UA News

The newly formed Feminist Action Research in Rhetoric is bringing Vivyan Adair, a feminist scholar from New York, to the UA to talk about motherhood, poverty and education.

A new coalition of scholars at The University of Arizona is hosting a lecture and exhibition with feminist scholar and author Vivyan Adair.

The Feminist Action Research in Rhetoric's one dozen members are graduate students studying rhetoric and composition in the UA's English department.

Adair, the Elihu Root Endowed Peace Fund Chair and associate professor of women's studies at New York's Hamilton College, will speak at the UA on Thursday. Her lecture will be held at 11 a.m. in the Student Union Memorial Center's Rincon Room, 1303 E. University Blvd.

The event is co-sponsored by the UA's McClelland Institute for Children, Youth, and Families, the women's studies department, the Southwest Institute for Research on Women, Campus Health Services and the Writing Program.

Adair's visit coincides with an exhibition of her photographic work, titled "Missing Stories of Ourselves: Poverty and the Promise of Higher Education," which will be on display during the month of April at the Joel D. Valdez Main Library, 101 N. Stone Ave. Both events are free and open to the public.

The UA coalition, also known as FARR, was created through a grassroots effort that is quite encouraging, and the topics the groups are concerned with are timely and relevant, said Amy Kimme-Hea, assistant director of the UA's Writing Program.

The group, Kimme-Hea also noted, focuses on ways in which gender and identity are socially constructed.

Bringing Adair to the UA at the creation of the coalition seemed appropriate, said Jenna Vinson, a doctoral degree candidate in the UA's rhetoric, composition and teaching program.

Adair, who is also founder and director of the ACCESS Project, has authored numerous books and articles on issues related to women in poverty, the welfare system, public policy, class-based dynamics and higher education.

Her exhibit features two dozen framed photographs of students who are single parents or eligible for welfare and is intended to show the ways in which certain impoverished individuals pursue higher education while also asking viewers to reevaluation their perceptions about women and families in poverty.

"Originally, we decided to meet as a group of scholars to figure out ways to make our scholarship mean something to the public," said Vinson, one of the coalition's founding members.

Also, members in FARR are working to replicate Adair's exhibition by involving low-income Tucson area families who are planning on pursuing a higher education or are already enrolled in college or at a university.

"There is a lot of interest in the rhetoric of motherhood and the stories we tell in order to construct ideas of what motherhood is," Vinson said.

Vinson said assumptions exist about young and poor mothers, particularly that their decision to have a child, may lead to unhealthy children and problems within the household.

"This is damaging to young mothers and fathers who chose parenting, but also continue with their lives and education," she said.

"This is both a feminist and an academic concern."