Ok everyone, now's the time! For the next six weeks--until Friday, February 24--we're opening up this blog to comments about the following proposal... Should CWSA/ACEF contemplate changing the name of the association? If so, to what? And why? Please read the following (it's a copy of what we sent you all a short while ago/towards the end of last semester) and let us know your thoughts. Feel free to comment on a little, a lot, some sections, only one question... your call! On February 24th, we'll close the blog and start looking through all the responses. Our intent is to distill what we get here into some recommendations, and then bring those to a special session at the annual conference in late May (at Wilfrid Laurier University/University of Waterloo), before bringing a motion to the AGM at the conference. So join in this conversation! Post as often as you like... and let's get this conversation going!!
Here's the rationale to begin your thinking...
The Canadian Women’s Studies Association/l’association canadienne des études sur les femmes is beginning the process of re-examining the name of the association. At a time when many of our own programs and departments are also undertaking such discussions and/or changing their names, and when several members have approached the executive on this topic, we feel that it is time for the association to also engage in this conversation.
We know, as you all do too, that there are many reasons given for why Women’s Studies in so many locations has begun this process of re-naming itself. We all have institutionally specific pressures and agendas, in addition to our own senses of the intellectual scope of the field and its changes over the past 40 years, that inform our many and different discussions. In these discussions, we ask ourselves what we want to convey through the name of both our own programs and departments, and the field more generally, and what we think we will accomplish with and through those other names. Additionally, we often frame our discussions differently depending on who our audience for them is (ourselves, administrators, colleagues across campus, students, broader community members, etc.).
As the executive of the national professional association of practitioners of this field, we want to let all of these local discussions inform this broader one about the association’s name. Thus, we are proposing some questions for people to consider in their comments and suggestions (note that these are only suggestions, and you are of course free to make additional comments!).
Here's the rationale to begin your thinking...
The Canadian Women’s Studies Association/l’association canadienne des études sur les femmes is beginning the process of re-examining the name of the association. At a time when many of our own programs and departments are also undertaking such discussions and/or changing their names, and when several members have approached the executive on this topic, we feel that it is time for the association to also engage in this conversation.
We know, as you all do too, that there are many reasons given for why Women’s Studies in so many locations has begun this process of re-naming itself. We all have institutionally specific pressures and agendas, in addition to our own senses of the intellectual scope of the field and its changes over the past 40 years, that inform our many and different discussions. In these discussions, we ask ourselves what we want to convey through the name of both our own programs and departments, and the field more generally, and what we think we will accomplish with and through those other names. Additionally, we often frame our discussions differently depending on who our audience for them is (ourselves, administrators, colleagues across campus, students, broader community members, etc.).
As the executive of the national professional association of practitioners of this field, we want to let all of these local discussions inform this broader one about the association’s name. Thus, we are proposing some questions for people to consider in their comments and suggestions (note that these are only suggestions, and you are of course free to make additional comments!).
- What is the purpose of the name of the association? Should it simply reflect the name used in the majority of programs and departments in Canada, or should it attempt to frame the field’s scope, breadth, depth, focus, emphases, etc., in some way?
- If the answer to the question above is the latter option, how would it do that? Should a name attempt to be descriptive of everything that goes on in the field in its many and various incarnations across Canada’s many and different educational institutions? What other considerations might be/should be part of the discussion around the association’s name in particular?
- Finally, should the association stop after reaching some decision about a name change? Or is it time for the association to also take on more of a leadership role in engaging the “Women’s Studies” (by any other name) community in Canada on other intellectual issues central to this academic field—i.e., its breadth and scope, its language and terminology, its connection to other theoretical languages and approaches, etc.? And if so, do you have suggestions for how the association should go about this process?
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