A newsletter of the project I
Integrating The Scholarship On Women:
Transforming The Curriculum
""\_\ f;!'~ . Tow son State University
I
RE-VISIONS INTEGRATING --~~:7~:~i~~
THE SCHOLARSHIP ON WOMEN
TRANSFONv\lNG ll-iE CURRICULLM
I
Number 3 fALL 1984
TO THE READER
The fall 1984 semester marks the begin- (AIMS) at theirannual meeting. These· project and for issues of Rl-VISIONS are .
ning of the second year of the FIPSE presentations, as well as the requests we indications of the growing interest in
project, "Transforming the Curriculum. receive from educators in various parts of curriculum transfor~ation.
Integrating the Scholarship on Women." the country for information about the
The eleven workshops, in which over
seventy faculty are participating, are continuing
to read and discuss the new
scholarship on women and will in this
second year be undertaking the actual
task of syllabi revision. Two major
conferences are scheduled to assist in the
work: an Interdisciplinary Conference in
January, 1984, which will explore the
interdisciplinary bases of feminist studies
and the ways in which the disciplineoriented
workshops can contribute to and
support each others' work, and a Pedagogy
Conference in March, which will explore
issues related to the actual dynamics of
teaching about women in the classroom.
Throughout the year, consultants will be
invited to present lectures on campus and
to work with workshop members on
problems of syllabi revision. Planning is
also beginning for the Area Conference,
which will be open to local secondary
schools, colleges and universities, and
_which will conclude the work of the project
in the spring of 1986.
In June, 1984, the project directors,
Elaine Hedges and Sara Coulter, reported
on the project's first year activities at the
National Women's Studies Association
annual convention at Douglass College,
Rutgers University. In October, K.
Edgington, Facilitator of the Business and
Professional Writing Workshop, presented
a paper on the project at the annual
meeting of the canadian American Studies
Association, in Ottowa, Canada. In
December, Elaine Hedges, and workshop
facilitators Judy Markowitz (American
History), Harriet McNamee (Art) and Jan
Wilkotz (Composition) gave a day-long
program on integrating women into the
curriculum to the members of the Association
of Independent Schools of Maryland
JANUARY
CONFERENCE
Interdisciplinary Issues curate or distorted biology? What are the
Interdisciplinary study is often- discussed latest biological theories of sex difference?
and idealized but seldom actually achieved, To what extent do our psychological and
either in the preparation of teachers or in sociological theories assume the male as
the actual presentation of material in the the norm? Do men and women develop
classroom. An exception to this general different value systems? How does the
pattern has occurred in the development history of the family help explain the
of women's studies. Women's studies cultural attitudes toward women? Why
faculty and classrooms have tended to be has the world of work been so narrowly
more interdisciplinary than usual because defined and why is there so much dislocawomen
have not been systematically tion as women try to participate in paid
studied before, and there has not been a work? Has literature reinforced the social
body of accumulated knowledge or an stereotypes or transcended them? can we
appropriate frame of reference already find women's lives in literature as we do
available from which to study them. Thus, not find them elsewhere? Are esthetic
the new information and insights from all standards neutral or biased? Do men and
disciplines must be pooled in order to women genuinely experience equal educaforge
an adequate approach to the study tional opportunity, either in the method
of women. Women's studies programs and or content of their education? can the
courses are carrying out this task and are history of education help us to understand
increasingly being asked to share their how we have arrived at our present
insights as faculty in traditional disciplines dilemma of a male centered curriculum?
and courses try to include women. These and many other fascinating but
What were women doing while the laws complex questions multiply rapidly as we
were being written, the constitutions pursue the study of women. They confront
drafted, and the battles fought? Did they us with the need to share information and
influence these activities? Were they ideas. As faculty try to include women
simultaneously contributing to civilization within traditional courses, they need the
in ways that we have only just begun to information that their colleagues in other
investigate or understand? What did the disciplines can provide. Revisions in one
development of the frontier mean to the discipline often support and reinforce
American women who participated in it? those in another. By combining the
To what extent have our traditional atti- insights of many disciplines we can begin
tudes towards women been based on inac- to explain why and how women have been