Preserving the Past and Preparing for the Future by jrolston

The Association for Feminist Anthropology (AFA) will turn 25 during the 2013 annual meetings, pushing us to reflect on AFA’s past and future. The decade leading up to its foundation and activities since can be examined as part of scholarly and political shifts concerning women’s rights across and within cultures, time periods, and activities—including the growing multiplicity of perspectives about what constitutes a right or a woman. At the same time, more study is needed about how AFA and feminist anthropology have influenced such shifts in anthropology and feminisms since 1988.

Toward that end, under the leaderships of former presidents and board members, AFA created a collection of its records that is now part of the Smithsonian Institution (SI)’s National Anthropological Archives. Perhaps because other scholars are thinking along similar lines, the June 2012 issue of Gender & Development includes an article by Irene Tinker about documenting feminisms; in it, Tinker suggests that donors of records also consider being donors of financial support to cover archive costs. Part of AFA’s commitment to anthropology and the examination of its history is the (small) maintenance fee paid to SI that also serves as a reminder to encourage our colleagues, students, and selves to make use of the Smithsonian archives of feminist and other anthropologists, including those of the AFA.

Besides accessing the past, AFA is interested in setting terms for what might be forthcoming. We know that both feminisms and anthropology face challenges—from without and from within groups identifying as feminists and/or anthropologists—regarding their often critical studies of relationships and representations among humans. We know also that merely facing a challenge is insufficient and our forms of communication should be flexible, creative, and multiple without reproducing opacity or oppression. We also know we need to work together so that AFA can continue to provide its own challenges toward gender disparities and all of their many intersectional aspects.

We therefore maintain our practice of providing access to relevant new work from all subfields of anthropology and all forms of feminist activity. AFA as a section shares ideas and research through our web site and listserv and, beginning this year, through Twitter and Facebook. We use our Anthropology News column as a way for any member to share research and develop dialogues, and want your contributions. Meanwhile, what began as a section newsletter and evolved into the fully edited journal of Voices is part of AAA-wide discussions about how to best enter the next phase of publishing even as AFA members discuss the possibility of a peer-reviewed serial.

We also communicate via AFA-invited and sponsored sessions at the annual meetings. This year in San Francisco, we explore topics of concern and fascination among anthropologists generally and those explicitly feminist particularly. Launching off the meeting theme of “boundaries,” we include sessions on classifications within sex and gender, disabilities and activisms, and occupations and activities (including athletics, trafficking, parenting, teaching, and prostitution). Responding to recent events and ways to analyze them, we have sessions on forms of violence. Finally, we also have a session that includes as AFA’s guests several non-anthropologist practitioners and advocates discussing the US penal system as it increasingly includes certain categories of women among the incarcerated.

Perhaps because of these efforts, AFA has a growing membership in spite of the current global economic context. Out of concern for that context, we would like to keep membership fees low. Toward that end, I remind everyone to renew and to encourage others to join so that income from dues combines with that from Voices to keep AFA’s budget secure.

AFA also is expanding in its opportunities for member involvement, through planning sessions and workshops for the 2013 AAA annual meetings, including special sessions and events for the AFA 25thanniversary. If interested in helping with past, present, or future AFA endeavors, please start by contacting me, at afapres@gmail.com.

Jane Henrici, is president of the Association for Feminist Anthropology; study director at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research; and professional lecturer at the Global Gender Program, Elliott School of International Affairs, George Washington University.

Send communications and contributions to AFA Contributing Editors Damla Isik at disik@regis.edu and Jessica Smith Rolston at jrolston@mines.edu.

via Anthropology-News http://www.anthropology-news.org/index.php/2012/11/28/preserving-the-past-and-preparing-for-the-future/