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Each March, the WGSS program celebrates Women’s History Month with a day-long symposium focusing on one central theme and featuring panels of scholars, activists, and journalists in dialogue with one another and their audience. This innovative symposium is open to Northeastern faculty, graduate students, undergraduate students, and interested parties from outside the university. Not a typical academic conference, the symposium features lively, accessible discussions of topics relevant to a broad audience. To view more information about past symposia, please click here.    

The annual Women’s History Month Symposium will be held on Friday, March 15, 2024 in the Cabral Center at the John D. O’Bryant African American Institute. “Feminist Foundations, Feminist Futures: Celebrating Signs at 50″ commemorates the 50th anniversary of the founding of Signs: Journal of Women in Culture and Society. Signs was founded in 1975 as part of an emergent tradition of feminist scholarship and has been publishing continuously ever since, establishing itself as a preeminent journal in the field of women’s, gender, and sexuality studies. At the time of the journal’s founding, its editorial staff sought to raise consciousness and develop theories about women’s oppression in both academic disciplines and society more broadly. The journal has consistently strived for intellectual nuance and robust interdisciplinarity, engaging with questions of concern to academics and activists; it has been under the editorship of Northeastern University Professor Suzanna Walters since January 2015. To honor half a century of publication, our fiftieth anniversary celebration aims to think big. This symposium addresses persistent conundrums and theoretical throughlines that have shaped our field for over half a century. Over the course of four roundtables (emphasizing discussion and dialogue), panelists will engage the continuing power of feminist theory, always cognizant of our own contested histories and imagined futures. All panelists have published in the journal or its open-access arm, the Feminist Public Intellectuals Project. Read more about the panels and panelists on the event website. Free registration is required. Be sure to register now to reserve your spot!