It was fitting, then, this morning that I read a great article by Washington Tribune writer Kim Geiger on diversity in Washington, DC. I knew Tuesday night as I stayed up late—waiting for Romney to concede and avert a succession controversy—that voters had elected women to the US senate in a few key states like Massachusetts and Wisconsin, but not till I read this article did I realize that voters had elected four new women Senators, bringing the total to an historic 20, or one-fifth of the Senate itself.
There was only one—Barbara Mikulski of Maryland—as recently as 1986. I know I’m getting older, but really, that was not very long ago. It was my ingusan year of high school.
Most of these senators are Democrats. Sixteen of them, in fact. Two of these, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii and Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin—are the first Asian-American woman and first openly homosexual senator. (I find it interesting that even though Romney chose Wisconsin’s Paul Ryan as his running mate, Wisconsin voted for Obama, elected a lesbian Democrat to the Senate, and elected a gay Democrat—Mark Pocan—to replace her in the House. Wisconsin Republicans must be stewing over that set of circumstances).
Equally impressive is the example of New Hampshire, whose governor, Maggie Hassan, both US Senators, Jeanne Shaheen and Kelly Ayotte (a Republican), and both US Representatives, Carol Shea-Porter and Ann McLane, are women. It is the first time in the history of the United States that all of one state’s highest elected offices are held by women.
As a man who was raised by successful women and as someone who now works in professional fields dominated by women, I find this really cool.
My maternal grandmother, a first generation Italian, was in the fifth graduating class of St. Joseph College in Hartford. She became a registered dietician and worked at Saint Raphael’s Hospital for 52 years, from the time she was 19 till she was 71. Yes, she had graduated from college by 18. Later, she became head dietician and then took graduate courses at UConn in health management in order to become head of food services. Her older sister was equally successful and also finished college at a remarkably young age.
My grandmother used to tell me stories of her mother preparing her for school in the morning by reciting a mantra—“My name is Jane and I am seven years old.†This was because she was five and the youngest in the family. Everyone called her baby, and my great-grandmother had to familiarize her with her own name when she sent her to first grade two years early and lied about her age.
I have been at UConn in one capacity or another since 1987, when I began as an undergraduate. I recall successful women professors from the previous generation, like Barbara Rosen or Joan Hall, who was the first woman offered a tenure line in the English Department. And I recall many new, young women professors who are now esteemed veterans, like Gina Barreca. But this year is the first time we have had a woman department head—Margaret Breen—who is acting chair during the current head’s sabbatical. Prior to Margaret, Kate Smith had served as acting associate department head. If I am not mistaken, these are the first two women to serve in those positions, and it only happened in the past five years. And of course we now have the first female president of the university in Susan Herbst.
In my areas of work, women are equally prominent, whether it be Wendy Glenn, who heads Secondary English and served as director of Teacher Education, or Marijke Kehrhahn and Manuela Wagner, who head Teachers for a New Era, or Lisa Blansett, Lynn Bloom, Sarah Winter, Kathleen Tonry, Penelope Pelizzon, and Ellen Litman, all of whom hold or have held administrative positions in the department’s various writing programs. Not to mention all the women on the CWP’s Leadership Council who are also building and department administrators at their respective schools—like Denise Abercrombie, Monica Giglio, and Michelle Vigue, just to name a few.
While women like my grandmother or Joan Hall or Lynn Bloom were true trailblazers, we’ve really come far since 1953. Heck, look how far we’ve come just since 1986.
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