Tag Archives: women’s history month

#WomenEmpowerment

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I grew up in matriarchal home, so female independence was a strong influence in my childhood. Terms like “… a man should take care of the house maintenance.” or “… heavy lifting is a masculine task.” were never apparent in my adolescence. We did things for ourselves, so the need for a man’s aid didn’t seem as much of a necessity to me from a very young age. After I realized the social gender differences, I began to have fun with pushing beyond the means of my feminine role in society. I was a tomboy as a kid; cornrows in my hair and a hoodie slung over my broad shoulders was my daily wardrobe, it was simple and sporty. I had also made a promise to myself never to use my femininity as an excuse not to do something out of my predetermined societal role. But the odd stares from older women and men always intrigued me and it only got more enjoyable as I got older.

Nowadays it’s the small things that make me feel empowered to be a woman. Regardless of the grandeur in my life, the little things tend to add up; giving me a certain kind of confidence I didn’t realize was missing.

Concurrently, the thing that makes me the most empowered is going to the wholesale club (laugh all you want, but wholesale shopping can a very emotionally cleansing experience lol). There’s nothing like walking through those red framed sliding doors, with a platform truck trailing behind my extended arm. I walk into the space differently than any other day, as if my intentions are seeping through my pores. I’m walking, briskly, through the forest of aisles; because I only have one thing in mind and I won’t stop until I get it. As I approach the water pantry, I’m already mentally rolling up my sleeves; thinking of game plans, how many cases I need, and how I plan to maneuver the platform truck out of the tight space without colliding with other shopping carts. Once I roll the truck near the seemingly endless stacks of six-gallon water cases, I begin heaving each 50 pound box one by one. Chuckling at every man that offers his manly services and every other guy trying to take two boxes at time, vying to match my intensity and significantly failing at the attempt. Eight boxes later, I roll the 400 pound load towards the registers; feeling confident with every stride and every glance.

So what inspires you? What makes you feel empowered to be the phenomenal woman that you are in your everyday life? Or guys, what makes you feel motivated by that special woman in your life? Feel free to share in the comments below!

Happy National Women’s History Month, everyone! Enjoy the upcoming holidays!

A woman’s place is in the home

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From the 1st first to the 31st of March we, as a nation, celebrate women’s history. As stated by National Women’s History Project, March was proclaimed Women’s History Month since there was an absence of female history in the grade school system. By time of the mid-1970’s, Sonoma County, California was the first in the nation to proclaim that the week of March 8th was to be acknowledged as “Women’s History Week” in 1978. President Carter professed the week of the 8th to be “National Women’s History Week” soon following the California trend in 1980. Seven years later, in 1987, Congress announced March to be “National Women’s Month,” celebrating the successes of American women. So in light of the 1987 affirmation, I would like to commence in my own acknowledgment of the immense “bad-assery” of women in architecture and engineering. Although there are numerous infamous females in these fields, I would like to bring attention to three women that, I feel, pioneered a change for both architecture and engineering in the past two centuries.

an image of kate gleason wearing one of her infamous hats

Image Credit: ASME

Kate Gleason

According to ASME, Catherine Anselm Gleason was the first woman to enroll into the Mechanical Arts major at Cornell University at the age of nineteen. Gleason was born on November 25,1865 in Rochester, New York. She got interested into mechanics due to her father who was a machine shop owner. Although her interest was always present, they were never really conditioned until her older brother, unfortunately, died due to typhoid disease. She then took on his role, helping her father in the shop and learning the trade. Once she became of age, she attended Cornell University and was later the first woman to become a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineering (aka ASME) after graduating in 1888. She went on to globalize her father’s business, making  it the successful Gleason Corporation that is still used today.

 

an image of nora stanton blatch

Image Credit: Cornell University

Nora Stanton Blatch Barney

Based on an article by Cornell University, Nora Stanton Blatch Barney was the first woman to graduate in the Civil Engineering program in 1905. She was born in Basingstoke, Hampshire, England on September 30, 1883. As the age of fourteen, she began to study mathematics and Latin at the Horace Mann School in New York and spent her summers at home in England. The Blatch family moved to the United States in 1902 and Nora soon began the Civil Engineering program at Cornell University. She graduated in 1905 and went on to build bridges, subway tunnels, and water supply systems in New York. Apart from being a Civil Engineer, she was also an architect, real-estate developer, suffragist, social activist for female equality rights, and even an author.

 

an image of louise blanchard bethune

Image Credit: Austin M. Fox

Louise Blanchard Bethune

As reported by Buffalo Architecture and History, Louise Blanchard Bethune was the first female architect in New York and to be inducted into the American Institute of Architects (aka AIA). Bethune was born on July 21, 1856 in Waterloo, New York. She was tutored at home until the age of eleven by her father who was a principal and teacher of mathematics at Waterloo Union School. After that age she was placed into school and later graduated in 1874. For the next few years, she spent time grooming herself to be prepared for the architectural program a Cornell University. Instead of attending the program, she radically turned down the opportunity and took an apprenticeship as a draftsman (or draftswoman per se) with a highly acclaimed architectural firm in Buffalo owned by Richard A. Waite and F.W. Caulkins. From 1876 to 1881, she honed the trade of architectural drafting and design. In October of 1881, She opened an an architectural office, in which, she co-owned with soon-to-be husband, Robert Armour Bethune.

Women Empowerment in “The Final Reel”

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by Robine Jean-Pierre

an unraveling reel of film

courtesy of Wikimedia Commons

Last week, City Tech put on a play called “The Final Reel,” directed by Mark Lonergan and produced by Parallel Exit, in the Voorhees Theater. I was personally invested in the show, since our professor, John Huntington, had us participate in the load-in and other technical aspects of pre-production. We helped out in both my Technical Production and Sound Systems classes. I heard a lot of good about it but had no idea what to expect.

Here is the blurb from the City Tech Theatreworks website:
“The Final Reel is inspired by the iconic films Sherlock Jr and The purple Rose of Cairo. An eccentric historian discovers the holy grail of silent films: the final reel of a forgotten classic thought to be lost to history. As he presents the film for the first time in a hundred years, his bumbling assistant accidentally steps into the movie and falls in love with the heroine. The two-love birds step back into the modern world and the heroine is left to make a fateful decision – one that changes every night of performance with the help of the audience.”

Watching the rehearsal that afternoon, hours before opening night, was definitely a rewarding experience. I was fascinated by the technological creativity, the excellent acting, and the hilarious plot, with humor reminiscent of classic shows like Tom and Jerry. To top it all, what I did not expect was a deeper underlying theme that unearthed itself toward the end: women empowerment.

Perhaps what no one is expecting is that this aforementioned heroine happens to be the real Penny, the actress and playwright straight out of the film from one hundred years ago! She explains that it had all been a part of her plan to escape her own era, and “time travel” to one in which women would finally be recognized for their full potential and talent. It worked and now, here she is, in New York in 2018, where that dream could finally come true.

The “bumbling assistant” mentioned in the blurb earlier introduces her to the crowd (us in the audience), to which she feistily replies, more or less, “I don’t need an introduction, bucko. I can introduce myself, thank you very much.” It is hilarious and somewhat gratifying to realize just how bold, loud and sassy she is in real life–especially after having observed her charming, gentle and submissive demeanor when she was still in the silent film. Her “true colors” certainly were not expected of a woman during her time.

She explains that, as an actress and playwright, she had been marginalized and objectified by the men of her day. She was often treated like a doll rather than a dignified professional. Now she has the authority to write her own plays, act her own character, and fully put her talent to use, without any glass ceilings over her head. And her love interest will be her assistant, waiting on and submitting to her (willingly) rather than the other way around. The Voorhees Theater would not have to be closed after all.

I appreciate the fact that, although the play was quite lighthearted and comical, it presented us with a talented and intelligent woman who took herself seriously and earned everyone’s respect. And what better time to put this play on than in March? Happy Women’s History Month!