Their presentations sported such diverse titles as “The Color of Music Heritage,” “Racist Humor in Late 19th Century Political Cartoons in Spain and the U.S.,” and “The Hair Dilemma: Professional Image Construction and Culturally Influenced Grooming Choices.”

As poles apart as their material appeared, however, the presenters shared a common goal: to engage in spirited dialogue that would transcend borders, both geographical and intellectual.

The Institute for Research on Women (IRW) and the Center for Race and Ethnicity joined hands earlier this month to sponsor their first joint faculty forum. The half-day program, “Gender, Ethnicity & Race: Global Perspectives,” brought together faculty and staff members from the New Brunswick, Newark, and Camden campuses to present research and to gain insight into each other’s areas of expertise.

“We saw this forum as a way to get a conversation started,” said Dorothy Hodgson, director of the IRW and one of the forum’s conveners. “Our ultimate goal was to overcome the challenge of Rutgers University geography. So many of us are working on a particular area of research, but we might not always know that someone on the next campus is working on the same thing.”

Keith Wailoo, director of the Center for Race and Ethnicity, said that faculty members are often invited to speak about their work at other universities, but “we often don’t have the opportunity to do so on our own campus with our own colleagues.” The meeting, Wailoo said, “helped shift that imbalance, while also helping break down the barriers of communication separating our centers and institutes.”

To launch the October 10 event on the Douglass Campus, Hodgson and Wailoo solicited papers on the interplay of gender, race, and ethnicity in disparate global contexts. They asked presenters to limit their presentations to five minutes to encourage lively interaction.

Hodgson herself planned to discuss her own research on “gendered indigeneities,” which she describes as “the ways gender and ethnicity articulate and interact to produce one another.” Wailoo envisioned speaking about his new work on the history of cancer and how issues of race and gender, along with science and technology, intersect in the disease's history

Amazed by the robust response to their call, however, both scrapped plans to present their own work to allow for the maximum number of scholars to speak. Zaire Dinzey-Flores led off the morning with a discussion on “Race, Class, and Gender Inequalities in Gated Communities in Puerto Rico.” An assistant professor in Latino and Hispanic Caribbean Studies/Sociology, Dinzey-Flores offered two models of life behind a community’s walls, one in an affluent private subdivision, another in low-income public housing. Community gates centralize the home as the locus of social life, while corralling unequal urban landscapes that protect elite lifestyles, imprison the poor, and regulate women, she observed.

Jyl Josephson, associate professor of political science at Rutgers-Newark, entitled her segment, “Sexual Citizenship and the ‘Healthy Marriage Initiative.’”  The federal marriage initiative, promoted by the Administration for Children and Families, seeks to promote “mutually enriching” relationships in which spouses have a “deep respect” for each other.

Cheryl Clarke, director of diverse community affairs with the Office of Social Justice Education, offered an overview of the new Livingston Social Justice Living-Learning Community. Conceived as a space where students can learn – and embody – the principles of social movements, the program offers 12 credit hours to students while exposing them to issues of poverty, inequality, and oppression. In its first year, the learning community has attracted 16 students who live together on the Livingston Campus while exploring the history, theory, and practices of social justice. Plans are under way to make social justice a minor in its own right, Clarke said.

David Hughes was among the many participants in the forum who brought dispatches from the writing front. An associate professor in the departments of Human Ecology and Anthropology and director of the Center for African Studies, Hughes shared insights into political and racial realities as reflected in his upcoming book, Skippers on Dry Land: Whites, Wilderness, and the Problem of Belonging in Zimbabwe. The book explores how white identity and environmental conservation have produced and shaped one another to the point where nature and recreation are “coded white” in that African nation – and, to a large extent, in the United States, Hughes said.

Hodgson gave this first collaboration glowing reviews, saying she foresees others following the same model. “It was more successful than I had hoped for. I was thrilled. We had people from Camden, Newark, New Brunswick – such a broad array of disciplines and professional schools,” she said.  Hodgson said the forum was particularly useful to junior faculty members who benefited from the opportunity to interact with their peers.