Contemporary Gender Roles SIG
This OLLI Contemporary Gender Roles Shared Interest Group was started by Deborah Caine to study and explore cultural changes in the roles of men and women in the family and in the workplace and the multiple changes in gender presentation and identity exemplified in the growth of the LGBTQ+ communities; changes not always easily understood by many.
The group has grown over the last several years from three members to two dozen people who enjoy the lively monthly discussions on topics of urgent and current interest.
Members volunteer to lead a discussion on a topic of their choice and/or invite an outside speaker and circulate articles from major newspapers, magazines and journals that are relevant to group interests.
The Contemporary Gender Roles group sponsored an OLLI course on the Equal Rights Amendment in 2018 which was well attended.
We meet on Zoom at 2 pm on the third Wednesday of the month.
For more information about this SIG, please contact Ellen Croibier.
Gender SIG topics 2025
1. Molly Guidette to speak about gender as a social construct on January 15.
2. Yehudit Elkana to speak life for women and girls in Israel on February 19. Women in Black.
3. Nancy McIntire will discuss her work at Williams College and more broadly across New England around the transformation to coeducation in the late 1960s and 1970s on March 19.
4. Susan Birns about the Elizabeth Freeman Center’s 50th anniversary on April 16.
5. Barbara Viniar to present Magnficent Disrupter, the new bio of Betty Friedan on May 21.
6. Alexander Herrmann, nickname Sascz, transgender man, President of the Pittsfield Unitarian Church on June 18.
7. Rachel Occhiogrosso-Schwartz, owner of The Doll Haus on Wendell Street B’n’B for drag queens on July 16.
8. Nina Keneally to speak about her career as a producer on August 20.
9. Carrie Baker on Reproductive Rights post-election, September 17.
10. Steve Horn’s story as an “elder gay” on October 15.
11. TBD on November 19.
12. TBD on December 17.
OLLI: the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at Berkshire Community College |
