2023 Feminist Practice Award

Presented annually the Feminist Practice Award recognizes department majors or minors whose work in community service or social action best exemplifies the application of feminist though to practice.

Winner:  Adriana Farmer–Mohamed

The 2023 Feminist Practice Award goes to Adrianna Farmer–Mohamed for thoughtful and committed feminist work across many different contexts. Adrianna is majoring in American Culture and Ethnic Studies, with a minor in Gender and Health. She has created opportunities to leverage feminist scholarship as a doula, a patient advocate in a local hospital, within many campus groups, and in retail jobs. For instance, while acting as a Patient Care Technician at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital, Adrianna worked to find Halal foods for patients, a religious need that was otherwise ignored by care providers. We commend Adrianna for her thoughtful attention to these, and other, needs shaped by gender, race, class, and religion, and celebrate the myriad ways she has enacted feminist practice.

2023 Undergraduate Dorothy McGuigan Prize

Each year, the Dorothy McGuigan Prizes are awarded to the best essays on women and gender written at the University of Michigan. The prizes honor the memory of Dorothy Gies McGuigan, a distinguished alumna of the University of Michigan who taught in the School of Business Administration and the Residential College.

Winner: Grey Weinstein

Black Transgender Community Building as an Alternative to Assimilation: Lessons from Miss Major Griffin-Gracy’s Oral History.

In the powerful essay, “Black Transgender Community Building as an Alternative to Assimilation: Lessons from Miss Major Griffin-Gracy’s Oral History,” Grey Weinstein uses the oral history of Miss Major Griffin-Gracy to examine the complex history of queer and trans activism in the Black community. Acknowledging the complex intersections of racial, gendered, social, and economic forces, Grey argues that “while Griffin-Gracy’s early life speaks to what many Black trans people feel is the necessity of assimilation into militant capitalist systems as a means of survival, her later work demonstrates the effectiveness of building alternative structures founded on Black trans community.” With nuanced analysis, the paper engages American history and shifting cultural norms through the lens of an important figure. Grey Weinstein is a senior majoring in Political Science and International Studies, with a minor in LGBTQ and Sexuality Studies. Grey wrote this paper in Prof. JenniferJones’ course “Black Queer Histories.”

Honorable Mention: Julia Watt

How Being Good Enough at Gender Determines if I’m Good Enough at my Passion.

 

2023 Graduate Dorothy McGuigan Prize Winners

Co-winner: Jessica Kiebler - Their great shame is poverty: Women portrayed as among the “undeserving poor” are seen as deserving sexual assault.

Co-winner: Sangita Saha - Women’s World of Vernacular Printed Books in Nineteenth Century Bengal: Battala, Bookwali and the Bhadramahila Reader.