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As a means to take initiatative and to re-empower ourselves, I would like to post here what Janet and I had originally planned to do in class on Tuesday. Our first activity, as you all experienced, was a way to get the discussion rolling. We thought McIntosh's argument was personable because it would be quite the challenge to divorce our own educational experiences from the abstractations of the cirriculum phases and cirriculum revisions that are of the essence to McIntosh's claim. Therefore, we asked the class to write up on the board an educational experience that was either empowering or disempowering. The results, as we discussed, were fascinating. Some felt empowerment in particular classes, some felt empowerment in particular assignments; there really was no way we could effectively synthesize or generalize the experiences within the class population,a  small data set.

As a way to continue the discussion, we planned to get everyone talking! We made an envelope with slips of papers with quotes, questions, or food for thought. These were drawn from the reading and the posts about McIntosh. Below you will find a few (I threw out, by accident) of what was written on those pieces of paper:

Blank: Talk about whatever you want in relation to your education, but be sure to relate it to our reading of McIntosh.

Blank: Talk about how your educational experience at Bryn Mawr/haverford/Swarthmore...and beyond? What did you think were McIntosh's claims for college education? How does your experience differ or not differ from McIntosh's experience as a college student?

"In McIntosh's discussion of the phases of education, it struck me just how stuck in Phase 2 I was in all throughout elementary school, middle school, and high school, and just how stuck in Phase 3 and most of my courses at Bryn Maw have been."(post by Sarah K) Please talk about your reaction to this post and/or discuss the phases you have been.  What is your ideal phase to be in? The most empowering phrase? the most disempowering phase?

"When a professor relies on her students to learn something new, my first tendency is to think that the class is less formal or that the professor in reality is never learning something new." (post by Sarah K) How do you feel that relates to this class, Critical Feminist Studies?  Talk about your experience when in a class where a professor actually learning something/said they were learning but never did. How does empower/disempower you as a student when a Professor is "learning" too?

"It seems to me that most women in the world today, at least women over 40, are megs. And most women's hopes and dreams are not shattered when they divorce from their husbands. Is McIntosh belittling the efforts of Phase 1 education and assuming negative outcomes that are not always true?" (post by Sarah K) Answer the question that Sarah has rasied in her post. Or raise a new question.

Blank: Talk about in what context you disagree with McIntosh.

Blank: Talk about in what context you agree with McIntosh.

"The result of phases of education...even though it seems [to be studying oppresion] and learning from power structures, it is actually just perpetuating thsoe structures and reinforcing the "win or lose" and "making it syndrome." (post by Sarah K) Do you agree? disagree? Why or why not?

"Years later, I began to realize that all teachers are trained to isolate bits of knowledge and that this very training keeps their students in turn oblivious of the larger systems which hold pyramids of power in place." (McIntosh 13) What is McIntosh saying here? What is your reaction to this quote?

"And that has meant that we have developed skills in keeping the human race alive which are the basic indispensable skills in an age of nuclear weapons (McIntosh 17)."  Decode McIntosh's statement and extrapolate something from this to bring to the larger group discussion.

"It is traumatically shocking to white women teachers in particular to realize that we were not only trained but were as teachers unwittingly training other to overlook, reject, exploit, disregard, or be at war with most people in the world (McIntosh 9)." Hmm.. Race in education! Share an experience where race has affected yours or someone else's educational experience...either positive or negative.

Blank: Talk about what interested you about the McIntosh reading.

"McIntosh also writes that the language used by college admissions "masks...the actual liberal arts function, which is, at present to train a few students to climb up to pinnacles and to seize them so as to have a position from which power can be felt, enjoyed, exericised, and imposed on others. "(Melissa Pottah post). *For this question, we had a photocopies of select section of admissions manuals from 5 renowned women's colleges: Barnard, bryn mawr, wellesley, smith, mt. holyoke.

Blank: Talk about what bothered you in the reading.

"The liberal arts cirriculum has been particularly concerned with passing on to students the image of what the 'top' has been." (McIntosh 5). As students of a liberal arts college who experience the sort of l.a. cirriculum McIntosh refers to here, tell us when the cirriculum has NOT showed you 'what the top is like'. 

"While the actual structures may be social constructed, the need for such hierarchies may be innate. Thus, the more challenging issue is how to address this need without empowering some groups and dienfranching others." (Julia Lustick post) Do you even think this is a challenge? Why/Why Not? Either way, do you have any suggestions on how to address this "need" Julia refers to?

"That's the truoble with Phase 2 History. It conveys to the student the impression that women don't really exist unless they are exceptional by men's standards." (McIntosh 8) Reactions?

"It seems like [bryn mawr] is constantly moving between phases 3,4,5." (Julia Lustick post). Do you agree with Julia? What is the ideal phase for BMC? Would this be a univeral ideal...for all colleges not just woman's colleges? In answering this question, reflect on Alex Tisman's "ideal admissions policy." How would this change in admission (change in college community) influence the phase we want to/should be in?

"McIntosh's discussion of Phase 2 cirriculum development was very intriguing tome. It all made sense as I read it, and itshould have occured to me before, but somehow it failed to. [This] reminds me of my AP US history class in high school...majority of the class was focused on people with the best access to political power: men." (Dawn's post) Where your experiences similar or different to Dawn's in high school? What would McIntosh say about the phases your high school was in?

_end questions_

Lastly, we wanted to know if anyone went to the McIntosh lecture. Was it interesting? After her talk, did her argument seem more convincing? less convincing? We would be interested to know what you thought, so please post your comments/thoughts/reactions to either our "kick off" or McIntosh's talk on Tuesday night.