By Azhley Rodriguez
The event #IAmWoman included a panel discussion that highlighted continuing gender-based discrimination in the workplace and in leadership positions.
The Center for Cultural Liberation (CCL) hosted #IAmWoman; an event to discuss issues that face women in the workplace and in leadership positions. About 30 people attended the virtual event.
Panelists included Christina Perez, chair and associate professor of sociology and criminology; Precious Porras, chief diversity officer; and Radia Mchabcheb, a graduate counseling intern.
Gabriella Nicholas, the assistant director for the CCL, emceed the event and guided the audience through a series of questions for the panelists to take turns answering. The first question: What does being a woman mean to you?
“I can’t separate this identity from my race,” Porras said. “As a Black woman, it means community.”
Other panelists highlighted similar themes of strength, guidance, and community in their answers referring to the struggle’s women face in the workplace.
“Womanhood – the first thing that comes to my mind – strength,” Mchabcheb said. “We’ve seen that individual thinking and Western ideas of thought haven’t helped us as a community.”
The panelists advocated for policies that need to be altered to promote gender inclusive workplaces.
Issues such as breaks that are too short for nursing mothers to pump milk for their children while at work, mothers who are expected to take time off after giving birth but not expecting the same from the father of the child and the lack of lactation spaces in workplaces.
“There are no lactation spaces for professors on Dominican’s campus. We’re told to use our offices and some of us share our offices,” Perez said.
Perez also noted that faculty meetings are usually held during the evening times when mothers might need to pick up their children, which leads to less attendance from women in these meetings.
The event concluded with a reading of the poem “Phenomenal Woman” by Maya Angelou read by Jacqueline “Jacky” Neri Arias, director of the CCL.
“It’s important to make institutional change by having these conversations,” Jacky said.
Women’s History Month occurs annually during the month of March.
arodriguez2@my.dom.edu
