FRI Summer Reading Club: Black Feminists Dream

Tuesday, July 5:30 pm

at Feminist Research Institute and online

We are thrilled to introduce the third cohort of the Environmental Justice Leaders Program! For the 2024 cohort, six leaders across California were selected to participate in a knowledge exchange with UC Davis researchers. The Leaders are very committed and passionate about creating change in their communities and come with many years of doing the work on the ground! This year’s theme is mobility justice, focusing on matters of emerging transportation and energy and their intersection with racial equity. 

Our fifth annual 2024 FRI Transformative Research Symposium on May 10, 2024 was a success! Thank you to all of our presenters, FRI staff, and attendees. 

“Biking is a political issue. It’s a just issue”––Yolanda Davis-Overstreet

The concept of health brings up images of doctor visits at a clinic, eating balanced meals, or exercising at the gym. Feminism is not just theory, but practice, that centers on care and well-being of everyone, including health. The Feminist Health Justice Collective wanted to expand the idea of health, focusing on open education as empowerment for anyone to access. The team, consisting of faculty and students, built an online database from scratch. 

We are excited to continue the Earthly Feminisms Slow Reading group. Last winter, we engaged in questions of unsettling Western narratives of conquest, heroism and human exceptionalism; discussing the meanings and politics of what constitutes life; and lessons from other earthly species like mushrooms. This Spring we started off by reading on Black Ecologies to think about how ecologies too become racialized.

Thank you to everyone who participated in making FRI’s Strategic Planning Workshop a great success!* 

More than 30 people showed up on a stormy morning and joined us online. Those in attendance included undergraduate and graduate students and faculty from over 15 departments, staff from several offices, one state government agency, as well as engaged community members. 

A student researcher is sought to work for the Feminist Research Institute. The Feminist Research Institute is dedicated to changing research culture to be oriented towards justice and liberation. Scientific practices remain infused with the legacies of white supremacy, colonialism, and patriarchy. And we seek to change this. If this mission resonates with you, please read on!

Seasoned environmental justice professionals working in mobility justice are invited to apply for the 2024 UC Davis Environmental Justice (EJ) Leaders Program. Applications are open to all California-based leaders interested in collaborating with research communities at UC Davis to enhance their community-based efforts. This year’s programmatic theme is Mobility Justice: the rights of all to access freedom of movement in different spheres of life.

Celebrating our Past and Envisioning FRI’s Future

On December 1, 2023, FRI hosted its annual Open House from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. Thank you to all of the community members and UC Davis faculty, staff, and undergraduate and graduate students who attended. Together, we reflected on the history of FRI, discussed our current programming and feminist research visions, and began conversations about our plans for the future. 

Reflecting on the History of the Feminist Research Institute 

Join us for coffee, tea, snacks, and a space to work and think in community. Fridays from 10 am to 2 pm at the Feminist Research Institute. Happening every week during the school year! 

Meet our new 2024 Undergraduate Research Interns and Graduate Student Staff!  

FRI is excited to offer a Reading Group on "Earthly Feminisms" in Winter 2024. Join us for slow readings on feminist sts, environmental humanities, and decolonial thought for reconciling loss, restoring hope, and reimagining more livable futures. Group will choose readings. Pace is approximately 1 book/month. All welcome!

Sign up here!

FRI's Associate Director, Dr. Sarah McCullough, will be teaching the graduate course "Asking Different Questions in Climate Sciences" in Winter 2024. This 2 unit STS course will meet asynchronously and on Mondays at 2 p.m.

This course provides researchers with the tools to weave considerations of justice and equity into their research agenda and practices.

Open to grad students, faculty, and postdocs. 

Enroll at: bit.ly/FRI2024ADQCS

The faces highlighted by the environmental movement have not always represented the wide diversity of leaders within the field. This dearth in representation must be reckoned with if we are to address the crises of a changing climate. Environmental justice offers a path to change in how we shape the future and who is represented and working in environmental spaces.