ceiling. I I didn't experience a lot of the things that that really

turned women to feminism. OK. I guess my next question would be, how did people around you react telling them like your career was in something in women

gender studies or like that you teach women in gender studies. Like how do people react to that? Well, when I started all of it, you know, over 30 years ago, a lot of people were challenging me like why?

Or, you know, sort of like a little bit making fun of it or belittling it And, you know, and and really like would want to challenge me on this topic or that topic. So they were, I don't know if they were threatened by it or

thought it was a joke, but, you know, at that point I could say I felt discrimination because certainly that wouldn't have been the attitude if I was a professor of physics. So yeah, I've I've definitely feel that whenever I tell people

that, that's my minor, they're like, what are you like? What are you doing? Yeah. The next thing I want to ask is how do you think since you've

been teaching it for 30 years, the curriculum or things that you teach about have changed from 30 years ago to now tremendously, not not from 30 years ago, but from last semester, you know, every semester.

I mean, I I don't even have a copy of the Sylvis from then, but I can tell you that it's completely different. And I I don't know if I'd mention it to your class, but I do tell my students, for instance, we, we talked about

gender socialization and all that, but we talked about, and when I started, homosexuality or heterosexuality, well, that's a joke now because gender is, you know, now understood to be a spectrum.

Your romantic attachments could be on a spectrum. You know, you don't have to identify as homosexual or heterosexual. You could be somewhere along the line and it can change over

time, back and forth, and you don't have to identify with any gender at all. So it's a mess, you know, It's very much a matter of keeping up with the culture, which changes, you know, tremendously.

And I'm very aware of it because that's the field I'm in. So the people that I see socially my age are just absolutely amazed at the way that I can discuss something that still is very foreign to them.

Like your grandparents wouldn't probably be as familiar with, you know, gender identity, gender fluidity and all that as I am. And then a lot of things haven't changed at all.

Anything about, like, violence against women, it's more now. It's not, it's not, as you know much. There's more now than ever. And, you know, the culture in some ways reinforces attitudes

of violence towards women, disrespect towards women, you know, portraying them in a way that belittles them and sexualizes them and, you know, doesn't take them seriously. And that unfortunately, you know, bleeds into other areas of

women's lives as well. Yeah, I was. That's another thing I was going to ask is how have you been able to keep up with the rapid change?

Like what are some ways that you do not not by going from 1 textbook to another. Yeah. I was going to say I don't think it's something that you can like

read from a textbook. Right. It it's you know it's it's keeping up with with popular culture mainly.

Yeah. I think popular culture is is where the students can relate. It's where you know I'm I have to I don't know if I did in your class.

But like, I'm always asking my students, like, what does this mean Or, you know, this artist or whatever, what is their message? And Dee can you, you know, from the taking the course in the

last year. We see films like Dreamworlds where, you know, this is the way women are portrayed in music videos and you know, I think the kinds of things that your age group, I can't say that I'm up

to date on what your age group listens to or looks at, but I see the way they're written about. So I keep mostly current by reading newspapers and, you know, opinion columns and just sort of watching what's going on

in popular culture. The next thing I would say is I feel like I did take your class. So a lot of things felt really relevant to me and they really did stick with me.

But I was going to ask you like what do you hope sticks with students? Like what do you hope with like teaching these classes. Like what do you want to get out of it?

Like two things. I don't know if I've said it to you, but I say it a lot. I want my students to leave my class. Two things.

One, how important it is to be economically independent. Because if you're did I say that to your class? Because if you're economically independent, you can get yourself out of unpleasant, unhappy, dangerous

relationships. You can live on your own with, you know, and if you have children, you can, you know. You should be able to support yourself and your children and

not depend on anybody else. That's the biggest freedom that women can have. Second thing is I want you, if you remember characteristics of abusers, I want you to be able to recognize red flags so that

you don't get pulled into a relationship. Because the pattern of abusers is so consistent that, you know, if you start dating somebody, male or female, who says, you know, oh, I love you so much, I don't, I don't want you to hang

out with your friends. And you know, or you know, I just want you to spend all your time with me or I don't want you to wear that or I don't want you to go there, I want you to be able to see that.

So if you can keep yourself economically independent, and if you can stay out of abusive relationships and you've said you've learned, you remember your old, little old women studies professor who taught you that that's more important than

anything else that I'm going to teach you, really, for your life. You know, you'll take a lot of courses and you'll learn this fact and that fact.

You know, what you're going to learn from me is be, be. Be independent. Be able to take care of yourself and keep yourself, you and your loved ones safe.

Yes, right now I'm taking feminist theory. And so one of the things I've been wondering is what are some feminist theorists that you've been inspired by or you go back to all the time?

Yeah, I can. You know, I, of course, you know, read Betty Friedan. I'm not. I don't go so much by that.

We didn't. I didn't do that in my class because the feminism rather than a theory is perspective on the world. To be able to, you know, whether it's, you know, they have

capitalist feminist and feminist theory and Freudian feminist theory and and socialist feminist theory and I don't even know all what. Because to me it's your, I would say existential feminist theory,

your lived life. You know, the way you're able to see that you are part of a class that's a sex class, that if you don't get a a, a a, an A promotion you deserve, it isn't because you aren't good enough.

It's they. They might not promote women so much in that field or in that department or whatever. So, you know, it's understanding the way the world works for

women. Women. OK, Yeah, that that's what would be important to me, you know, to just to have that background, Like when we, you know, take

things and we take them apart. And you, we had articles like the female objects, the semantic humanization and violence. We looked at the history that is far back as, you know, the Bible

and as far, you know, every country in the world and every famous thinker all had these horrible things to say about women. And there's no theory there that's existential.

That's the way women were looked at and had to and live their lives because of ideas about what women were. So, you know, you get the history you get it's always been this way.

You get that we're working very hard to change it and it's ongoing process that you're going to face. Yes, if you're political science, you want to go into politics.

Anyway, good luck. We still haven't had a woman president and the one we have right now, the vice president, they don't leave her, you know she can't breathe, right.

So you know, of course that's politics altogether. But are there any works in particular that you do go back to or like you've built your based off of? Like any important works like books or even like films.

I use Beloved, you know, the novel, hopefully to get the students to read it. I don't know how many of them actually read it. I think that that well it won a Pulitzer Prize and a Nobel

Prize, so obviously it is groundbreaking and historic and all that. So that go back to that book. I think it's very valuable for students to to understand, you

know, all that went into the nightmare that was slavery. You know what? I assigned, you know, Gloria Steinem and some, you know, talk about some people like Betty Friedan.

I guess people from my day, you know, that I'm more familiar with than maybe the newer feminist theorists. I could definitely, I could definitely feel that in the class.

Yeah. Yeah. OK. And in, in the department that you are in, what do you see for

the department, like in the future and just the feminist movement in the future. Like where do you see it going or do you see maybe like future things that like may be discussed maybe even next

semester like you said because things just change so quickly. Well, I think that there you know I think that like Kimberly Crenshaw who who does the intersectionality, I think her idea and certainly it's it's it was one of the biggest

weaknesses of the first and second women's movement is not well I guess it's a natural progression see women as one group and then you begin to see women as 550 different groups. So I I I guess I see more the voices of more women coming from

different places and you know, even what is a woman and you know, what makes a woman? And you know, that continuous conversation about gender and I think they're getting involved with, they're getting involved

with environmental and ecology and all those kinds of issues. And to, you know, to me, the biggest issue right now that does affect all women who have a uterus is, you know, losing the rights to abortion.

It's huge. It's a huge, horrible thing that happened. I was going to ask you, like what? How do you think that was achieved?

Like, how do you think we went back in time with all this? Like, like you said, all this education of women's struggles and like studies going forward and changing all the time. How do you think that went backwards?

Because you had a very vocal minority. Yeah, vocal religious minority that sees abortion as murder and they were able to you know get the Republican Party behind them and the the majority of P of Americans want women to have the

right to choose. But you had that vocal minority that that ruined it. Now it it's it's not over for for good. But we've got another hill to climb.

Unfortunately, here in Maryland, we're OK, but you're going to hear horrible stories. We we saw that. We saw voices where you saw the doctors who used to perform the

abortions when they were illegal. That's another thing that has always helped with me ever. It's so important to your age group. And then go ahead.

Go ahead. I can't hear you. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Off one, One.

Can you hear me? Hear me. Yeah, you reconnected. OK.

Yes, yes, still recording. There we go. OK. So would, you know, for your generation, it doesn't matter to

me anymore, but for your generation, that's it. It's catastrophic, you know? Well, we talked about it when you were in class. You know, how many of you knew somebody in middle school or

high school had an abortion? Everybody. You know, you can have all the birth control you want. You know, kids will be kids.

People be people. You're going to have that. I think that your whole life has to stop because of a unwanted pregnancy, to me, is the worst abuse of women.

Yeah. The next question and the last question I have is, what has been the most influential part of the Women's studies department for you?

What do you mean by that? Like maybe some like a student you've met or something a student has said. Or maybe just like just any part of being in this department or

teaching this subject that has influenced you in any way. Once every once in a while you'll get feedback from a student that you've. For instance, I've gotten a a letter from a student who said

after they took my course she got out of a an abusive relationship way. She didn't really realize it was an abusive relationship until she took my course.

And then everything she heard like Bing, Bing, Bing was going on in that relationship and she got out of it and was so grateful because she doesn't know how long she would have stayed in or, you know, that kind of a thing.

We're just that they never, you know, they never realized. Because, you know, this is when I start the chorus with we're going to take our everyday experiences and deconstruct them and see what they really mean, you know, But it's really not OK

to be catcalled on the street. That's, you know, that's and how many, you know we how many of you have been catcalled on the street. Every hand goes up and they're starting at 7-8, nine years old.

You know, what does that do to a person's freedom in the world? You know, so when they come and they say, you know, I, I, even after a certain lesson, they'll say I never realized that, you know, I I never realized that that really frightened me and

made me less confident to even walk out of the house. So, yeah, but those things are the things that are most important. You know that they they understand that this isn't a

silly topic. It's not a silly department. It's not a silly course that you know. Understanding these ideas will strengthen you to you know to go

forward. I definitely How come you went from you know the introductory course to to to a minor beside the fact you got it probably A and like you said, this is the first class I've ever taken

where I felt like it has helped me in real life or it's actually taught me like real life lessons like things like that. Like you just said like being cat called is not OK. And hearing that and hearing that in like an academic setting

makes that feeling even more validated and understanding why that happens. And like even going to the history of it, like why girls that young get cat called or like you said, or just knowing

the characteristics of an abusive person or relationship or friendship or anything like I that's the first class I've ever taken where I have learned real life lessons that I've actually been able to apply to my life And the field I want to go into,

Like I want to go into human rights and helping women is something that I want to do for sure. And so the way that this has given me insight into the way, you know, a deeper understanding of women's struggles and where

it comes from, I just didn't think of ways I didn't think of things in the way that you put them until I took that class. Like violence against women. Like, it's literally everywhere.

I didn't understand that seeing a music video is the reason why this is so normalized. Like, it blew my mind. It absolutely blew my mind.

Do you remember when we said how many of you know somebody who's been a victim of an attack or an attempted attack and everybody's hand went up? OK, how many were reported?

Let me know. The hands all go down. We have no idea. As much as we think it is, it's more and people don't.

You don't talk about it. You keep it to yourself. You don't want anybody to know and you blame yourself and you know.

And again, we teach women how to stay safe. We don't teach men not to rape. Yes, exactly. And I feel like it's deemed as so radical to, like, think like,

talk about these things. Or to, like, for me to even acknowledge the fact, like when I watch a movie now or like a music video, I can't help but to think about those things.

I cannot. Like it's forever in my mind. And I don't know, it's considered radical. When I like say things like Oh my God, like I can't believe

that they're doing that or like I hate like that they're making the woman character do this. Let me ask you something because I always learn from the students now from my now, you have to understand I'm not the next

generation. I'm the one past that. I'm your grandparents generation. So for me to see women like on music videos or whatever, like

mostly naked and, you know, now when you go, when even when you look at an awards program, the dresses, however, I used to talk about them the worst. Yes.

And the young people think that that's empowerment. Oh my God, that's another thing I took away from your class, you know, So I've always been taught this. So I was, my mom is European, my dad is Pakistani, Muslim.

So I was raised with like, being forced to be like modest and dressed modestly. And I viewed it a lot like how our culture and my generation views it as like, Oh my God, I feel so like oppressed.

I feel this like. And so I come with it from like that understanding to where, like, I understood that. And also feminism told me like as a way to rebel and feel

empowered, like I need to wear less clothes. And then I got older and just realize, like, probably from your class that why don't men have to take off clothes to feel empowered?

Why do they get to wear suits and be fully covered and feel powerful? Or I also learned more about being Muslim and my religion. And I was like, I myself was like, felt like victim to this

idea that Muslim women were oppressed and that they were oppressed because they wear hijabs. And it wasn't until I got older and I, like, realized like, Oh my God, no.

Like a lot of these girls who wear hijabs and cover up feel empowered when they cover up. And I was told so opposite, like, you have to take off more clothes to feel empowered.

You have to wear less clothes to feel empowered. And I got older and also like I feel more empowered now when I'm not taking off. I feel degraded when I have to do that or like the fact that I

have to wear less clothes to feel more powerful or to be empowered, you know? Well, in that case **** stars would be the most empowered women in the world.

You know, And it's funny you guys have in one of my classes this semester, I have an older student, must be in her 50s. And she said to me something about, well, you know, what do you think about, you know, women empowerment and, you know, it's

showing their bodies and all the, you know, and I said, well, right now the woman in the United States with the most power actually is Kamala Harris. Have you ever seen her in a thong?

No, exactly. You know, I mean, what kind of power? I said the kind of power you're talking about, the sexual power is short lived and and you know, there's somebody going to come

along younger and sexier. That's not real power. Yeah. Yeah, well, I'm glad you've enjoyed the that's, you know,

right here. You know, keep me going for a decade. And I do believe very strongly in what I teach. Like you say, you'll forget so many other courses.

But I've ruined things for you forever, you know. You know, never forget about anything. Stays with you. You cannot forget it.

So you know, I'm. I'm glad that that it it's an education. That's what education is exactly. Yes.

Well, thank you for choosing to speak to me. I feel very honoured. Thank you. Thank you for making time for this.

And, yeah, it was good to to learn more about you because like I said, that course that that course has stuck with me. You'll always remember that little thing. Thank you.

All right, sweetheart. Thank you very much. You tell me.