Alison Klayman '06 and Julia Liu '06, creators of a new documentary titled "Women's Only," hope to change the face of student activism at Brown by making current students more aware of their predecessors' efforts. The film screened on Saturday at Wilson 102 to a half-capacity crowd of administrators, students and alums.
Funded by a C.V. Starr National Service Fellowship and the Pembroke Center for Teaching and Research on Women, the film chronicles the history of Brown student activism over the past 50 years, focusing especially on race and gender issues. It examines these themes through interviews with alums and administrators.
Klayman and Liu told the crowd they hope to inspire others to action with the film, as well as educate incoming students about Brown's historical involvement in social activism.
The film begins with the story of black female activists at Pembroke College who staged a walkout in the early 1970s to protest the low number of black students enrolled at the college.
Through several interviews with participants of the walkout, the film explains the culture shock that these women faced at Pembroke. Their college made little effort to accommodate them, and as the film explains, did not understand why it should.
The activists also explain that they did not feel comfortable working within the confines of the administration's complaint system because it did not acknowledge the legitimacy of their demands.
"The attitude of the administration was, 'Why do you need help? You are lucky to be here,'" one activist says in the film.
The movie explains that during the walkout, female activists at Pembroke, along with black men at Brown, left their dorms and refused to return until both Brown and Pembroke pledged to increase their enrollment of black students to 11 percent.
The walkout drew national attention, but as the film states, only 7 percent of Brown's class of 2009 identifies as black.
Jumping to the 1990s, the film then focuses on the efforts of student activists who used bathroom graffiti at the Rockefeller Library to protest the University's lackadaisical sexual harassment policies. As the film explains, in 1991, women made a list on a bathroom wall of male students whom they accused of rape.
One of the students involved in this effort, Jesselyn Brown '92, says in the film that the writing indicated the administration's failure to take sexual assault seriously.
"The bathroom walls were a last resort for these women because the system wasn't working," she says.
The film also indicates that the lists became an issue of men's rights as well because the accused were denied due process in the allegations.
The University painted over the lists several times, the film explains, pushing enraged students to action. A group of four students who spearheaded the protest movement were interviewed by the New York Times and appeared on the Phil Donahue Show.
National media attention caused the University to re-examine its sexual assault policies, but the film argues more needs to be done.
The final portion of the film focuses on the efforts of students lobbying for gender-neutral housing for first-years.
The University initially agreed to place a statement on its first-year housing requests providing gender-neutral housing as an option, according to the film. Yet, as the film shows, a few weeks before the forms were sent to enrolled students, the University removed the option and replaced it with a statement of its non-discrimination policy.
The film indicates, however, that the form still encourages transgender students to speak with the administration if they have specific housing needs.
Activists involved in this cause note that national media attention detracted from their effort. Luke Woodward '04 states in the film that a Times article may have made the new policy more difficult for Brown to accept.
Throughout, the film stresses the continuing nature of activism at Brown as both a frustrating and rewarding endeavor.
Gail Cohee, the current director of the Sarah Doyle Women's Center, emphasizes in the film that the nature of a four-year institution makes activism difficult to sustain.
"It is frustrating because you see students come in with the same problems year after year, but at the same time they are all part of the continuum of activism," she says in the film.
By sharing these stories, the creators of "Women's Only" hope to rectify this problem facing activism at Brown, keeping the memories of successes and failures alive. The student creators said at the event they hope the film will become a part of the standard program for both new students and administrators.
