Women in the United Methodist Church (UMC) were officially granted full clerical rights over 50 years ago, and the church’s official stance is that women and men are to enjoy fully equal rights throughout all aspects of life and society, religious and otherwise. Despite these policies, however, women’s and men’s opportunities and experiences in professional ministry in the church remain far from equal. Women continue to be underrepresented in the leadership of the UMC, especially in more prestigious appointments and positions, and face challenges to their work, leadership, and authority throughout their ministries. In fact, national statistics from the UMC show that as of 2010, only 24.6% of the clerical leaders are women. In the Kentucky Annual Conference (KAC), the focus of the present study, women are even more sparsely represented, constituting only 13.56% of the leadership as of 2010 appointments, with few serving at larger churches and only one currently serving as a district superintendent; only four have ever served in that role in the Conference’s history. Using qualitative, semi-structured interviews, I collected data from 36 of the 118 clergy women of the 2010 Conference, including women serving in all types of positions in the Conference as well as all current and former district superintendents and many of the earliest pioneers in the KAC. The goal of this study is to understand from the perspectives of these clergy women their paths into and through ministry, the support and resistance that play such key roles in their lives and work, how their families affect and are affected by their work, and the symbols and symbolic actions that they use to claim and demonstrate the authority they have been given and to navigate some of the obstacles in their paths. In order to provide a theoretical framework for this study, I used primarily social constructionism and standpoint theory and related methods.

Using an institutional ethnographic approach, this research explores the everyday experiences of women living with Multiple Sclerosis and the work they do to understand and manage their illness. Starting with the women's own accounts of their everyday experiences with MS, this research analyzes and explicates the social relations that are involved in their everyday taken-for-granted lifework. An exploration of the ruling institutions coordinating with the everyday work of these women provides insight to some of the struggles and problems people with MS encounter. This project explicates and problematizes the disjuncture between the actual lived experience of having MS and the biomedical institution's authority over the illness. / Graduate

The purpose of this qualitative study is to enrich the understanding of the counselling and psychotherapy experiences of women who have previously or currently worked in the Canadian sex industry. I conducted semi-structured interviews with 6 participants ranging in age from 19 to 52 who described an individual counselling experience in which they revealed their sex work employment status. I analyzed the interview drawing from a Gadamerian hermeneutic phenomenological approach grounded in feminist standpoint theory. The results revealed 17 themes organized in 5 categories: (a) seeking counselling, (b) the therapeutic relationship, (c) disclosure of sex work, (d) counselling outcomes, and (e) recommendations for counsellors working with sex workers. The results shed light on indoor sex worker clients’ heterogeneous counselling needs, expectations, and experiences, providing valuable considerations for culturally responsive and socially just practice with sex workers. The discussion of the results reflects previous research studies, clinical implications, and suggestions for future research.

MGS / Institute for Gender and Youth Studies / ‘Gonyalelwa lapa’ is a form of a marriage whereby a family marries a woman to a deceased son who passed on without having biological children, for the purpose of restoring or reviving the deceased’s name. The woman is married with her existing children, or to bear children who will take the surname of the deceased man. Women find it difficult to leave such marriages for the fear of losing their children whom they signed off by accepting to be married under this type of marriage. This study employs the feminist standpoint methodological approach in order to explore experiences of women who are married for ‘lapa’. The study purposefully selected a sample of 8 women who are married under ‘Gonyalelwa lapa’ as well as 4 key informants. Findings demonstrate that women marry for ‘lapa’ mainly for economic reasons, to escape stigmatization, for the acquisition of the marital surname, which is tied to being acknowledged, respected and recognized by the community. Nevertheless, these women face multidimensional challenges within their in-laws’ households: they receive no support from the inlaws; their girl-children suffer discrimination based on ‘sex-preference’, boys are given more value on the basis that a boy will be able to perpetuate a deceased man’s name. Most women married under this type of marriage suffer from emotional and economic abuse at the hands of their in-laws. The study reveals that these challenges are attributed to lack of physical presence of the husband in the family. The study recommends that a large scale study be conducted on this or related topic, to build knowledge and create an awareness of such a marriage as to facilitate its inclusion in Customary Marriage Act.

Abstract WHY WOMEN GIVE TO WOMEN: A PORTRAIT OF GENDER-BASED PHILANTHROPY AT A PUBLIC COLLEGE IN VIRGINIA By Amy Gray Beck, Ph.D. A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University. Virginia Commonwealth University, 2019 Chair: Katherine Cumings Mansfield, Ph.D., Associate Professor, Educational Leadership and Cultural Foundations, School of Education, UNC Greensboro The cost of public higher education is steadily increasing, with state and federal government cutting its support year after year. Students are having to pay more out of pocket for classes and tuition, and institutions rely on private funding support to provide educational opportunities to students in need. Historically, fundraising operations in higher education have focused on a traditional solicitation model, focusing on fundraising from men in households, but savvy institutions have begun to focus on philanthropy from specific populations, including women, to increase dollars raised. Research shows women are more philanthropically generous than their male counterparts, especially when giving to education. The main purpose of this qualitative case study was to highlight the successes of a women and philanthropy program at William and Mary, a public college in Virginia, as it is the first and only women and philanthropy program in the country where the funds donated are given back to benefit women, as well as add to the growing body of literature on women and philanthropy, and the lack of literature that exists on women giving to women in higher education. The alumnae initiatives endowment funded by the Society of 1918 offers alumnae leadership development, networking opportunities, continuing education, empowerment, and more. Private funding in this case is enabling a social justice program to exist that otherwise would not be funded through tuition and state and federal funding. Interviews, observations, and document analysis were utilized to examine contextual factors contributing to the development of the Society of 1918 and motivations for members joining the Society at a $10,000 level. A feminist standpoint theoretical framework helped to develop meaning-making of alumnae’s motivations for joining the Society of 1918. Utilizing portraiture as a qualitative method, findings showed how gender and timely social justice movements played a role in influencing alumnae motivations to join the Society of 1918. Finally, best practices are shared for institutions considering a comprehensive women and philanthropy program whose private gifts benefit women.

This study attempts to examine how gender roles appear in the adaption of Margaret Atwood’s published book, The Handmaid’s Tale TV series, which introduces the fictional and dystopian society Gilead, where the infertility rates decreased as the result of climate change. This study focuses on the first, second and third seasons of the TV series from 2017-19. A qualitative method was used to study how groups of males and females are portrayed in a hierarchy. This study examines how males and females are represented in The Handmaid’s Tale through a content analysis with multimodal critical discourse analysis as a method, completed with gender system theory and feminist standpoint theory.  In the study, we focused on four groups of females and two groups of males that were included in an obvious ranking in the hierarchy of Gilead. All of the groups were analyzed separately to observe how their gender roles were represented in the TV series. Consequently, we compared the male groups to the female groups to examine the differences between their representation and ranking in the hierarchy in Gilead. The results of this study shows that males are dominant and females are submissive in Gilead, which confirms the gender theory used in this study. The low-ranking groups of females, such as the handmaids or the marthas also confirmed the existence of the feminist standpoint theory. It shows that the groups of males were placed in the highest ranking in the hierarchy in Gilead, even though some of the women seemed to be powerful, it was not enough to dominate all of the male groups in the hierarchy.

This study aims to examine play as a phenomena from a phenomenological approach. This I do by discussing a dominant approach to play, an perspective which is reproduced in the context of pre-school and in where the play and learning is in single focus. Using alternative perspective on play, mainly by Gadamer and Bakthtins philosophical thoughts about the feast or the carnival, contents differ significantly from educational or developmental psychology perspectives. I open up for an understanding of what play as ontology can be understood as, and thereby enable second readings. I illustrate this thought by an empirical example from a pre-school context which where created alongside with the children in the study. Thesis that has inspired the methodology and the empirical approach includes a feminist research tradition where power analysis and critical theory of science usually has been the main focus.

Drawing on literature about place-based education and service-learning, as well as three groups* perspectives about their service-learning experiences, this research describes how place (understood simultaneously as a material agent, a setting for human activity, and a factor in an individual*s situatedness) and identity (understood in terms of one*s social position) are socially- constructed concepts that impact students* writing and learning experiences. More specifically, this project presents place-based education as a teaching method that can focus and reinvigorate service-learning in a writing course. Including place-based content and service-learning projects in a writing course requires careful design and reflection. However, course design should not be an activity limited to just teachers. In alignment with feminist research methods and standpoint theory, this research values and privileges the perspectives of stakeholders who are not normally included in the course design process: students and community partners. To present a rich account of these stakeholders* experiences designing, implementing, and participating in a place-based service- learning project, a combination of qualitative data methods (interviews, classroom observations, and textual analyses) is used. This information serves as the basis for the design of a place-based writing course with a local service-learning component. The proposed course asks students to work with community partners to identify a place-based need that can be addressed—at least in part—by writing-related service. By collaborating with community partners, creating writing products that address community needs, and reflecting on how their identities and learning experiences have been impacted by the places they*ve worked and the communities they*ve worked with, students can apply their knowledge in meaningful contexts, write for real audiences, and develop more thorough understandings of the places where they study, work, and live.

Gender lens investing (GLI) considers gender-based factors across the investment process to advance gender equality and better inform investment decisions. It recognizes that gender-based discrimination persists in many areas of society, including access to economic opportunities. The aim of this study is to understand GLI as a phenomenon using the feminist standpoint theory. The research question guiding this study is: how does the management team of a venture capital fund interpret and implement gender-lens investing? The study conducted an in-depth case study on Company X, a venture capital fund that invests with a gender lens. The results were supported by interviews with the management team and company documents and were categorised according to the interpretations of GLI and key lessons to fulfil the aim. We conclude considerable efforts are underway to achieve the end goal of gender equality, however, in view of the shortcomings discussed, there is still room for improvement. The results and discussion can be used to better understand the phenomenon of GLI and lessons in the development of gender-responsive investment strategies.

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