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Friday, October 19, 1973
University Daily Kansan
Participants Trace Women's Groups' Past
Kanaan Staff Reporter
Bv PEGGY C. SCOTT
Since the formal beginning of the women's liberation movement at the University of Kansas in 1970, two organizations, Women's Coalition and the Commission on the Status of Women (CSW), have led that movement.
Women's Coalition, the more radical of the two, offers direct action programs such as self-defense training and abortion counseling. CSW takes an academic approach, offering seminars and forums to reach a broad range of students.
Five years ago, there was no campus women's movement. The Commission on the Status of Women existed only as a committee of the Intercollegiate Association of Women Students, a group with close ties to the Dean of Women's offi-
In 1970-71, the programs of the CSW included a career week, sexuality seminars, a library committee to gather material on the status of women and a research committee.
IN THE spring of 1970, the officers of that group decided to transform their organization into the CSW, according to Casney Eike, assistant to the Dean of
Women's Coalition did not evolve from any recognized group. Patti Spencer, one of the founders of Women's Coalition, described its beginning.
"in the spring of 70," she said, "we, the group I knew, were starting to notice it. The city was changing."
"ONE DAY I was sitting in front of the Union. It was summer school; I was selling Vortex. Somebody came up and said the Student Senate budget was put in and there wasn't anything allocated for women. So we went to a college and crode up a budget and asked for $15,000."
Spencer laughed at the memory.
"The focus at the beginning was just women getting together—it was a really messy and difficult process."
Women's Coalition is more active toward issues than programs. A recent coordinator,
Ann Francke, called Women's Coalition a resource center for women. Committees listed in a January 1971 newsletter included the women's health care, legal action and women's library.
"The revolutionary kind of thing had great influence on where women were as far apart as the city," she wrote.
"I'm a fairly rigid, traditional woman,
person in many ways. And therefore I
think I'm very much more comfortable."
Katzman, who soon left the organization, also cited a lack of other women her age and in her position of mother and a wife as problems with Coalition.
ANOTHER early Coalition member,
Sharon Katanan, remembers from a dif-
ferent time.
The Sisters met after Morgan's speech and decided to occupy the KU East Asian Studies building Feb. 4. They demanded a day-care center, an affirmative action program to end discrimination against women, and a department of women's studies, a woman as vice-chancellor and a review of the Kansas civil service system.
Equal Rights to Face Tough State Fights
The Sisters' action, which involved about
Kansas has ratified the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA), but there is a possibility that it will never go into effect nationally.
In early February 1972 the February Sisters' organization caused a major split in the Women's Coalition. February Sisters was formed by a large group of women aroused by a speech given on campus by Robin Morgan, a radical feminist.
DURING the short life of the February Sisters, many old members of the coalition dropped out. Women who had been leaders of Women's Coalition, now leaders of Women's Coalition, Pat Henry, now coordinator of Women's Coalition, first became involved during February Sisters'
A proposal encountered by every Congress since 1923, the ERA was finally approved March 22, 1972. Kansas six days to state decision state to sation the amendment.
Women's self-help, a health group which urged women to learn to give themselves pelvic examinations, started in the spring of 1971. Coalition women were active in developing a feminist studies program, which included six courses by 1970.
BY OCTOBER 1971, Women's Coalition had added a speaker's bureau and gay caucus and women's media committees, which handled a newsletter and an occasional Lawrence Daily Journal-World editorial.
The first section of the amendment, often called the Women's Rights Amendment, reads, "Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex.
In April 1973, a legislative attempt to rescind the ratification was crushed by a large number of women's groups who rejected the testifyability of a legislative committee hearing.
A total of 38 states must pass the legislation to attain the three-fourths majority necessary to make it the 27th country in the world. 27th states have ratified the amendment.
However the issue is no longer alive in Kansas, local activists are taking alive in the fight.
LYNN KNOX, political action coordinator of the Commission on the Status of Women, says the duties of Kansas women's groups fulfilled in respect to EKA legislation.
"Kansas has handled itself well. There is no need for further involvement," Knox said.
Knox says she is displeased with anti-ERA forces from other states that have attempted to influence Kansans. She says that groups with names like Concerned Kansans Against the ERA have sent mail that displays Missouri letterheads.
"I am a resident and voter of Kansas," Knox said. "Kansas is my concern. I will not do as anti-ERA people in Missouri have another state, state."
Liz Witt, the Lawrence president of the National Organization for Women (NOW), says she doesn't agree that the struggle to get women into college be confined to activities within the state.
150 women, was the first introduction to feminism for many KU students. One woman who became involved in the February Sisters, Barb Krasne, Overland Park junior, talked recently of the leddown after the action.
Witt says funds raised locally by her organization will be used for NOW causes in states that have failed to ratify the ERA. She said she will be sent to Oklahoma and Missouri.
ACCORDING TO WIT, it is necessary to be organized nationally to deal effectively with them.
The NOW leader says she expects a big push this year to ratify the ERA in enough detail.
"When I went into it, February Sisters were a really tremendously energetic group that was composed of all these different kinds of women," Krasne said. "Each woman had a personal awareness that was growing."
"This year is important, because u lose it drags out momentum will be lost," Witt said.
"That summer, a lot of the impetus died, because the students went home." As the school moved to a center less and less on the demands of the February Sisters, and instead specialized on their personal projects, Kirsten was head of the Feminist Bureau at the college's Bureau.
"As a result of February Sisters, it (Coalition) became a much more political, obviously political organization," said Spencer, who dated her own departure from Women's Coalition from the February Sisters.
AFTER the February Sisters, radical women shifted their focus toward inflammation.
Besides political action, a new emphasis, to Spencer, revolved around gay rights.
"From February Sisters on, the impact of the gay women has been really obvious. Because of that, I think there's a lot of strength in Coalition."
"Gay women are in positions of authority in Coalition, and the programs that have evolved since then have a lot of gay conflections them, like gay counseling," Spencer said.
Francis, last summer's coordinator for Women's Coalition, said she saw fear of gay men in schools.
"I think Women's Coalition is imploding. I think it's going through a process right now that stems, to me, from women refusing to confront their bigotries, their fear of the gay women that are working in Women's Coalition."
The CSW has also had its problems with sexuality issues. The Commission, based in the Dean of Women's office, often takes a more conservative position than Woman's
Eike, also past president of the Intercollegiate Association of Women Students, said that the Dean of Women's College would be for publicizing birth control information.
"There are still people out there who are "very much against us thinking that people have sexual lives at all," she said. "And we hear from them."
Women's self-defense and rape victim counseling were two programs that came out of the study.
Self-defense is a course of karate-style training taught by women who have learned formal karate. The Student Senate funded karate lessons for the instructors.
According to Henry, there are 35 women in the course. She rated it the most effective of the three.
Rape victim counseling is a service Coalition offers women who have been assaulted. Volunteer counselors will meet with victims to help them help her make a complaint to the police.
Francie said the program was highly ineffective, though, because of senate cuts in funding.
IN CONTRAST to the Women's Coalition, the form of the CSW has changed very little in the four years it has existed. Cindy Hird, Lawrence senior and Commission president, talked about changes in people's awareness rather than in programs. She said that the Commission now had more women on its mailing list, and one-third were men.
Hird measured the changes at KU against other schools.
"Okay, like we see so many problems around KU and our community. right? But other places, they're still fighting not to have closing hours in their residence halls people or die from the illness of people die or campus because of lack of ability people at their campus health centers.
"We went to the Intercollegiate Association of Women Students convention in Harrisburg, Pa., last spring. I was really shocked.
"Birth control information isn't passed out. Or it isn't even readily available to you."
OTHER WOMEN, who have left the organizations, say they see little hope for their futures.
left Coalition, she said, because she felt no progress was being made.
"It's really sad that there are a lot of women who have achieved some kind of self-realization and have a lot of frustrated emotions. You don't know where to do it." Kraume said.
"They don't want to work with the Commission, in such a structured organization, and they don't want to waste it by spinning their wheels in Coalition."
Spencer, one of the first activists, talked about pre-women's liberation days.
"I can remember when we were
CWENZ—it was one of the few women's organizations on campus, and you had to be a hot shot to get in it," she said. "It was just fun." The girls were like Liking. Like being somebody's grandmother,
"BEING in the women's movement for me always came out of caring for people. And directly out of my experiences as a woman, I'm fairly confused now about a lot if things. I think a lot of people are. I think a lot of people are. I think a lot of people are. The Coalition, and had those alternatives fall apart or seem to fall apart. Hassles develop. It leaves you with a lot of confusion."
Lesbian Group Seeks Community
One of the main goals of the Gay Women's Caucus is to end gay men's oppression. According to a spokesman for the caucus, the organization says that it aims for being gay, and again for being gay.
"lesbians are losing their jobs if they're found out," said the spokesman. "It was a mistake."
The caucus was organized when a small group of women who had been attending Gay Liberation Front meetings decided to found an organization exclusively for gay
"I think we have things in common with
She said the Gay Women's Caucus sponsored consciousness-raising sessions and discussion groups for gay women to problems they faced and their solution.
The group is a caucus of the Women's Coalition and was founded at the University of Kansas last fall. A core group of about 10 women attends each of the monthly caucus meetings, said the spokesman, but twice as many come to occasional meetings.
the Gay Liberation Front." said the spokesman "but we decided it was really too much to say."
"But there are male and female, gay and straight counselors," she said, "and there is a female counselor."
The Gay Women's Coalition offers a free counseling service to people who are questioning their sexuality, said the spokesman.
The spokesman said the type of calls to the counseling service varied greatly. They range from requests for information to about how to make contacts with gay women.
Many of the calls, said the spokesman, are from gay women who are "in the淋湿区."
Some have acknowledged that they are lesbians, but are afraid to admit it, she said. Others have noticed an attraction to other people, and are attached to themselves that they are lesbians.
In either case, said the spokesman, they are told where they can meet and form
friendships with other gay women and are
able to make contacts with the Gay
Women's Center.
The spokeman said there were lesbians in the area who had never had contact with them.
"There are lots of gay women out there on campus and in the town," she said. "That's a hard statement to establish in fact, though."
lesbians who weren't affiliated with the Gay Women's Caucus are the large attendance all-women parties given by the caucus.
The caucus has a statement of purpose. "To provide an alternative to individual isolation and to join with our lesbian sisters in supporting community and cohesive community."
Efforts toward that purpose are being made through study groups that delve into "herstory," a view of history in a feminist perspective, said the spokesman, and through studies of matriarchal societies, especially Amazon societies.
By SARAH WOHLRABE
Kansan Staff Reporter
"Woman may be said to be an inferior."
Eminy Tully, dean of women, has spent most of her adult life trying to dupe this girl with the illusion that she
For the past 17 years as KU's dean of women she has maintained an administrative and teaching goal of educating young women to become self-sufficient adults, aware of the career options and lifestyles available to them.
During these years at KU Taylor has earned the reputation of being one step ahead of everyone. She started building that foundation for the College of Women Commission on the Status of Women (CSW) in 1858, five years before President John Kennedy established the national com-
In 1971 Taylor joined the Affirmative Action Board, attempting to provide economic justice for young women and their teachers.
Now she has attacked academic priorities, demanding and participating in the expansion of women's studies courses at the university. She also stressed that according to only through liberal higher education will the dignity of work and the equality of opportunity be instilled both in students and in faculty.
Taylor's duties as dean of women do not include receiving plaudits for her accomplishments in the women's movement, and she also does provide a base for helping students.
she does not exclude herself from the dutes of the two associate and 10 assistant deans. Not only has Taylor increased personal contacts with students during the past 17 years, but also she coordinates the office's staff and administers administrative hierarchy of the University.
When Taylor came to KU, replacing Martha Peterson, she brought three methods of approaching students: speaker series, group activities and individual instruction. But has not changed, and the demand for services has increased greatly, Taylor says.
AS HEAD of the dean of women's office.
As counselors to one-half of KU's students, Taylor says, staff members of the dean of women's office have a constant problem trying to keep students up to date on what is important in their Resources and Career Planning Library access of women's office is her major weapon
IN 1988 the women's library began to organize subject notebooks with topics ranging from human sexuality to women in religion. The subject notebooks present a variety of topics, and the library is the second largest women's resource center in the United States. Taylor says
Taylor is proud of the development of the library. At every chance she points out how rapidly the library is growing and how it serves students.
The women's library receives much of its information and material from organizations in which Taylor is active and whose names are members of the Bureau of the Department of Labor.
She belongs to the National Women's Political Caucus, Women's Equity Action League, National Organization for Women, Women's Association of Students, American Association of University Women and National Association of Women Deans and Coun-
Taylor says she also considers it her responsibility to ensure the safety of so many students.
abreast of the various aspects of the women's movement.
Taylor is a major speaker, organizer and
Emily Taylor
contributor to each of these groups. Taylor says she accepted speaking engagements several years ago for many of these groups and has also offered many offers because of the time involved.
Her favorite speaking series is the "Feminist Perspective" radio program she started in January, 1972 with KANU, Taylor Director of the weekly half-hour program.
MANY PEOPLE have the impression that she has changed her philosophy on the women's movement, she says. Taylor Kirkpatrick, a woman with her ideas and approach in the slightest.
"It's just that more people are listening now so that it makes it seem as though there is a problem."
Although Taylor has gained recognition at KU because of her commitment to the work she did, Taylor herself a radical feminist. In fact, Taylor calls herself a conventional feminist concerned with equal opportunity for women in the labor market and with equal access to the workplace.
sone says radical feminists want to restructure society whereas her special interest is with the American society as it exists. This society, she says, offers more opportunity to change whatever needs to be made to make things more fair for everyone.
The phrase, she says, gives many women satisfied with traditional roles the unmet. "We need a more inclusive," she says.
everybody to get out and work, to force them to give up the choice they had made
Taylor refuses to use the term "women's liberation" which she says has an emotional connotation that identifies it with the New Left of the '60s.
TAYLOR HAS always been committed to the woman's movement in the economy. She
The acceptance of alternatives and the equal opportunity to choose are the goals for which Taylor is striving. She says there still exists discrimination in educational access, in pay and in job promotion, and will exist under the declaration of the Equal Rights Amendment.
"Women could manage to live with being barred from many public places, but they never will stand for being barred from the truth of political decisions, because being made," she says.
The fact that several equal pay and opportunity laws exist today, Taylor says, has moves to believe that women's movement is inevitable process, says the women's movement has finally gone beyond enforcing basic civil liberties to attacking the roots of discrimination in the workplace.
has never accepted a job anywhere without asking whether the employer was committed to the principle of equal pay for equal work, she says.
Taylor is extremely concerned with equal job opportunity because she elected not to marry and instead remained in the labor force. The family returned back into the home after World War II.
"I did not have the problem of somebody saying you have a husband to support you, so I just went home."
Taylor is a woman who succeeded on her own. After receiving a bachelor's degree in English and history and a master's degree in counseling from Ohio State University, she earned a doctorate in personnel admissibility in Indiana University. Taylor came to KU in 1956 after being associate dean of women at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio.
TAYLOR'S CAREER has been so deeply imbedded in the progression of the post-bachelor's movement that her thoughts on the movement and its history seem to be identical.
As existing myths about jobs befitting women and the inadequacies of women have gradually changed. Taylor feels that she has also grown and changed psychosocial needs. Her usefulness has increased and her ideals have been realized, she says.
"We want equity now, not way off the future sometimes," says Taylor. "We want it now so that none of you have to go through a phase as I did where someone can tell you that you are only worth two-thirds as much as someone else just because that person took on responsibilities which the rest of us have ended up paying for."