Herstory
Herstory
The Womxn of Color Conference, originally an installment of the University of California Student Association (UCSA) conference, was picked up by a different UC campus every year. However, for the past six years it has been hosted at UCSB. We believe, as womxn of color that this space is necessary to continue to nurture and cultivate within a university that often does not center or cater to our many different lived experiences. We specifically honor the revolutionary existence of this space after the May 23rd Isla Vista tragedy, which continues to remind us the misogynistic, gender based violence that leaves many female and femme identified individuals feeling unsafe in Isla Vista. We honor those lost on that day. In addition, we honor all womxn who have paved the way so that we can unapologetically take up this space and organize for our collective liberation.
Mission Statement
At the 2017 Womxn of Color Conference at UCSB, we aim to recognize that as womxn of color we are often the targets of policing. Throughout much of our lives, we experience attacks on our minds, bodies, and spirits when agents of the global white supremacist capitalist heteropatriarchy attempt to control, abuse, and exploit us. Due to such policing, an image of womxn of color has been born without our consent, one that obscures the complexity of our identities with harmful stereotypes. As womxn of color, we are too often seen as inhuman statistics -- something to be analyzed and used, and nothing more. Violence is inflicted on our bodies as if we are mere objects rather than multi-faceted people. Despite all the institutional and structural factors that often limit our agency as womxn of color, there have been many who have contributed to dismantling these oppressive systems and who have paved the way for us to exist unapologetically around the world today. As unapologetic women of color, we work to reject the reliance on structures and institutions, because they have failed us time after time. Instead, we turn to grassroots efforts that break away from these cycles of oppression and misrepresentation so that we might create solutions for us and by us. We do not seek mere survival; rather, we seek to thrive. We demand the power to create changes at individual, communal, and structural levels. At the 2017 Womxn of Color Conference, we will acknowledge and validate these contributions through speakers, workshops, caucuses, and panelists focusing on issues of the queer and undocumented communities, mental health, first generation students, and many other intersections of marginalized identities. On February 11, 2017, we will come together as a community and as a united front to push and dismantle the boundaries of the various forms of oppression we each face on a daily basis in order to liberate ourselves in mind, body, and spirit.
“It is our duty to fight for our freedom, it is our duty to win. We must love each other and support each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.” -Assata Shakur
Womxn's Commission
The UCSB A.S. Womxn’s Commission is an educator and an advocate for womxn’s rights, with a commitment to representing and improving the status of womxn on campus and in the community. The A.S. Womxn’s Commission is working toward becoming a diverse group of members reflecting the different voices of the campus and community.
The A.S. Womxn’s Commission must constantly redefine itself if it is going to actively try to recognize how womxn’s issues function within the intersections of race, class, age, sexual orientation, religion, culture and ability. Recognizing this means that we acknowledge that one group can never represent the voices of all womxn across these intersections. Therefore, we must look beyond Womxn’s Commission and into the campus and community.