Symposium on women’s lost histories to feature RCC, La Sierra profs

  College of Arts & Sciences   Arts+Culture  

RIVERSIDE, Calif. – Two Riverside higher education professors will lecture in a symposium that sheds light on the little-known contributions of women to scientific method and the discourse on mass violence.

Dr. Jo Scott-Coe, associate professor of English and creative writing at Riverside City College will deliver a talk at La Sierra University on women's voices in the discourse on mass violence during a library symposium on women’s lost histories. (Photo: Joshua Scheide)
Dr. Jo Scott-Coe, associate professor of English and creative writing at Riverside City College will deliver a talk at La Sierra University on women's voices in the discourse on mass violence during a library symposium on women’s lost histories. (Photo: Joshua Scheide)
Dr. Lora Geriguis, associate professor of English at La Sierra University will discuss 17th century aristocrat, writer and philosopher Margaret Cavendish during a talk during a library symposium on women’s lost histories. (Photo: Natan Vigna)
Dr. Lora Geriguis, associate professor of English at La Sierra University will discuss 17th century aristocrat, writer and philosopher Margaret Cavendish during a talk during a library symposium on women’s lost histories. (Photo: Natan Vigna)

Lora E. Geriguis, associate professor of English and associate dean of the College of Arts & Sciences at La Sierra University and Jo Scott-Coe, associate professor of English and creative writing at Riverside City College will give talks in a library symposium titled “Libraries as Site and Subject of Research on Lost Women’s Histories.” The event is co-hosted by the La Sierra University Library and the La Sierra University Department of English. It will be held Tuesday, April 10 at 5 p.m. at the La Sierra University Library Lincoln Room. Admission is free.

Geriguis’ talk, titled “Recovering One Woman’s Voice within Scientific History” will discuss Margaret Cavendish, a 17th century aristocrat, philosopher, writer, scientist and playwright who actively pursued publication and gifted books to major university libraries as well as to members of the Royal Society of London for the Improvement of Natural Knowledge founded in1660.  Cavendish became the first woman invited to one of the society’s meetings. Had she not pursued her course of action, “her oppositional voice in the debates that marked the rise of scientific methodology in 17th century England would have undoubtedly had been silenced and forgotten,” said Geriguis. “What can we learn about her modern world by rereading her today?”

Scott-Coe’s talk, “Recovering Women’s Witness in Violent History” will discuss the voices of women victimized in private prior to a public massacre whose words are lost or disregarded in official archives. She will delve into how newly-shared private letters, kept under wraps for 50 years, “bring more depth to our understanding of victims and perpetrators” in the infamous 1966 mass shooting at the University of Texas, Austin by former Marine Charles Whitman who took the lives of 15 people from atop a clock tower. He killed his mother and wife prior to the tower rampage.

“People say we are having a #metoo moment for women’s testimony. But listening is the labor of generations, not seconds,” says Scott-Coe. “Although public violence is often preceded by attacks or murders in the home, private crimes continue to be treated separately in the public imagination, avoided or even erased by repeated narratives. Making room for women's voices can expand and transform the narrative ‘canon’ on mass violence.”

La Sierra University is located at 4500 Riverwalk Parkway, Riverside. The La Sierra University Library is located off of Middle Campus Drive. A campus map is available at lasierra.edu/campus-map/. For further information call 951-785-2241.

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