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I began this semester with really no idea what this class was going to mean to me. I thought okay we’ll talk about feminism and empowerment it’ll be great. I could have never prepared myself for the journey that I feel I’ve taken with myself and the rest of the class. The class has made me question everything I knew to be true and actually able to teach people some things about my learning and experience. I’ve never been an academic person, that sounds crazy because I’ve been in school my whole life, I just mean I’ve never been excited about school until I came to Bryn Mawr. And I’ve never been excited about anything in particular until I came to this class. I’ve never felt so connected to the world and present issues, most everything we read and discussed has an important place in our world today and that is so important to me.

I’ve really never been one to be silent in the classroom but I found that side of me in this class, which disappointed you and me both. My silence was never a lack of interest, let me assure you. I was selfish in this class in that I wanted to hear everyone else’s stories but didn’t have the guts to share my own out loud. I tried to make up for that during our teach-in which was an experience in and of itself. My group (Julie, Elizabeth and Sam) had a very hard time getting anywhere in our discussions. We threw around ideas for hours until we reached the agreement of the book. We had ideas for games, and videos to show but nothing was catching everyone and we wanted that spark of inspiration. We found it in the book where we were able to share our own experiences and encourage our classmates to do the same. The name of our book rang true in many different contexts for each of us “I think we need to talk” brought together our experiences of hearing generalizations or stereotypes about gender or sexuality or women’s colleges and not knowing what to say until after the fact. So the book was an outlet for discussions we wished we could have had. I felt very connected to my class on the day of the teach-in I thought it was such an important experience.

So many of the readings in this class hit home in many different ways. Eva’s Man was probably the most challenging text for me, I had to walk away from at some points, but that is a sign of good writing. Exile and Pride was so beautifully written, the word home had such a warm and beautiful place in it. The book of salt was so well-written I found myself crying at the poetic nature of it. I fully enjoyed each and every text, I don’t think I have ever felt that way about any other subject matter. (I changed my major from psych to English this semester.)

I would like to say my writing has improved this semester through this class and others, however this class especially had the outlet of putting myself into the papers. I enjoy that because I love knowing fully what I am writing about and being able to back it up with my own experiences.

I would hope that I can take this class and give back some of what I have learned. I want to be able to have responses ready for when someone makes a back- handed comment instead of writing it down in a book weeks later. I feel like there is so much I can teach people now and I’ve never felt that confident about a subject matter. Of course there is so much more for me to learn but this class was without a doubt the best way to start on my journey.