Feminisms at the Door: Gender and Sex at a Women's College

Syracuse University SURFACE Cultural Foundations of Education - Dissertations & Theses School of Education 5-2013 Feminisms at the Door: Gender and Sex at a Women's College Susan Chappell Overton Syracuse University Follow this and additional works at: https://surface.syr.edu/cfe_etd Part of the Education Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Overton, Susan Chappell, "Feminisms at the Door: Gender and Sex at a Women's College" (2013). Cultural Foundations of Education - Dissertations & Theses. 57. https://surface.syr.edu/cfe_etd/57 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Education at SURFACE. It has been accepted for inclusion in Cultural Foundations of Education - Dissertations & Theses by an authorized administrator of SURFACE. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Abstract This dissertation is a qualitative study of early 21 st century American female college students’ experiences of their gender, sexuality, and racial identities, and of institutional politics as their single-sex college transitioned to co-education. It is an ethnography that utilizes feminist theorizing to understand tensions between feminists of different generations or waves; the complexities of identities and institutions in which gender, sexuality, and race intersect (bell hooks and Kimberle Crenshaw); and the workings of dominant gender and sexual norms (Judith Butler). As the College prepared to ‘go coed,’ the prospect of introducing male bodies into this environment generated rich discourses about sexual differences, and the operations of individual and institutional power. Data for this dissertation were gathered through individual interviews with five senior administrators and twenty-two students, a group interview with four students following one semester of coeducation, and participant observations over the course of four years. Historical and contemporary texts were analyzed for evidence of competing feminist discourses. Each chapter of this dissertation discusses my findings of feminist generational tensions between students and administrators; of Womyns College as both a nurturing place and a site for practicing resistance to gender, sexual, and racial norms; and of the difficulties of challenging societal and institutional impositions of femininity and heteronormativity. This work contributes to the fields of education and women’s studies by providing a thick description of everyday life at a women’s college, and of a significant institutional transition – from a women’s to a coeducational college – in American higher education. It describes some young women’s negotiations of the constraints of femininity and heterosexuality, and exposes how hegemonic notions about sex and gender work. It makes an argument for separatist spaces within historically masculinist and white institutions: intentionally created and institutionally sustained “homeplaces” (hooks) where radical subjectivities can be cultivated by members of non-dominant groups. “Feminisms at the Door: Gender and Sex at a Women’s College” by Susan Chappell Overton M.A., Ohio State University, 1983 B.S., University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, 1978 Dissertation Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Education Syracuse University May, 2013 Copyright 2013 Susan Chappell Overton All Rights Reserved Acknowledgements In the words of Karen Russell (author of Swamplandia ), “During the years that I spent lost in the swamp, sometimes the only thing that kept me pushing forward was the thought of making it to this acknowledgements page. It is a joy at last to get to thank the following people: …” Victoria Blodgett, who has sacrificed much play time over the past 11 years so she could sit in our house(s) with me as I wrote and quietly will me to keep going. Her patience and unwavering belief that I could finish, if only I would, were the insistence I needed. Her vision of me as “Dr. Overton” never faded. I hope I can re-pay you with more fun than you ever imagined for the rest of our lives. My mother, who would never ever give up on me or this endeavor. She always said she wished I would move toward something, rather than away. Mom, this Ph.D. was the thing I moved toward, at my own pace and in my own time. I thank you and Dad for my brains, my love of reading and learning, and for your lifetime of modeling stick-to-it-tive-ness for me. I am so proud to be your daughter! This doctorate is yours, too. My beloved Berners, Burleigh and Hattie, who would have leant a paw if they could, but instead waited close by my writing chair every day and taught me to love the pace of my days. My advisor, Dr. Barbara Applebaum, without whom I am sure I would not have finished this degree. Her intellectual gifts and pursuits in philosophy, education, and feminism guided me, even as I resisted trying to ‘get’ Judith Butler. Her calm pushes when I stalled, space when I needed it, challenges when I lingered too long, and her availability and approachability at all times were the very Model of a Modern Major Mentor. Barbara, every word in my dissertation is a testament to your genius and counsel! My brilliant teachers at Syracuse – Dr. Marjorie DeVault, Dr. Vivian May, and Dr. Huei-Hsuan Lin – who introduced me to the endlessly sustaining field of feminist studies. Your writings and instruction, and the sharing of your own intellectual journeys showed me a legacy to which I could contribute, and gave me the desire to join you there. I am so pleased to be one of the hundreds of students who have been (and will be) inspired by your pedagogy and scholarship! Dr. Cathy Engstrom, whose membership on my dissertation committee sealed its status as a Dream Team. Dr. Sari Biklen, who brought me into the Cultural Foundations of Education program. My brilliant peers at Syracuse – Tina Limpert, Glenda Gross, Dr. Benette Whitmore, and Sarah Miraglia. Tina, ours is a love story, begun that first day in the Tom Green Room, as I noted with relief an eager, friendly face that had almost the same aging lines as mine. You have been an invaluable and tireless friend, colleague, intellectual role model, source of inspiration and laughter, and sister. As with Barbara, I am sure that I would not have finished this degree v without you! Glen, you are as intellectually luminous and illuminating as they come. I have been so blessed to be in your graduate school circle and to have you in mine. Tina and Glen, I’m convinced that our Ph.D. journeys were long so that we could stay connected, lo, these many years. Benette, you offered for me the final beacon, the example I needed of someone who persisted and bounced back until she finished; for this, I’ll always be grateful. And Sarah, whose politics and integrity are never far behind her great wit and brainpower, I thank you for your comradeship in WGS, and I have every wish for a Ph.D. for the hardest working mother scholar I know. The extraordinarily open Deans and President of Womyns College, who trusted me and supported – in the most profound way – my development as a researcher. My dear friends and cheerleaders: Steve Toben, who has known me since we were 12 and who intuited that I needed permission to quit before I would pick myself up, dust myself off, and get on with it. To Susan Stallone Oliver, who has also known me since we were 12 and who never seemed to doubt that I would finish. To Bill Rando and John Nonnamaker who pushed without apology, and to the New Hampton School gang who expressed appropriate and polite interest at the right times. My friends at Friends Homes West in Greensboro, particularly Mrs. Helen Medlin, my primary school principal who turned 100 years old while I was finishing this highest of educational pursuits and whose voice I will never forget sternly reminding me, “I’m 98, you know. We haven’t got much time!” To Jane and Bill Lambert, and Harriet Mitchell, thank you for your kind and ongoing inquiries into my progress. It was a source of immeasurable delight to feel embraced by North Carolinians while working on my dissertation. My sister, Harriett Overton Watson, for her caretaking of our mother and her gentle support of me. The myriads of computer people who created word processing machines and other software tools for use in writing and revising dissertations. I cannot fathom doing this with a typewriter. This dissertation is dedicated to and in loving memory of my Uncle Bill Overton, whose ghost often sat on my shoulder as I wrote; and to William David Porterfield, who was truly the most gifted and giving intellectual I have known – your presence in the world is missed. vi Table of Contents Chapter One: Feminisms at the Door 1 Description of the Study 6 Theoretical Frameworks Defining Feminisms 9 Liberal Feminism and the Birth of Women’s Colleges 10 Cultural and Radical Feminisms 12 Essentialism and Feminist Thought 16 Third Wave Feminist Theory 19 Girl Power in the Third Wave 22 Generational Tensions in Feminism 25 Judith Butler Theorizes Undoing Gender 30 Butler’s ‘Subjects’ Constructed by Norms 31 Gender as Performative and Constitutive of the Heterosexual Matrix 33 How and Why Gender Norms Work 35 Linking Gender Norms, Performativity, and Agency 36 Feminism’s and Womyns College’s Subject 39 “Homeplaces” and Margins: Location Matters 40 bell hooks’ Subject and Her Agency 42 Contributions of this Study 44 Limitations of this Study 50 Outline of the Dissertation 51 Chapter Two: Literature Review 53 Two Similar Studies 54 Historical Foundations of Women’s Colleges in the United States 58 Recent Research on Women’s Colleges in the U.S.

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