National Women's Studies Association (10/19/07; 6/19-22/08)
Guaranteed Panel (Aging and Ageism Caucus)
Life writing is full of visible and invisible connections to people's ideas
about aging and old age. When younger people do creative pieces about their
own lives' futures, they often kill themselves off before they have to
imagine what being old is like. Many of the life writing projects created
for multigenerational collaboraton are life review studies, as if the past
was the main part of an old person's life worth considering and the future
was not going to be as interesting. How can feminist aging studies
positively affect these experiences? Panel presentations might consider, but
are not limited to, questions such as these:
-What is feminist life writing, inside and outside of academia?
- How might assignments channel the ideas of traditional-aged student or
returning students to reconsider ageist stereotypes?
- How might service learning projects incorporate such reconceptions?
- What is the value of doing revisiting our ideas of aging and old age via
course assignments and our own work, and what is the value of asking people
to bring feminist Aging and Age Studies concepts to focus on life review?
Queries and 1-page abstracts arriving by October 19, 2007 to
Leni Marshall
leni@agingstudies.edu
Email submissions preferred, but hard copies may be addressed to
Leni Marshall
Department of English
Century College
3300 Century Avenue
White Bear Lake, MN 55110
