2017 Berkshire Conference on the History of Women, Genders and Sexualities

June 01 - 04, 2017

The upcoming centenary of the Nineteenth Amendment's ratification offers practitioners of the history of women, gender, and sexuality a unique opportunity for scholarly and public visibility.  In this roundtable session, the participants offer a forum for discussing how we might use the occasion to move beyond the commemorative to shape research agendas, engage public audiences, and strengthen institutions that support women's history.

Panelists will address the following issues:   

            *          What questions relating to the Nineteenth Amendment call for scholarly attention?   Which compelling, persistent questions -- about movement ideology and organization; race, class, gender, and sexuality; law and the state; public memory and public policy; and more, before and after ratification, and within and beyond U.S. borders -- still need consideration?

            *          How might the anniversary be used to strengthen support for research and publication in women's history, gender history, and the history of sexuality; graduate, undergraduate, and K-12 teaching; libraries, archives, and museums; and media and public programming?         

            *          How can we encourage deeper public understandings of the Nineteenth Amendment, to move beyond celebration to more nuanced interpretations?

            *          How might we connect these historical, scholarly interests to very real concerns about democratic practice in the present?

            The participants bring to bear diverse research interests, disciplinary perspectives, and experiences in public engagement.  Together with the audience, and in the best tradition of earlier generations of woman suffrage scholars and of the movement itself, we hope to help craft a scholarly agenda and facilitate deeper public discussions of the Nineteenth Amendment.