The Legacy of Transformational Moments in Feminist Psychology

Abstract

Important turning points in the history of feminist psychology can sometimes be traced to particular moments—specific publications or situations in which an individual or group sparked advancement of the field. Just as there are national milestones (e.g., formation of the American Psychological Association’s Division 35, the Society for the Psychology of Women and formation of the Association for Women in Psychology), there are also transformational moments with a local flavor, that is, events specific to a city, college/university, or specialization within psychology that play a role in the development of our field. In this article, I report the initial findings of a project aimed at collecting feminist psychologists’ first-person accounts of local events or activities (late 1960s to the present) that contributors believe have influenced, or are influencing, the development of feminist psychology, especially the scholarship of feminist psychology. Thus, this ongoing project focuses on the experiences of psychologists who organized, participated in, or benefited from the development of feminist psychology. Feminist psychologists in all phases of their careers in the United States and internationally are invited to participate by visiting the Division 35 website. The archive comprising these accounts complements existing archives of the history of psychology and individual biographies and autobiographies.

Reimagining the history of the psychology of women.

“…An emphasis on multiple, local histories is also consistent with a recent call by Shields (2015) to frame the history of feminist psychology as "transformational moments with a local flavor" (p. 143). This approach is especially fruitful for discerning and exploring strands of feminist activity in the (roughly) eight decades of androcentric psychology leading up to the tumultuous 1970s.…”

Family, friends, and faith-communities: Intellectual community and the benefits of unofficial networks for marginalized scientists.

“…Another example comes from Shields’ (2015) review of transformational moments in feminist psychology: Virtually all are moments of unofficial intellectual community. Shields recalls the galvanizing effect of informal faculty-grad student meetings at a Penn State professor’s home to discuss their “mutual interests as women psychologists” (p. 144).…”

“…These meetings birthed a seminar on the psychology of women taught by Carolyn Wood Sherif, a course which was highly significant for many of the participants and which directly led to the beginning of women’s studies at Penn State. Another instance is the Nag’s Heart conferences—in 1993 scholars looking for an environment to reflect on feminist issues recruited a colleague whose parents had a house on Martha’s Vineyard for a “conference cum sleep over” (Shields, 2015, p. 148). Her parents’ willingness to host a “sort of sleep-over party for some middle-age women scholars” (p. 148) provided attendees space in which to formulate their thought without interruption or opposition.…”

Further Reflections on Sandra Lipsitz Bem’s Impact

“…In the 1970s, many women (and some men) in psychology were examining ways that sexism and traditional gender roles were manifested in people's thinking and actions; in addition, feminist psychologists were challenging psychology's own androcentric biases (see Shields 2015, for a review). Sandra Bem's first published article on gender (co-authored with Daryl Bem) examined how the wording in job advertisements could contribute to sex discrimination (Bem and Bem 1973a).…”

“…With the resurgence of the feminist movement in the 1960s and 1970s, many psychologists were questioning the desirability of traditional gender roles as well as how they were conceptualized (see Shields 2015). Bem helped to lead the way in 1974 when she published her landmark article on psychological androgyny.…”