female genital mutilation, apartheid, racism, refugees, work,
and the family. In fact, a large body of work is beginning to
emerge on female genital mutilation from the perspective of African
women themselves who emphasize the negative health consequences of
this cultural practice. Alice Walker's film Warrior Marks
has also helped to bring international attention to this
controversial issue. A data base on third-world women's literary
works is being compiled at Gustavus Adolphus College, St. Peter,
Minn. It presently lists more than 600 novels, short story and
poetry collections, plays, and personal narratives written by women
in the third world. This outpouring of creative work has provided
additional insights into the nature of female experience around the
globe.
The movement
to institutionalize women's studies outside the United States has
been aided in large part by Ford and other foundations. As early as
1973, Ford provided funding enabling Beirut University College,
long an advocate for women's education in the Middle East, to
establish the Institute for Women's Studies in the Arab world. The
institute generates research and action programs on Arab women and
publishes a newsletter, Al-Raida. The Women and Development
Unit (WAND) at the University of the West Indies, Barbados, was
established in the late 1970s with Ford Foundation funding. It was
an outgrowth of a seminar on the "Integration of Women in National
Development in the Caribbean" held in Jamaica in 1977. Ford also
funded the African Association of Women for Research and
Development (AAWRD) in Senegal, whose journal ECHO
unfortunately ceased publication recently.
Chamberlain
and Bernstein begin their chronicle of this effort with Ford's
travel and study awards to enable international scholars to come to
the United States. Funds for attendance at the annual meetings of
the National Women's Studies Association (NWSA) "became a major
vehicle for the spread of ideas and organized programs abroad." In
1979 UNESCO sent women from several countries to NWSA and, on their
return, convened the Committee of Experts in Paris, which
recommended that UNESCO support the development of women's studies
programs and research at universities and other relevant
institutions under the Plan for the Development of Human Rights
Teaching. Though this master plan never materialized, UNESCO
sponsored various regional meetings, out of which the Latin
American Women's Studies Association emerged.
The UN Decade
conferences for women in Mexico (1975), Copenhagen (1980), and
Nairobi (1985) helped to broaden the base of women's studies
internationally. The nongovernmental organizations (NGO) forums at
Copenhagen included women's studies seminars (organized by the