Women Activists To Speak At Virginia Tech

Joan Browning and Ruth Harris, two women who challenged race and gender roles in the early 1960s, will discuss their experiences as civil rights activists at Virginia Tech. The event, "Challenging Boundaries/Challenging Ourselves: An Interracial Conversation about Activism and Experience in the Civil Rights Struggle," is a part of Virginia Tech's Women's Month and will take place Monday, March 17 at 7:30 p.m. in Squires Student Center.

Marian Mollin, an assistant professor in the department of history and organizer of the event said it is not only important to highlight the history of women's experiences and achievements during women's commemoration month, but it is also exciting to bring people who actually made history to campus.

"The two women who will lead the event, Joan Browning and Ruth Harris, have a wealth of experience in working with students," Mollin said. Browning was a permanent guest in an English class at Virginia Tech and Harris is a full-time high school teacher.

"Both of these women provide compelling examples of how ordinary people can take actions that make a difference on a national scale," Mollin said. Joan Browning, a white woman from the rural South, joined the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) in the early 1960s. Around the same time, Ruth Harris, a black woman from Albany, Ga., joined the movement and helped create the SNCC Freedom Singers, a group that traveled around the country raising money and awareness for the civil rights movement.

Forty years later these two women still continue to fight for social justice. Browning, now a resident of West Virginia, said she works on building community and still strives to undo the legacy of slavery and white supremacy. Harris still lives in Albany and is not only a dedicated high school teacher, but also the director of the Albany Civil Rights Movement Museum Freedom Singers.

The event will be in the form of a back-and-forth conversation that will allow the two women to reflect openly on what it means to work as black and white women in the struggle for racial equality, Mollin said. There will also be time allotted for questions and discussion with the audience.

Event sponsors include the history department, English department, sociology department, the office of multicultural affairs, Amnesty International and Womanspace.

For additional information contact Marian Mollin at (540)231-8367 or at mmollin@vt.edu.