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Project on Women & Social Change

Collage of Smith students throughout the years

The Smith Project on Women and Social Change is an interdisciplinary faculty research group. Founded in 1978, the project draws together faculty from a range of disciplines including anthropology, political science, sociology, education, history, exercise and sport studies, literature, psychology, religion and economics.

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Associated Faculty

The project's faculty participants are involved in research and teaching that explores women's contributions to social change and the ways in which women are affected by change. Members of the project undertake both individual and collaborative research and translate their findings into teaching. The 2017–18 director is Velma García-Gorena.

Carrie N. Baker

Sylvia Dlugasch Bauman Chair of American Studies and Professor of the Study of Women and Gender

Velma García

Professor of Government

Suzanne Z. Gottschang

Professor of Anthropology and of East Asian Studies

Leslie King

Professor of Sociology; Director of Honors, Sociology

Cristina Suarez

Professor of Chemistry

Nancy Whittier

Sophia Smith Professor and Professor of Sociology

Research & Publications

The Project on Women & Social Change has achieved national recognition through its scholarly publications, such as the award-winning Women of the Andes, Women Living Change and Learning About Women: Gender, Politics, and Power.

Through the project, Smith enjoys membership on the National Council for Research on Women. This membership links Smith to all major research universities in the United States and keeps those institutions apprised of the research of the Smith faculty.

Women on Power: Leadership Redefined, edited by Sue J. M. Freeman, Susan C. Bourque, and Christine M. Shelton, with a foreword by Jill Ker Conway, Boston, Massachusetts: Northeastern University Press, 2001.

Politics and Society in Ottoman Palestine: The Arab Struggle for Survival and Power, by Donna Robinson Divine. Boulder, Colorado: Lynn Reinner, 1994.

The Politics of Women's Education: Perspectives from Asia, Africa and Latin America, edited by Jill Ker Conway and Susan C. Bourque. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1993.

Free Women of Spain: Anarchism and the Struggle for the Emancipation of Women, by Martha Ackelsberg. Bloomington, Indiana: Indiana University Press, 1991.

Managing Lives: Corporate Women and Social Change, by Sue J. M. Freeman. Amherst, Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press, 1990.

Women, Welfare and Higher Education: Towards Comprehensive Policies, edited by Martha Ackelsberg, Randall Bartlett, and Robert Buchele. Northampton, Massachusetts: Smith College, 1988.

Learning About Women: Gender, Politics, and Power, edited by Susan C. Bourque, Jill Ker Conway, and Joan Wallach Scott, Daedalus, Volume 116, Number 4, Fall 1987; and Ann Arbor, Michigan: The University of Michigan Press, 1989.

Unequal Colleagues: The Entrance of Women Into the Professions, 1890-1940, by Penina Migdal Glazer and Miriam Slater. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers University Press, 1987.

The Economics of Comparable Worth, by Mark Aldrich and Robert Buchele. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Ballinger Publishing Company, 1986.

Women Living Change: Cross-Cultural Perspectives, edited by Susan C. Bourque and Donna Robinson Divine. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania: Temple University Press, 1985.

Women's History as Women's Education: Essays by Natalie Zemon Davis and Joan Wallach Scott from a Symposium in Honor of Jill and John Conway, April 17, 1985, Smith College. Northampton, Massachusetts: Sophia Smith Collection and College Archives, Smith College, 1985.

Women's Place in the Academy: Transforming the Liberal Arts Curriculum, edited by Marilyn Schuster and Susan Van Dyne. Totowa, New Jersey: Rowman and Allanheld, 1985.

Family Life in Seventeenth-Century England: The Verneys of Claydon House, by Miriam Slater. Boston, Massachusetts: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1984.

Women of the Andes: Patriarchy and Social Change in Two Peruvian Towns, by Susan C. Bourque and Kay B. Warren. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1981.

The Environmental Crusaders: Confronting Disaster and Mobilizing Commmunity, by Penina Migdal Glazer and Myron Peretz Glazer, University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1998.

Building Domestic Liberty: Charlotte Perkins Gilman's Architectural Feminism, by Polly Wynn Allen. Amherst, Massachusetts: University of Massachusetts Press, 1988.

The Whistle-Blowers: Exposing Corruption in Government and Industry, by Myron Peretz Glazer and Penina Migdal Glazer. New York, New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1989.

Resources

Smith College Archives

The Smith College Archives are open to all individuals with an interest in the history of Smith College.

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Sophia Smith Collection

An internationally recognized repository of manuscripts, archives, photographs, periodicals and other primary sources in women's history.

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Five College Consortium

A consortium of Amherst, Mount Holyoke, Smith, and Hampshire colleges, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.

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Women in Intercollegiate Sport

A national survey funded by Smith's Project on Women & Social Change and Brooklyn College of the City University of New York.

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Contact

Project on Women & Social Change

Wright Hall
Smith College
Northampton, MA 01063
Phone: 413-585-3060
Fax: 413-585-3068
Email: jcce@smith.edu
General questions and mail can be addressed to the Jandon Center for Community Engagement.

Keep Exploring

Jandon Center for Community Engagement

The Jandon Center is involved in special projects, conferences and workshops, such as a regular speaker series and the Project for Women and Social Change.

Study of Women & Gender

Smith's program examines the experiences, ideologies, works and actions of women in national, cultural, historical and political contexts.

International Center for Research on Women

ICRW's mission is to advance gender equity, inclusion and the alleviation of poverty worldwide.