NCRW Spotlights Intersectionality with Name Change

By Melissa J. Anderson (New York City)

Earlier this week the National Council for Research on Women held its annual Fire Starter Awards Dinner. Along with honoring a diverse group of of women and men for their work in gender equality, the organization used the evening to announce a name change and rebranding.

NCRW’s new name, Re:Gender, is a nod to the organization’s historical cross-disciplinary mission of bringing together university researchers, activists, and practicians to work toward gender equality. Aine Duggan, president of Re:Gender, explained that many of the group’s constituents have had a difficulty understanding what the organization does.

“Our specialty is connections,” Duggan said. “Connecting people across sectors and approaches.”

The group hopes to highlight the cross-sectional nature of its work, Duggan said. The fight for gender equity encompasses not just issues of male or female, but also those of class, immigration, ethnicity, ability, parenthood, and more, and sometimes these divisions push gender champions apart, rather than bringing them together. But it doesn’t have to be that way.

“We’re not going to debate the different approaches to gender equality,” Duggan said. “The more ideas there are, the merrier.”

Diverse Honorees
Re:Gender set about to demonstrate its devotion to intersectionality with a diverse set of honorees, speakers, and performers. The evening kicked off with a new rendition of Lesley Gore’s 1963 hit “You Don’t Own Me,” performed by actress and singer Maxine Linehan and hip hop artist and producer Phlaymz.

Later, the event’s MC Rosa Flores, CNN correspondent and anchor, moderated a panel featuring Norma Kamali, designer and women’s empowerment advocate, Geri Thomas, chief diversity officer and Georgia market president at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, Peter Warwick, chief people officer at Thomson Reuters, and Patricia J. Williams, professor of law at Columbia University.

The panelists shared advice and experience from their lives and careers on how women can empower themselves and others, and how institutions can level the playing field for women.

For example, after sharing the tale of her first job interview with a powerful man who belittled and harassed her, Kamali discussed the importance of sharing painful or embarrassing stories of workplace harassment.

“Every woman in this room has a million secrets,” she said. “If I told my own father what had happened to me, he would be heartbroken. He would be the staunchest advocate for women’s equality. Tell every man you know those stories and make them advocates,” she said.

Meanwhile, Warwick discussed how Thomson Reuters was working to implement more women- and family-friendly policies, developed around flexibility and parental leave. But, he said, these policies were only the first step.

“It doesn’t matter the amount of policies you’ve got. You’ve got to make sure to train everybody on how to manage those policies every day,” Warwick said.

Thomas shared pragmatic advice about the importance of developing relationships with those around you. “We’re all programed to believe when you’re in the corporate environment you do a good job and that will move you forward,” she said. “But just doing a good job will not cause you to be recognized.”

“If you’re taking about development, you’ve got to invest in those relationships,” she continued. Thomas encouraged women to share not just what they’re doing at work, but also to tell others about their families, their interests, and their values.

Lastly, Williams emphasized the importance of building a network. For her, that meant building a network of other female law students from her graduating law school class, which was only 8% women.

“Part of that was finding friends in a hostile environment,” she said.

In the early days, the women started a listserv to organize and advocate for one another. They also fought against very real physical barriers – for example, at Columbia Law School, even up through the early ’90s, women’s bathrooms were only on the first floor of the building, Williams said. But today, decades later and having built distinguished careers, the women still stay in touch with the listserv and continue to advocate for one another.

Following the panel, Ilene Lang, retired president and CEO of Catalyst, was honored with an award. She discussed the importance of sponsorship, touting Catalyst’s 2012 research on women helping women. She said she was honored to have “taken the sting” out of the queen bee myth.

Finally, Re:Gender honored its 2104 trailblazers, a group of gender activists and practitioners including corporate diversity leaders, activists, students, artists, consultants, and more. Bringing the evening to a close, the New York City Labor Chorus performed two musical numbers.

The diversity of the evening’s honorees and panelists emphasized Re:Gender’s multifaceted work to draw connections across different disciplines and approaches to equality. As the conversation about gender diversity grows broader, the importance of intersectionality is becoming more and more clear. To achieve the aims of gender fairness, advocates will need to reach across disciplines and issues, and they will become stronger in the process.