Feminist Research Institute and the Women Studies Program

invite you to attend two brown bag talks this April:

Beatriz Salcedo-Strumpf

Monday, April 10, 12 noon
SUB Cherry/Silver Room (3rd Floor)
Light refreshments will be served

Author Beatriz Salcedo-Strumpf will talk about the construction of a bicultural feminine character from a woman writer's point of view in her novel E-mail for Lovers. She is originally from Guadalajara, Mexico. She has a bachelor's degree from the University of Guadalajara and a master's degree from Marquette University in Milwaukee, and is ABD at Syracuse University.

Sonia Johnson

Thursday, April 13, 12 noon
SUB Cherry/Silver Room (3rd Floor)
Light refreshments will be served

Sonia Johnson was a Mormon housewife who became a radical feminist when her church began to oppose the Equal Rights Amendment. She was a founding member of Mormons for ERA, and was ex-communicated for her support of the amendment. She fasted for almost 50 days in the Illinois legislature as the deadline for passage of the ERA approached and engaged in other forms of protest for the ERA and other feminist causes. She also ran for U.S. President from the Citizens Party. She came to believe, however, that working within patriarchy was not the way to achieve social change. She decided to "take her eyes off the guys" -- to stop worrying about what patriarchy did -- and to begin to live women's world. She decided to stop resisting what she didn't want and to start enacting what she did. This lead her to stop writing and lecturing, believing each woman is capable of finding and following her own path to transformation.

Sonia, however, recently has moved back to New Mexico and is starting to write and lecture again. She has had another evolution in her thinking about feminism. This will be the focus of her FRI brownbag.

Sonia Johnson has never been afraid to question, challenge, and change her position as her thinking about feminism shifts. She is radical in the best sense of the word, going to the root of issues to figure out how she feels about them and wants to approach them.