Women Discussing Their Differences: A Promising Trend

In the last three months the authors have actively participated and been invited to several major conferences that bring women of color together to dialogue, network and develop skills and strategies to enhance their advancement and organizational contributions. There are a number of underlying fact...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Diversity Factor (Online) 2004-07, Vol.12 (3), p.22
Main Authors: Holvino, Evangelina, Blake-Beard, Stacy
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
African Americans
Asian Americans
Business networking
Conferences
Corporate officers
Employment
Female employees
Leadership
Minority & ethnic groups
Professional development
Race
Stereotypes
White people
Women
Workplace diversity
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Summary:In the last three months the authors have actively participated and been invited to several major conferences that bring women of color together to dialogue, network and develop skills and strategies to enhance their advancement and organizational contributions. There are a number of underlying factors and undercurrents that accompany conversations across differences in these types of conferences. The first issue is that the dominance of race in their experiences as women differs across diverse racial and ethnic groups, let alone individuals. Another common dynamic that they see in these conversations is that social differences are often reduced to a black-white discourse that makes all other ethnic groups invisible. While the authors are not proposing that women of color conferences become the latest "diversity fix," they want to underscore that these conferences serve a number of important functions: they are an oasis, an opportunity for women to come together, recharge and reclaim their full and differentiated identity as working women.
ISSN:1545-2808