Speaking about power: gender, history and the urban classroom.

In an urban university; diversity is stretched far beyond the usual contemplation of higher education professionals. In the metropolitan area of Detroit, Michigan, over 100 languages are spoken. The city of Detroit is 85 percent African American. Latinos comprise the largest minority in the city, and their population has increased by fifty percent since 1990. (2) East Indians comprised the largest immigrant group in the state of Michigan in the 1990s. In the Detroit metro area, they mostly settled in the technological and industrial corridors about eight miles north of the city. Metro Detroit is also home to one of the largest Arab populations outside the Middle East, and within this Middle Eastern population, there exists great diversity in religious, national, and cultural practices. Many of the students at the University of Detroit Mercy are the children and grandchildren of immigrants, while other students and their families migrated to the city looking for union wages and a low cost of living. All of the students have had a range of experiences that are stories of great achievement; there are also tales of heartbreaking devastation. Many of the students are the children of blue-collar parents, and they are proudly the first in their families to go to college. Other students dock off the line at 7:30 a.m. and come to class using the tuition reimbursements offered through the United Auto Workers (UAW). (3)

As a scholar of Latin American gender and women's history, I know that contemporary women's history is light years beyond what it was thirty years ago. As part of the third wave of feminist scholars, I owe much of my ease in the field to the trailblazers before me who questioned aspects of work, motherhood, reproductive rights, sexual orientation, war, and community and who struggled within the profession for a respected space for their work. (4) As these women and men inspired me, I too wanted to interest students in the study of men's and women's pasts. More importantly, I wanted them to critically analyze gender. This may seem a great demand for second and third year students, but I argue that everyone constantly engages in some form of gender analysis and criticism whether in their homes, at school, or standing in a check-out line skimming the fashion and gossip magazines. My central goal in the design of the class was to move away from lecturing about gender history and to organize a class that taught students to use their analytical abilities and knowledge about gender and apply it formally to the past.

Building upon methodologies such as interactive learning and humanistic approaches, I recognize that the socioeconomic and ethnic diversity of the students makes for an engaging, enlightening, and controversial classroom. The challenge of teaching gender history in an urban classroom offers a profound opportunity for an exchange of historical narratives, voices, and discussions rarely found even in academic conferences. How to combine the voices of the students and to offer the students a glimpse of their and their ancestors' pasts became a central focus in the development of a class entitled "Introduction to Gender History." In this paper, I examine how gender history exposes the constructions of power and control and how, in turn, students apply their own knowledge to interrogate the fragility of power through history and to contemplate their own perceptions of power and how those are formed. In exploring the ramifications of gender and power, students transgress intellectual and cultural boundaries that are rhetorically constructed for them in the media, community, politics, and society.

Influenced by the ideas of Paulo Freire that embrace the knowledge that students bring to the classroom and by Peter N. Stearns, who advocates teaching students how to recognize social and cultural patterns and to develop their humanistic and research skill, I embarked on a new approach. (5) I embraced a comparative contemporary world history approach, and then examined the United States. I hoped this approach would allow students to see linkages between other parts of world and the United States and encourage a deeper antis of gender in the West. Rather than standing in front of a class "talking gender" by staying bound to a lecture schedule or texts that did not really interest students, I invited them to decide what intrigued them about gender. By examining gender through a lens of power, students drew different conclusions, analysis and evaluation of historical events and personalities. That approach embraced aspects of radical teaching by empowering students in the construction of the class where they could, if they wanted, lead the discussion to areas that are sensitive issues at Catholic universities such as gay studies or the history of contraceptives, abortion, and women in the church.

The first three weeks of the class were a general overview of the field of history and how historians work. I started out with the basics. We discussed what history is, what evidence is, the difference between primary and secondary sources. We questioned how history is subjective on the basis of evidence used, the interests of the researcher, and the questions asked. We also discussed the historical profession as gendered, and some of the controversies and struggles that have emerged with the rise of women's history and gender history. The class then turned to basic exercises of gender analysis. We discussed the meaning of gender, and how it is applied to history. (6) Due to the industry in the city and the long history and presence of organized labor, we considered gender and work (what types of work have women traditionally performed? and men?), and we also contemplated gendered characteristics (what is a feminine trait versus a masculine trait? And why are certain traits more accepted than others?).

In these early exercises, I introduced the concept of power and how it relates to work and its intersection of race and gender. What were the areas of work where African American women were employed? African American men? Latino men and women? Middle Eastern men and women? The students and I considered local examples of gendered work. For example, Mexican artist Diego Rivera's murals of the Rouge River Ford Plant at the Detroit Institute of Arts offered an excellent representation of work and gender that many students are familiar with in the Metro-Detroit area. In the mural, African America men work in the foundry and on the line alongside other blue-collar Latino and Anglo workers. Anglo women work as secretaries and nurses, or they are the elite voyeurs on factory tours. Elite Anglo men dressed in suits and ties observe the workers or perform modern miracles as scientists or doctors. African American women and Latinas are non-existent. So too are Arab Americans whose neighborhoods surround the plant. The mural reveals the gendered and racial intricacies of power and work.

We considered in the course how race, ethnicity, class, and religion may affect what was considered feminine and masculine, and how these may be different from US or Westernized constructions of gender. Students were encouraged to analyze gender from their own positions as informants of the past and the present. (7) Many students talked about how their grandparents came to Detroit during the Great Migration to work in the factories and the type of work they performed. At times, these discussions offered students a vehicle to consider and position their own contemporary work situations and how those are gendered. An Arab American student discussed her personal struggle with gender, family, and work. After working 60 hours in her parents' store, she argued with them about going out at night. She argued that due to the amount of hours she worked for the family, she was entitled to her freedom without questioning. She stated that she had to educate her parents about what it means to be an "American girl." This student served as her parents' cultural interpreter in this foreign land, and her comments reflect a phenomenon that scholars have noted. Women use their economic leverage in the family to gain or demand certain status or privileges.

After the introductory part of the class, we read articles focusing on women in Vicki Ruiz and Ellen DuBois's Unequal Sisters as well as Peter N. Stearns's Gender in World History. (8) The articles in Unequal Sisters served as examples of research on gender and women's history throughout the class. Students read about individual women who were African American, Asian American, Latinas, and lesbians, and they read about other themes in women's history such as the cosmetics industry, business owners, single women, musicians, housewives, and servants. We discussed how the articles presented and analyzed gender. We questioned how race, class, and sexuality intersected with gender, and we considered what was missing from the articles and the books. What other stories were there? What further research ideas and questions did the articles promote? For the Detroit area classroom, we questioned, why were there no articles on Arab American women's or gender history? (9) We questioned what the meaning of absence from history is, and who has the power to decide who is historically "significant" and who is not.

Within the first month, they chose the topic that they pursued for the rest of the semester. At the end of the first month, the students submitted an annotated bibliography that served as the basis of their final research project. Once they submitted their bibliographies, each student and I met to discuss how to narrow the topic for a 3,000 to 3,500-word paper. Due to the lack of available library sources on the campus, we also discussed where in the metro area they could find sources for their topic.

Thus, the students embarked on a scavenger hunt (to them) in search of primary research (to me). I encouraged students to visit parts of the city that they might not know to understand the cultures or themes they wished to study. For example, one student wanted to examine Middle Eastern gender, and I encouraged her to visit the libraries in Dearborn and the Arab bookstores and cultural centers. The students were encouraged to broaden their own knowledge of gender, but also their knowledge of their city and its surroundings.

To further develop a greater understanding of the intersection of race and masculine gender and how it influenced nationalism and imperialism, we looked at George Mosse's work The Image of Man. (10) In groups, the students presented the chapters and examined how masculinity was gendered, and how race, class, ethnicity, and religion intersected in Europe to construct a masculine archetype that was riddled with meanings of power and oppression. Students found that Mosses argument, that Europeans first developed their concepts of race and construction of the Other, whether the Jew in France and Germany or the Irish in Great Britain, resonated in the other texts and in their research.

Along with Mosses work, we examined Sonya Michel and Robin Muncy's Engendering America. (11) The students saw excellent examples of primary evidence that they could, if appropriate, bring into their final project. More importantly, the students recognized the similarities between Europe and the United States in the use of race and gender as a means of social control. Students read racist references by Elizabeth Cady Stanton against immigrant and African-American men made in the hope of attaining suffrage for elite women. Although Stanton was a major force for the attainment of the women's right to vote, she embraced a racist rhetoric that was also elitist to further her own agenda. She argued not for the extension of the vote to all women, but to a certain class and race of women. (12)

More structured to classroom teaching, Michel and Muncy provided students guiding questions to consider while reading the documents. Like Mosse, they also include images. Again, as a class we considered the lack of material on the experience of immigrant men and women, particularly Middle Eastern, Eastern European, and East Indian. Building upon early feminist scholars' criticism of historical periodization that is used to denote watershed events such as the Civil War, World War I, and World War II, we also noted that the thematic structure of Michel and Muncy did not take into account immigrant experiences and different views of gender. (13) In the final sections of the text, the immigrant experience was completely neglected though the 2000 census revealed that the United States has more immigrants than ever before. Again, the ability to create history is a profound form of power.

To further empower students as historians and also as gender critics, the students had to flex that power and criticism when they presented a piece of material culture or image and analyzed their chosen find using gender as the category of analysis. Their brief presentation was the first of two peer-evaluated assignments. This exercise offered me the opportunity to see if the class understood the concepts of gender, how to critically think about gender, and apply their criticism in a historical context. It also offered the dam and me insight into who was pulling their weight in the group work on the Mosse and Michel and Muncy books. For the most part, I as thrilled with their work, but more importantly, I saw their enthusiasm. he first presentation was controversial. Visoni Rimson showed an image of a young, muscular man in leather briefs who gazed coyly at the camera; he image was from gay erotica. He juxtaposed hat image with an analysis of the Greek image, the idealized Western view of masculinity. The class was particularly attentive in part due to the image and subject matter. Rimson's presentation was highly detailed and analytical, questioning constructs of the idealized Western masculine image of man as a representation of homoerotica. Rimson questioned the glorification and objectification of the male body that glorified the Aryan male and was manipulated for social and political purposes such as in Nazi Germany. (14)

Although not as controversial, another student enthusiastically discussed her methodology. Cierra McFarlin went to the Detroit Public Library where she found images of women in Detroit in the 1920s. In one image, the hot was of four men and women at the lake. The women had bobbed hair, and they were smoking. A second image was of an elite woman sitting in her Ford, wrapped in a fox stole with a cigarette dangling from her mouth. McFarlin talked about the shifts in sexual mores of women in the 1920s that scorned the rigidity of Victorian ideals. Moreover, she also talked about all the other images she found and how she worked with the archivists. Her research reflected her growing awareness of gender and power and how marginalized people, in this case women, subvert those in power to transform cultural life.

Other students showed forms of cultural and gender resistance. Colleen Anderson took a different approach by questioning the gender rhetoric of the Communist Party of the United States (CPUSA). Anderson showed an image of a CPUSA beauty pageant that she found in her research. She talked about how the CPUSA embraced traditional gender roles, while allowing women certain nontraditional roles in activism. Tracy Irby brought in images of "Mammy" that she collected and that can also be found at the Charles Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit. In her presentation, she juxtaposed her figurines with images of real "Mammies" and described their work and their relations with their masters' families. No longer the smiling, asexual white construction of African American women, Mammy now had a real name, a husband, children, and recognized influence. Irby also discussed the influence Mammies had on their owners and employers. Mammies had access to the secrets of the family that they served. Thus, they could spread information among themselves about the families that may or may not have reached the ears of their masters' peers.

Once the students completed their image or material culture analysis, we moved on to discuss sexuality and gender. We examined parts of David Halberstam's The Fifties. In the section about Alfred Kinsey, the students considered what Kinsey's work told us about sexuality and gender of the 1950s, and particularly about homosexuality in the United States. (15) We considered how the 1950s were viewed, but again, we considered what the film was telling us versus the idealized images of Ozzy and Harriet. (16) And again, the intersection of race, class, gender, and power was all too evident. One section of Halberstam's film focused on Emmett Till and his brutal murder. (17) One student stated in regards to the fourteen year old boy who was murdered because he was "fresh" to a white woman: "The boy was made into a man/child so he could be murdered." The students recognized how rhetorically the child Emmet Till became the embodiment of deviant black male sexuality. We considered how race and the gendered constructions and meanings of "child" were manipulated in Mississippi. Till had be turned into a man so that white adult males could justify their brutal murder of a child.

The final presentations of the students reflected an acute knowledge of gender and power, but also how people resist gender constructions. In the final presentation, students displayed the evolution of their research. Joanna Karner contemplated the role of women in the Catholic Church. Her topic came from her rejection of the Church, but also her continued fascination with the religion of her childhood. Using contemporary church writings and feminist criticism, she explored her own unease with the Church by using gender as a category of analysis. She questioned the use of masculine power and authority within the Catholic Church, but she also learned how women resist the authority by following their own conscience on key Church teachings, such as birth control.

One of the most interesting discussions came from Rimson who initially used the gay erotica image. He explained that the theme for his paper, the gay body in sports, was inspired by the brutal murder of his best friend who was a gay athlete. His friend was murdered by his fellow teammates when they found him and another player embracing in the shower. Using Mosse and queer analysis, Rimson discussed the gay body in sports as a complex archetype riddled with meanings and contradictions within the world of sports, but also among the spectators. (18) On the one hand, the homoerotic celebration of the male body in sports is highly acceptable, and yet gays are continually bashed whether on the playground or in the locker room.

The presentations led to considerable discussion about gender and its intersection with race, class, sexuality, and culture. At times, the topics were uncomfortable for some students, but the discussions that took place offered a space for students to show their own knowledge and to learn from one another. The final papers that I received from the class were probably the best in four years. Although not all the papers were grammatically correct or well-cited and documented, the students' analysis of gender was highly sophisticated. The class may have been schizophrenic in its thematic approach, but it exposed students to a wide range of interpretations of gender. In turn, they contemplated gender in a more profound and historical approach. Viewing them as knowledgeable or as experts who have insight into gender empowered the students to take their analysis to a deeper level. In turn, they viewed one another as informed experts. Their questions of one other were respectful but probing, reflecting what they had learned from one another. Their presentations brought a unique, diverse, and expanded interpretation of gender history that I alone could never have covered in the class. Lastly, the class offered students a safe space to talk to one another about controversial subjects and ideas. In feedback, students responded to the atmosphere of the class. They felt empowered and knowledgeable; they realized that they too were experts who had the power to engage in historical research and inquiry.

NOTES

(1) This paper is based on the Introduction to Gender History at the University of Detroit Mercy, Detroit, Michigan in spring term 2002. I want to thank all the students for their participation and work. Those students who are named in the text granted their permission to use their names.

(2) Nichole M. Christian, Detroit Journal: Mexican Immigrants Lead A Revival," New York Times, (March 21, 2000); "For Hispanics, Census Should Give Added Clout, "Detroit Free Press, (March 10, 2001).

(3) For discussions on teaching in Detroit, see Hal Friedman, " 'Red, White, and Black' in the Motor City'. Teaching the Early American Survey at a Comprehensive Metro Detroit Community College," The History Teacher vol. Nov. 2001 (http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ht/35.1/friedman.htm); Jose Cuello, Power Tools for Teaching and Learning at an Urban-Access University, online articles, American Historical Association, (http://www.theaha.org/pubs/cuello.html).

(4) Gerda Lerner, "A View from the Women's Side," The Journal of American History, vol. 76, 2 (September 1989), 446-456; and Judith Zinser, History and Feminism: A Glass Half Full (New York: Twayne 1993).

(5) Paulo Freire, Pedagogy of the Oppressed (New York: Continuum 1972); and Peter Steams, Meaning over Memory: Recasting the Teaching of Culture and History (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina, 1993), 16 and 17.

(6) Joan W. Scott, "Gender: A Useful Category of Analysis" American Historical Review vol. 91:5 (December 1986), 1053-1075. I link this article to the class web article. It is also there for them to return to read while they are conducting their own research.

(7) Lerner, Why History Matters: Lift and Thought (New York: Oxford University Press, 1997). For a recent discussion of such an approach, see Gerald E. Shenk and David Takacs, "History and Civic Participation: An Example of the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning, "Perspectives, vol 40 (April 2002), 30-32.

(8) Ruiz and Ellen Carol Dubois, Unequal Sisters: A Multi-cultural Reader in U.S. Women's History (New York: Routledge 2000); and Peter N. Stearns, Gender in World History (New York: Routledge, 2000).

(9) Arab population in Detroit dates back to the early 1900s. Nabeel Abraham , "Arab Immigration," presented at "Detroit Immigration: Past and Future: A Legal and Social Perspective," University of Detroit Law School, October 25, 2001. See also Nabeel Abraham and Andrew Shyrock, Arab Detroit: From Margin to Mainstream. (Detroit: Wayne State University, 2000); and Anan Ameri and Yvonne Lockhood, Arab Americans in Metro Detroit: A Pictorial History (Arcadia 2001). In Unequal Sisters, bibliographies are listed, and Arab American women are not recognized with a separate bibliography.

(10) George L. Mosse, The Image of Man: The Creation of Modern Masculinity (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996). I would also consider using Gail Bederman, Manliness and Civilization: A Cultural History of Gender and Race in the United States, 1880-1917 (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1995). Although there are many excellent books on masculinity, I chose Mosses book for the class (like Bederman's) but also because of its discussion of archetypes.

(11) Sonya Michel and Robyn Muncy, Engendering America: A Documentary History, 1865 to the Present, Boston: McGraw-Hill College, 1999). I do consider this an excellent text for its Post-World War II focus on a Black/White construction of US history that is rapidly shifting in large cities.

(12) Elizabeth Cady Stanton, "An Open and Deliberate Insult to the Women of the Nation," in Engendering America.

(13) This section built upon the early work of feminist scholars such as Joan Kelly, Women, History, and Theory: The Essays of Joan Kelly (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 1-19.

(14) See Mosse, The Image of Man. One of the most well-known depictions of the glorification of the Aryan masculinity can be found in Leni Riefenstahl, director, Triumph of the Will," 120 mins., 1934:2002, videocassette.

(15) David Halbertstam, The Fifties: Volume 4: A Burning Desire, 100 mins., 1997, videocassette.

(16) In other dames, I have supplemented this section with other films, such as Yvonne Welbon, director, "Living with Pride: Ruth Ellis at 100," 60 minutes, 1999, videocassette. In the film Ellis discusses the lack of bars and clubs for gay African Americans in Detroit in the 1930s-1950s.

(17) David Halbertstam, The Fifties: Volume 6: The Rage Within and the Road to the Sixties, 100 mins., 1997, videocassette.

(18) In one section of his paper, Rimson contemplated the image of Billy Gunn or Mr. Ass whose theme song is riddled with homoerotic imagery for the consumption of a wrestling fans. "I'm an Ass Man/I love to pick 'em/I love to stick 'em/So many asses so little time/I'm a lover of every kind/The best surprises always sneak up from behind."

ELAINE CAREY is an Assistant Professor of Latin American History at St. John's University. She received a Ph.D. from the University in New Mexico and an M.A. and a B.A. from Florida State University. Her research areas include Latin American social movements and gender studies. Her recent and forthcoming publications focus on the 1968 Mexican student movement.