154: The Self-Empowered Woman Mildred Dresselhaus

Dear Followers,



Can you imagine--at the age of 81--happily going to work each and every day, and loving what you do? Meet Mildred Spiewak Dresselhaus, who was born in Brooklyn on November 11th, 1930 and is an Institute Professor and Professor of Physics and Electrical Engineering (Emeritus) at MIT. She has taught there ever since she became a visiting professor of Electrical Engineering in 1967, and she has been a tenured faculty member since 1968.

Her parents were immigrants from Poland, and her father always had a hard time finding work (1: No Parental Safety Net). During her childhood, the family often had only meager amounts of food, she had no toys, and owned only one set of clothes, which her mother would wash each night (12: Hard Times).

Because she grew up in a tough neighborhood, she learned to protect herself against bullies when her family moved to the Bronx and she had to travel on the elevated train and the subway (as a six year old) to a school in Greenwich Village. In her words, "The scariest part was coming home and getting off the train in the Bronx, when I had to walk through that dangerous neighborhood. But I survived."

Dresselhaus' older brother was a musical prodigy, and at the age of six she also received a music scholarship. Today, she still plays violin and viola in chamber groups (9: Music).

After attending Hunter High School, Dresselhaus then enrolled at Hunter College where she thought she would become an elementary school teacher because "At that time there were only three kinds of jobs commonly open to women: teaching, nursing and secretarial work." At Hunter she took a class in elementary nuclear physics and her teacher was Rosalyn Yalow, who would later become a Nobel laureate. The class was small, and Yalow told her that she should focus on science. "After that, she was always in my life, writing letters of recommendation for me, keeping up with my progress." Like Dresselhaus, Yalow also came from a disadvantaged background and urged her student to press ahead despite detractors, taught her to recognize opportunity, work hard, and then followed her career with both "advice and love."

Then, when Dresselhaus enrolled in the University of Chicago for her graduate work, she studied with Enrico Fermi, who also had few students and took a great personal interest in each of them. Because they lived near each other, student and professor began walking together early each morning, "He had such a sharp mind. I learned how to think about physics from him." (4: Supportive Someone).

Known to her friends as Millie, Dresselhaus particularly enjoys interacting and working with her students at MIT. "I like to be challenged. I welcome the hard question and having to come up with a good explanation on the spot. That's an experience I really enjoy." (10: The Critic Within).

Dresselhaus became a Fulbright Fellow in 1951, earned a masters in physics from Radcliffe College in 1953, and a Doctorate in physics from the University of Chicago in 1958. As a married mother of four children, she was often harassed when working at the male-dominated Lincoln Lab if she arrived late or left early because of child-related issues (16: Intensive Motherhood). Most of her female colleagues left MIT, but she persevered and became one of the few female professors at MIT when the student body was only 2% female. (5: Life Is Not A Popularity Contest).

As a pioneering woman in science, Dresselhaus has received dozens of prestigious awards. These include 19 honorary doctorate degrees, the 1990 National Medal of Science, and she was one of five women (in 2007) to receive L'Oreal-UNESCO's Women in Science Award (13: More Than Meets The Eye).

Looking forward to your comments...

153: The Self-Empowered Woman: BRAVE/Merida

Dear Followers,

Last week's top grossing movie, BRAVE, represented another milestone for women. After 17 years of feature filmmaking (and a dozen box office hits) Pixar has given audiences it's first female animated protagonist. 

Merida (Kelly Macdonald), the film's heroine, is a doer rather than a princess who is merely waiting to be rescued. She rides a Clydesdale named Angus, and lets her long orange-red curls frame her face like an unruly mop of sunshine. At first, naysayers worried that only girls would buy tickets for a film that didn't have a traditional male hero. But those concerns evaporated when the box office results of $66 million proved otherwise.

The story line is that Merida's mother, Queen Elinor (Emma Thompson) has invited local clan leaders to visit and compete for Merida's hand in marriage. Like many mothers, Queen Elinor would like her daughter to be more ladylike and pay more attention to her appearance. Merida's father, King Fergus (Billy Connolly) represents the world of masculine freedom, hearty laughter and adventure. Like Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games, Merida is a wiz at archery because her father has given her a bow and taught this spunky princess to feel right at home in the great outdoors. Audiences can't help but identify with both mother and daughter when Queen Elinor tells Merida "A lady does not place her weapon on the table."

The photo above is of Brenda Chapman, who is considered a pioneering figure in animation. She was the first woman to serve as head of story on Disney's The Lion King, and she also worked on The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, Shrek, Ratatouille, Up, Toy Story 3, and a host of other animated features. 

Chapman spent six years on BRAVE, which was inspired by her relationship with her daughter. She told the Los Angeles Times "I have this daughter who is very strong willed, very independent natured...I wanted to do a story about a mother and a daughter and what that relationship is like, the struggle...I love fairy tales and I wanted to do one that wasn't a spoof--something with contemporary, modern women and families. It wasn't just the mother and daughter, but a contemporary kind of family set in an old world fairy tale." 

After creating Merida and working on the film for six years, Chapman had "creative differences" just before the film was ready to be released. Although she remains with Pixar, she now shares directing credit with Mark Andrews. 

Historically, the animation industry has been dominated by men (much like the whole field of engineering, i.e., software, technology, etc.), but that is changing. Jeffrey Katzenberg of DreamWorks recently announced that "almost every producer of our films is a woman." And today, at USC's Division of Animation and Digital Arts, at least half of the students in both the bachelor of art and masters programs are women.

Looking forward to your comments... 

152:The Self-Empowered Woman: UNC & ZONTA

Dear Followers,



I've been out of touch recently because--thanks to force of nature Sonia Cooper (Cooper & Holly)--Tony and I (plus the ever-enjoyable Ed Broderick) spent the last week in Colorado, where I had two keynote speaking engagements. The first was at the University of Northern Colorado (Greeley), where I spoke at the graduation ceremony for Las Chicas Matematicas, and met amazing young girls (14-18) who knocked my socks off with their ability to problem solve and work with numbers.

The next event was a Meet The Author fundraiser where I met local Colorado writers, and learned about the amazing work that ZONTA International does on behalf of women everywhere. ZONTA was founded in 1919, and has over 30,000 members in more than 1,200 clubs in 68 countries (see the map above). Some of the statistics they use to remind women why they should join ZONTA appear below: 

70% of the world's 1.3 billion "absolute poor" are women

2/3 of the illiterate adults in the world are women

2/3 of the children not in school are girls

60 million women who would be alive today are "missing" due to gender discrimination violence

Every year, over 40,000 women in developing nations die from pregnancy-related causes

To remedy those depressing statistics, ZONTA International strives to:

IMPROVE the legal, political, economic, health, educational and professional status of women through service and advocacy; 

WORK for the advancement of understanding, goodwill and peace through a world fellowship of executives in business and the professions; 

PROMOTE justice and universal respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms;

BE UNITED internationally to foster high ethical standards, implement service programs, and provide mutual support and fellowship for members who serve their communities, their nations, and the world.

For more information: http://www.zonta.org/

It was an honor to speak to so many enlightened and enthusiastic women last week, and the memories of my Colorado author tour will stay with me forever.

Looking forward to your comments...

151: The Self-Empowered Woman: Dr. V Mohini Giri

Dear Followers,

In the past, I've written about a variety of  troubling women's issues around the world: child prostitution in Cambodia, genital mutilation in Africa, Saudi Arabia refusing to allow women to drive, Afghanistan making it hard for girls to attend school, Japan's use of "Comfort Women" in WWII, Somalia's Islamic Militia terrorizing nomadic women, etc., etc., etc.

Today I'd like to introduce you to Dr. V. Mohini Giri, who has devoted her life to human rights and gender justice in India and South Asia. Currently, she is best known for her work on behalf of widows in India. These women, once their husbands die, are "highly stigmatized," and she must never 1) remarry, 2) dress differently (see the photo above), 3) fend for themselves, and 4) eat only once a day. Currently there are about 40 million widows in India (this means eleven percent of all Indian women) who are struggling against this cultural prejudice.

Vrindavan (which is "the city of widows" and has always been considered to be a holy place for Hindus in India), is where 15,000-20,000 widows have congregated and live on the streets: some have been there as long as 30 years. The women there pray for seven to eight hours a day in public, and in exchange they receive a few rupees and one cup of rice.; most widows also beg on the streets, in Dr. Giri's words "it's depressing and demeaning."

Dr. Giri speaks nine languages and has earned eight honorary degrees, in addition to the postgraduate degrees she earned as a student. She is famous in India for her work to empower women economically, legally, politically and socially. She was lucky enough to have a father who had studied at Harvard, and encouraged her to complete her education and be of service to others (even though he died when she was only nine years old). A widow herself, her father in-law was the former President of India from 1969-1974, and during that time she was very active in social welfare causes related to the Indo-Pakistani war.

According to Dr. Giri, the biggest obstacle to ensuring that older Indian widows be treated with respect "is patriarchy. They don't change--they think they are superior. Slowly women are breaking their silence, but only the educated ones." An organization called Guild of Service was established to help women in need. In addition, Dr. Giri runs the Ma Dham Shelter where women can live in a group environment, learn a skill, and receive room and board.

In spite of the overwhelming challenges she faces, Dr. Giri remains optimistic: "I have hope for the future when I see the women in this country today and women all over the world...When I see the grassroots elected women leaders speaking about gender budgeting in the government's fund allocation, my heart fill with pride. These are women who until a few years back could barely sign their names...Aren't dignity and love absolute elements of life for every woman, man, and child? Isn't the woman born into this world with the same rights as the man? Without the woman could there be any harmony within the family, community and environment? No nation can develop without the woman's well being."


Looking forward to your comments...

150: The Self-Empowered Woman: P.D. James

Dear Followers,

It seems fitting this week--when so many eyes are focused on London due to the Queen's Diamond Jubilee--that today's blog be focused on another amazing white-haired much-admired Englishwoman. I have been a fan of P.D. James ever since 1980, when I read Innocent Blood, which was her first best-selling novel in America. By now, of course, her dozens of books have earned her millions of fans around the world.

Born on August 3rd, 1920, in Oxford, England, Phyllis Dorothy James is today referred to as Baroness James of Holland Park (OBE, FRSA, FRSL), but when she was younger her life was far from enviable. She grew up during the Depression, and when she was a teenager her mother was in a mental hospital. That meant that James had to care for her younger brother and sister. At age 16 she had to leave school and go to work because her family was always in need of money (1: No Paternal Safety Net). Even though her jobs included work in a tax office, as an assistant stage manager for a theater group, hospital administration employee and civil servant work with the criminal section of the Home Office, James always wanted to be a writer (2: An Early Sense Of Direction).

In her words "I never doubted that [writing] is what I could do and wanted to do and psychologically needed to do...I think I was born knowing it. From an early age I used to tell imaginative stories to my younger brother and sister. I lived in the world of the imagination...writing was what I wanted to do--almost as soon as I knew what a book was." 

Raised as an Anglican, James--who is a Lay Patron of the Prayer Book Society--has made no secrets of her religious faith. "At a very young age, I moved away from the idea of the benign gentlemen up there in the sky. I think I always believed that God was not visible. I always thought of him as an in-dwelling spirit...I do continue to believe in the existence of God, that he is loving and that it's possible to be in contact with him...I do believe in redemption through love. That is my religion..." (3: Belief in the Unbelievable). 

In 1941, James married Ernest Connor Bantry White, an Army doctor, and they had two daughters. But when he returned from World War two he suffered a mental breakdown, ended up in a psychiatric hospital, and she had to support the family (12: Hard Times). In 1968, she took the civil service open exam and began work in the Home Office. In her words "They didn't normally want people who'd left school at 16, and very few women were successful. But I was number three in the country on the exam" (13: More Than Meets The Eye).

James began writing books in the mid 1950's, and her first novel Cover Her Face (published when she was 42) introduced readers to the perennially popular Adam Dalgliesh of New Scotland Yard. With strict work habits instilled in her from childhood, the detective novel appealed to James' pursuit of perfection. She told an interviewer "A detective story is very easy to write badly, but difficult to write well. There is so much you have to fit into 80 or 90 thousand words--not just creating a puzzle, but an atmosphere, a setting, characters...It takes me as long to develop the plot and work out the characters as to write the book. Sometimes longer." (10: The Critic Within). In those days, she would write from six until eight am and then go to work; she retired from her work in government service in 1979.

Never afraid to speak her mind, James recently ruffled feathers after she visited Sommerville College, Oxford and took note of the portraits of the first woman to graduate from the college versus those who are currently enrolled "If [those first female graduates] came back today, they would be horrified to see what kind of society we live in...So often this so-called independence means that you are paying someone else to do your work--you go out to work in order to earn money to pay the woman who is looking after your children. She is enjoying your children instead of you." And as a sitting member of the Tory side of the House of Lords, she became an outspoken opponent of political correctness (5: Life Is Not A Popularity Contest).

P.D. James has enjoyed a vastly successful career writing crime fiction, and in the genre she is as popular as Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Ruth Rendell and/or Patricia Cornwell. Obviously, she has spent decades being fascinated by mysterious death (7: Magnificent Obsession).

The young woman who for decades was never able to attend university (or start a career as a young writer)somehow managed to brilliantly--if belatedly--make her dream come true. She now has seven Honorary Doctorates and over a dozen major writing awards (8: Turning No Into Yes). James has always referred to her two daughters as "an absolute delight," and she has five grandchildren and seven great-grandchildren (16: Intensive Motherhood). 

When asked what her detective fiction said about her, James--who is now 91 years old and still writing--replied "That I am a woman who likes life to be ordered. In a long life, I have never taken a drug or got drunk...because the idea of being out of control is appalling to me...What I was doing was examining human beings under the strain of an investigation of murder...It's a fascinating way of dealing with people."

Looking forward to your comments...

149: The Self-Empowered Woman: Madeleine Stowe

Dear Followers,



Wednesday night's season finale of Revenge will leave TV viewers hungry to see more of Madeleine Stowe's complicated character Victoria Grayson. Just when her career was at it's peak after The Last of The Mohicans movie, Stowe decided to turn her back on the entertainment business and move with her husband (Brian Benben) to a 400 acre cattle ranch in Fredrickburg, Texas (14: Selective Disassociation).

Fortunately, the 53 year old actress is more than just another pretty face. And much of what makes her a substantial talent is the challenging childhood she faced in Eagle Rock (a working class neighborhood in LA). Stowe's mother was from an wealthy, aristocratic Costa Rican family, while her father came from a lower-class family in Oregon. He was prone to anger-management issues, and the situation escalated when--at age 28--he was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis; a self-taught civil engineer, he was forced to retire due to health issues when Stowe was only six years old (1: No Paternal Safety Net).

Because the disease took both his mobility and his memory, Stowe and her brother essentially wound up helping to provide full-time care to an uncommunicative father who spoke in one word sound bites, and spent his time watching one TV station and smoking two packs of cigarettes a day. Stowe recently told More magazine that as a young girl, she would stay near him with water in case his cigarettes might start a fire (12: Hard Times).

This type of a complicated home life caused a number of difficulties for Stowe while growing up. In addition to her anxiety and heightened sense of responsibility, she was also unable to have a normal social life as a schoolgirl. Because of what was going on at home, she was never able to invite other children to visit. In her words "I was always afraid of being deeply humiliated...I always had a recessive quality. i could never come out of the shadows too well" (5: Life is Not A Popularity Contest).

The one safety valve she had as a youngster came from her piano lessons with the Russian pianist Sergei Tarnowsky, who had taught the young Vladimir Horowitz; their lessons took place in a room that had two grand piano's placed side by side (9: Music). The other escape for Stowe was the movies, and during college she worked as an usher at a playhouse in Beverly Hills. While handing out programs one night, the pretty teenager was asked by legendary agent Meyer Mishkin if she'd ever thought about becoming an actress. Several months later, however, she signed with him--even though he primarily represented male stars like Charles Bronson, Richard Dreyfuss and Lee Marvin. He is credited with guiding her career and landing roles for her opposite Kevin Costner, Daniel Day Lewis, Jack Nicholson and James Purefoy (4: Supportive Someone).

For years, Stowe has worked to bring a movie about the abductions of settlers' children by Native Americans in the wild west to the big screen. The script (Unbound Captives) tells the story of a woman whose children are kidnapped by the Comanches in the 1860's, and for close to a decade Stowe has been determined to bring it to production and to act in it as well. Nine years ago, 20th Century Fox offered her $5 million for the script, but stipulated that there was no role for Stowe; she rejected their offer "without a moment's thought" (11: Risk Addiction).

But the project has been close to her heart for so long that by the time she turned 50, she'd had an epiphany. Because she was now too old to play the leading role of the mother, she decided she would direct the movie instead. Now in development, Hugh Jackman and Rachel Weisz have signed on, and Stowe admits that "I'm on fire with this idea of what I want this film to be." (8: Turning No Into Yes).

In 2008, Stowe's other passion emerged when she went to Haiti and met with Father Rick Frechette who heads the Saint Luke Foundation for Haiti. Ever since then she has frequently flown to Haiti and even participated in grim chores like processing dead bodies out of the Port-au-Prince public morgue. In addition to her on the ground work in Haiti she has also endeavored to raise money and interest in the work that needs to be done for the island's hardest hit (7: Magnificent Obsession).

Looking forward to your comments...
     

148: The Self-Empowered Woman: Donna Summer

Dear Followers,

It came as a real surprise last week to learn that Donna Summer (aka The Queen of Disco) had died of lung cancer even though she didn't smoke. Years ago I met and interviewed her at the Mayfair Hotel in London and was blown away by how open and warm she was. I had expected to meet a larger than life diva with attitude, but was pleasantly surprised to learn that the only oversized thing about her was her talent. She was one of the 68 women profiled in The Self-Empowered Woman, and even though her story was used as part of the Supportive Someone chapter she actually embodied several important traits.

LaDonna Adrian Gaines (born in Boston on December 31st, 1948), began singing as a toddler, and by the time she was a ten year old elementary school student (who was asked to fill in for a no-show soloist) she knew that she possessed a remarkable voice (2: An Early Sense of Direction). She sang in the church choir, but (remarkably) never had singing lessons or vocal training. The strength and power of her voice surprised her when she first began to sing in public, and astonished others for decades. Her tight knit family was strongly affiliated with Grant African Methodist Episcopal Church, and it was in that church where she believed that God told her she would be a famous singer, but that she must never misuse her talent (3: Belief In The Unbelievable).

Summer struggled for years with low self-esteem. One side of her face had been badly scarred in a childhood accident, and her siblings teased her by giving her the nickname "scarface." To make matters even worse, one of her girlfriend's father often poked fun at her by calling her "Donna Ugly," a taunt that stayed with her for years (6: Life Is Not A Beauty Contest).

When the teenaged Summer decided to suddenly audition for a psychedelic rock group called The Crow, which   was looking for a male lead singer (11: Risk Addiction), her rendition of Aretha Franklin's "R.E.S.P.E.C.T." secured her the position of the band's lead vocalist. The leader of The Crow was a young man named Hoby Cook, and he took Summer under his wing and, in her words, "...became Professor Henry Higgins to my Eliza Doolittle."  

Summer moved to New York after high school, but didn't find the success she had hoped for. What she did secure, however, was a role in the German production of "Hair," and that experience changed her life (8: Turning No Into Yes). While in Germany she recorded the 17-minute record "Love to Love You Baby," which became 1975's major disco hit.

Several years later, I attended her sold-out concert in Los Angeles at The Hollywood Bowl. Her performance  was being filmed for a network TV special, and I remember being amazed at how comfortable she was when it came to calling a halt to the filming whenever she was displeased with the orchestra or the lighting or whatever (10: The Critic Within). Summer's first marriage was to an actor she met when she lived in Europe (Helmuth Sommer), but after their daughter, Mimi, was born they divorced (15: Forget About Prince Charming). In 1980, she married Bruce Sudano, and they had two daughters, Brooklyn and Amanda.

Around 1985, untrue rumors spread that Summer had made anti-gay remarks, which resulted in a backlash from her fan base. Angry fans returned thousand's of her records, and the controversy negatively affected her record sales and her reputation (12: Hard Times). In 1989, Summer wrote a letter of apology to ACT UP, explaining that the alleged quote was untrue.  

Summer's mother, Mary, said that Donna sang from the time she could talk and "...literally loved to sing. She used to go through the house singing." And, obviously, that passion stayed with her until the very end. At the time of her death she had begun recording material for two new albums (7: Magnificent Obsession).

Looking forward to your comments....