CWLU Herstory Blog

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It is no secret that there has been a painful debate over the relationship between race and gender. It has been building for a long time, but the fierce primary battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton brought it to the fore. We have included links to to two recent articles that have starkly contrasting views on this controversy. We hope that Herstory visitors will read both and then add their voices to the ongoing often heated discussion.

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Michelle Obama Watch is a blog set up for the sole purpose of defending Michelle Obama from the blizzard of racist and sexist attacks that have come her way. Gina McCauley launched the site last month and it has attracted women and men of all races who are disgusted with the media coverage of Michelle Obama.

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We received this communication from the National Women's Law Center about the efforts to pass the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. In it Lilly Ledbetter tells her story and urges other women to do the same.

If you have been a victim of pay discrimination based on your gender, share your story of pay discrimination here and help get the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act passed.

A message from Lilly Ledbetter

For months now, I have been traveling the country, speaking about the importance of passing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. I never dreamed I'd see a bill in Congress with my name on it — but sometimes in life the totally unexpected happens. After all, I also never imagined that I would be paid less than my co-workers — just because I'm a woman.

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Professor Margaret “Peg” Strobel of Chicago, Illinois, won the 2008 “Write Women Back into History” Award given  by the National Women’s History Project of Santa Rosa, California.

Peg is a longtime feminist activist and former UIC women's studies professor. She is also on the Board of the Herstory Project and has helped us out many times from behind the scenes . If we gave out prizes, Peg would certainly get one.

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Writer and reproductive justice activist Judith Arcana will be in town on August 5 reading at the Peggy Notebart Nature Museum. Her appearence is part of the Chicago Public Library's Read Green-Live Green series.

Judith will be joined by Alison Swan, Susan Firer, Donna Seaman, Gail Louise Siegal and Judith Strasser for a lively reading that celebrates the richness of life on and around the Great Lakes.

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Jo Freeman is a feminist scholar and longtime Democratic Party activist. In this essay reposted from her website at JoFreeman.com, she reflects on the the recent and often acrimonious Democratic Primary.

As we emerge from the miasma of the primaries, let us not forget that this has been an historic Presidential selection season and it will be an historic election.

The voters in the Democratic primaries and caucuses chose as their favorites two extraordinary candidates – Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton -- who are both extra-ordinary individuals in many, many ways.

They chose them out of a field of exemplary candidates for the Democratic nomination for President, who in other years would have had been excellent choices in their own right.

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