EIU Media Relations

Public Invited to Women’s History Awareness Month Events

The public is invited to celebrate women’s contributions to history and culture during March, Women’s History and Awareness Month.

The month, sponsored by Eastern Illinois University’s Women’s Studies Program and Women’s Resource Center, will offer a film festival, musical performances and lectures to highlight women’s accomplishments.

For this year’s month, some of the events and lectures will be focused on the theme of “Gender & Sexuality.”

Ruben Quesada, assistant professor of English, said the theme draws on history, literature, cultural studies, social science and science to offer EIU and the Charleston community perspectives from which to study the diversity of the human experience.

“Gender is the distinction between the sexes—and sexuality—is the distinction of sexual identities,” Quesada said. “This year's theme uses the two categories of Gender & Sexuality, which are universal categories that intersect with class, race, ethnicity and nationality, to create a conversation about the people in our growing community.”

“In many ways the world is getting smaller and in order to live in a smaller world we need to understand how we fit into its diverse and often undiscovered landscape of experiences,” Quesada continued.  

All events are free and open to the public. For a full calendar of events, click here.

Calendar of Events:

• Elaine Fine & John David Moore: Concert of Violin and Piano Music Written by Women

          7:30 p.m. on Saturday, Feb. 28, in the Recital Hall of the Doudna Fine Arts Center

• WHAM Keynote Event Featuring Dr. Elaine Richardson: Ph.D to Ph.D: How Education Saved My Life-The One Woman Show:

          5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, March 3 at 7^th Street Underground of Martin Luther King Jr. University Union 

• Lecture on Latina Representations Presented by Angharad N. Valdivia: Brain, Brow, Or Bootie? Contemporary Latinidad in Popular Culture

          5 p.m. on Thursday, March 5 in the Lecture Hall in the Doudna Fine Arts Center 

• Faculty Panel Presentation: Sex in the City…in the Country…in the Mind

          6 p.m. on Tuesday, March 10 in Room 4440 in Booth Library 

• Central Illinois Feminist Film Festival

          March 23-25 in Coleman Hall Auditorium

• Barbara King Humanities Lecture: “How Animals Grieve”

          5 p.m. Thursday March 26 in the Lecture Hall in Doudna Fine Arts Center

• Women’s Studies Annual Awards Ceremony

          5:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 31 in the 7^th Street Underground in the Martin Luther King Jr. University Union.

The month is co-sponsored by EIU’s African American Heritage Month Committee, Latin American Studies Program, Division of Student Affairs, University Board and the Coles County Arts Council.